Fashion Shows at Rosenbaum’s

by Erin Doane, Curator

For 125 years, Rosenbaum’s was the place in Elmira to get the latest specialty fashions for women and children. From the early 20^th century until it closed in 1989, the business put the newest styles on display for the shopping public in seasonal fashion shows at the store and other locations throughout the community.

Rosenbaum’s fashion show participants, Star-Gazette, October 3, 1933

Rosenbaum’s opened on East Water Street in 1864, just one day before Elmira was chartered as a city. The store began as a wholesale-retail business specializing in custom-made ladies’ hats and millinery trim. Over the years, it expanded to include women’s and children’s clothing and accessories. By 1930, Rosenbaum’s was so popular that it moved to a larger store at 112 West Water Street. It continued expanding throughout the 20^th century until it had three locations – in downtown Elmira, at the Arnot Mall, and at the Oakdale Mall in Binghamton – and had more than 120 employees on its payroll. The business finally closed for good in 1989.

As early as the 1920s, Rosenbaum’s was highlighting its fashions in shows throughout the city. In 1923, the store was a hit at the American Legion Style and Fashion Show at the Armory. The Star-Gazette reported that “a gray afternoon gown of a combination Russianarian and Canton Crepe, shown by Rosenbaum’s and worn by Miss Alma Myers, caused much comment Friday night. The cape of the gown was of poiret twill, lined in turquoise blue canton crepe. Miss Myers wore a broad brimmed, light blue hat with this gown, flower trimmed and underlined with the color of roses.”

Inside Rosenbaum’s on West Water Street, mid-20^th century

After Rosenbaum’s moved in 1930, the company started hosting fashion shows inside the store. Carolyn Modes designs were widely popular at that time throughout the country. By 1938, major Hollywood costume designers including Orry Kelly, Walter Plunket, Edith Head, Howard Greer, and Travis Banton were creating fashions for Carolyn. Rosenbaum’s would bring in members of the Carolyn design staff to conduct fashion shows. Typically, the show was run three times over the course of one day with “living models” displaying the latest clothing of the season. Some of the shows featured outfits that hadn’t even been released to the public yet. One such show on September 28, 1933 brought more than 1,200 people into the store.

Another Carolyn Modes fashion show at Rosenbaum’s in 1934 featured both living models and a famous stylist broadcasting new style notes over the Columbia Broadcasting System in a nation-wide hookup and by special arrangement through the local radio station WESG. http://chemungcountyhistoricalsociety.blogspot.com/2016/12/wesg-broadcasting-live-from-mark-twain.html Years later, in 1955, Rosenbaum’s took advantage of another technology to reach a wider audience for their premiere fashions. “Fashion in the News” was a 20-minute long, full color, 16mm sound film showing a complete wardrobe of new fall clothes by Carolyn. The fashions were worn by “New York’s most famous television and fashion models” and the film was narrated by Vyvyan Donner of Movietone News. Rosenbaum’s loaned the film to women’s clubs, church groups, and other organizations for free.

Teresa Carozza modeling at Rosenbaum’s fashion show, mid-1950s

In 1937, Rosenbaum’s underwent a major expansion and it added the Young Folks Shop to its departments which had a complete line of children’s wear from infant to teenage. This marked a shift to more focus on younger customers. From the late 1940s through the 1960s, the Mademoiselle fashion shows held at the store focused on styles for young women going off to college or starting careers. In 1966, Rosenbaum’s and Eldridge Park sponsored a Miss Southern Tier Queen contest. The winner, 18-year-old Charlotte E. Riedel of Ithaca, was announced during the store’s “Fashion Fit for a Queen” fashion show at the park on August 21. Charlotte received $100 in cash and a $100 gift certificate from Rosenbaum’s.

Rosenbaum’s advertisement, Star-Gazette, August 15, 1955

In 1966, Rosenbaum’s started a Charm and Modeling School for teens and pre-teens. For just $1 a week, girls could take part in a 10-week course taught by Miss Marie Bowman, former Niagara Frontier Milk Princess. Her classes guided the students in the areas of figure and posture correction, wardrobe planning, hairstyling and haircare, good grooming, basic makeup, voice cultivation, self-confidence, charm, poise, and personality development. Those who completed the course of study had the opportunity to model in one of Rosenbaum’s fashion shows. Some of the Charm and Modeling School graduates were actually among the 150 young people who modeled Rosenbaum’s clothing in a fashion show sponsored by Parents Without Partners that November.

