Jacoby Bros.

Jacoby Bros. (late 1930s, Jacoby's) was one of Los Angeles' largest dry goods retailers in the 1880s and 1890s, developing over the decades into a department store, which closed in the late 1930s.[1]

Jacoby Bros. Dry Goods store in Temple Block, Los Angeles, around 1896
The Jacobys' first store: "Harris & Jacoby, successors to H. W. Hellman", and forerunners to both Harris & Frank and Jacoby Bros., in the Old Downey Block around 1870. M. Kremer is also nearby, forerunner of the City of Paris department store

In 1870,[2] Isaac, Nathan, Charles, Abraham, and Lessor Jacoby had joined with him and Leopold Harris in buying out Herman W. Hellman's store, to form Harris & Jacoby.[1] The Jacoby brothers, Leopold Harris and Harris Newmark all came from the same town of Löbau, West Prussia (later part of the German Empire, now Lubawa, Poland). The Jacobys sold clothing, home furnishings, boots, shoes, hats, et al., both wholesale and retail.[1]

In February, 1878, Loewenstein sold his business at in the Downey Block, 63 N. Main St. (post-1890 numbering: 163 N. Main), on the west side of Main, just north of Temple, opposite Commercial Street, to Lessor Jacoby and "Jacoby's Clothing House" started business there later that year.[3]

From 1879, the store (first promoting itself as "L. Jacoby", then "Jacoby Bros." was located in County Bank Building of the Temple Block, 121-127 N. Main St. (post-1890 numbering: 221–227 N. Main St.)., between Temple and First streets. Later the address was given as 128–138 N. Spring St., which was the western entrance to the same building.

In 1900, it moved, as many upscale retailers did, west to Broadway and south, to 331-333-335 S. Broadway, between Third and Fourth streets. The new store opened on March 3, 1900 and had five stories, 60,000 square feet (5,600 m2) of selling space, a sixty-foot frontage and two elevators. The second floor featured men's clothing, the third floor, ladies', and the fourth floor attended the wholesale business. The store boasted that a 25-by-40-foot center court allowed light to permeate the store, and that its 13,125 sq ft (1,219.4 m2) basement shoe department was the largest in the Western United States and three times as large as any other shoe store in the city. The store was exclusive retailer for clothing by Hackett, Carhart & Co.[4][5]

In 1935 the Jacoby Bros. liquidated their Broadway premises, unable to renew their lease, and sold their stock to the May Company.[6] A Los Angeles-based Boston Store (not the Inglewood-based Boston Store, which would become a large chain) occupied the premises in the late 1930s.[7]

The concern reopened in early 1936 (dropping the "Bros." and advertising as Jacoby's) at 605 S. Broadway, southwest corner of Broadway and 6th,[8] but went out of business in 1938,[9] and in 1940, retailer Zukor's leased the majority of the premises.[10] The Zukor's sign is still visible on the portion of the Jacoby Bros. building that it occupied.

Notes
1^ Several sources from the 1920s-1930s state that the Jacoby's opened their first store in Wilmington in 1875, and then in Los Angeles in 1877. However, photographic evidence in Wilson's book contradicts this, showing Harris & Jacoby in the Old Downey Block which was torn down in c. 1870. Also, advertisements for seeds sold at the Hellman store at No. 2 Downey Block, Los Angeles, cease in January 1870[11] while an ad for the Harris & Jacoby store at No. 2, Downey Block, started appearing in the same newspaper in December 1870.[12] It is currently difficult to establish the exact date in 1870 that the business changed hands from Hellman to Jacoby, as online archives for Los Angeles newspapers have a gap between the 1864 (for the Star) and 1873 (when the Herald archives commence). Jacoby Bros. themselves, in advertising in 1900, referred to a start date for their business of 1867.[13]

References
  1. "The Jacoby Brothers: Pioneer Jewish Merchants of Los Angeles". Jewish Museum of the American West. Retrieved 16 May 2019.
  2. Wilson, Karen. Jews in the Los Angeles Mosaic. p. 6.
  3. "Legal notice". Los Angeles Express. February 15, 1878. p. 2.
  4. "Grand opening: Jacoby Brothers' outfitting store on Broadway". Los Angeles Times. March 4, 1900. p. 35.
  5. "Los Angeles Herald 22 August 1899 — California Digital Newspaper Collection". cdnc.ucr.edu.
  6. "Advertisement for Jacoby Bros./May Co". Los Angeles Times. May 19, 1935.
  7. https://www.newspapers.com/clip/56348763/boston-store-los-angeles-1939-331-s/
  8. "Pioneers' Modern Home: Jacoby Bros.Will Open New Store Soon". Los Angeles Times. January 31, 1936. p. 11.
  9. "Advertisement for liquidation of Jacoby Bros". Los Angeles Times. September 30, 1938. p. 45.
  10. "Downtown Broadway Store Leased in $1,000,000 Deal: Business Prepares to Expend $150,000 in Converting Property to Its Uses". Los Angeles Times. February 11, 1940. p. 63.
  11. "Ad for Hellman's store, Los Angeles". Arizona Weekly Miner, Prescott, AZ. January 8, 1870. p. 3.
  12. "Ad for Harris & Jacoby". Weekly Arizona Minor (Prescott, AZ). December 17, 1870. p. 3.
  13. "Ad for Jacoby Bros". Los Angeles Times. January 7, 1900. p. 20.
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