Rosenbaum’s Charm and Modeling School students at Parents Without Partners fashion show, left to right: Nancy Henrich, Elizabeth Dixon, and Marie Zwanka, Star-Gazette, December 4, 1966

Rosenbaum’s continued adverting the newest styles in fashion shows at its stores and at offsite locations as fundraising events for groups like the Elmira Newcomers Club, the YWCA, the Zonta Club, and the Rotary Anns for nearly fifty years. The company showed off its latest seasonal looks one last time on November 30, 1988 at the Christmas Gala Fashion Show at St. Patrick’s Church in Elmira. Rosenbaum’s closed its downtown store just two months later. The store at the Arnot Mall lasted ten more months before closing as well.

 

“Clothes of Charm” - The Gorton Coy

by Erin Doane, Curator

The Gorton Coy, northeast corner of Main and Water Streets, 1949

For 56 years, the Gorton Coy was Elmira’s leading specialty shop. Women of discerning taste shopped there for all of their fashion needs. On July 3, 1916, Warren A. Gorton of Batavia purchased E. N. Crandall’s store, a small shop at 127 West Water Street in Elmira. Within days of the purchase, Gorton announced he would be selling off all of Crandall’s stock in order to make way for the new Gorton Company fashions. Gorton’s partner and co-owner of the store, Morris A. Black, was president of the Lindner Company of Cleveland and the manufacturer of “Wooltex” clothing. Their store in Elmira became the area’s exclusive seller of the Wooltex line. In 1917, they moved the store to 107 East Water Street.

Elmira Star-Gazette, July 10, 1916

George H. Danzig became manager of the store in 1919 and worked to transform it into a fashion center for the city. He had a second floor added to the single-story building and brought in a shoe department and a millinery department, the Charm Hat Shop. He built the store’s reputation among fashionable, discriminating women in the 1920s by stocking exclusive brands.  He was also the one who decided that the company’s name would be abbreviated to the Gorton Co’y, as was common in England. A sign painter, not understanding the abbreviation, produced a sign for the store that simply read “Gorton Coy” and the name stuck. In 1923, Danzig purchased 51 percent of stock in the company and took effective control of the business. Six years later, when his health began to fail, he sold his share of the store to Morris Black.

Elmira Star-Gazette, September 19, 1928

In the late 1920s, plans started being made to move the Gorton Coy to a new, larger building. A desirable location at the corner of Main and Water Streets was selected and a lease was secured. Then, the work began on building the store’s new home. On June 13, 1930, as excavation at the site was just nearing completion, tragedy struck. A wooden walkway that had been constructed along the west side of the work area collapsed under more than twenty pedestrians. Eleven-year-old Maria Smolka died in the accident and Effie W. Corey died the next day from her injuries after spending 45 minutes pinned in the wreckage. Nineteen others were sent to the hospital. Twenty lawsuits were subsequently filed against the Lowman Construction Company, which was in charge of the building project.

Building site after the walkway’s collapse, June 1930

The project continued, however, and on March 12, 1931 at 9:30am the new Gorton Coy store opened for business. The building was one of the last projects designed by Pierce and Bickford and is one of the only known examples of Art Deco architecture associated with the firm. The building’s three floors were filled with fashion, from coats and dresses to sportswear and undergarments. There was a beauty salon conducted by M. Henri of Paris on the third floor and a modern tearoom with two private dining rooms. The general offices were also on the third floor and the building was plumbed with a pneumatic tube system for transporting paperwork.

Pneumatic tube carrier used at the Gorton Coy

In 1938, Richard G. Raitt moved to Elmira to work as manager of the Gorton Coy. In 1941, he purchased the company outright and became the sole owner. In the mid-1940s, a department with electrical appliances for the home was added, the beauty salon was renovated and enlarged, and five toddler, child, and teen departments were combined to form Gorton’s Youth Center. Two new stores were also opened in Penn Yan and Geneva.

Electric City shop at Gorton Coy, 1946

Younger Set Shop at Gorton Coy, 1950

In 1967, Lane Bryant Inc. purchased Gorton Coy. Two years later, $250,000 was spent on a modernization program to make improvements to the entire store. Two new departments catering to tall women and larger women were added and one of the two manual elevators was replaced by a self-service elevator.

Buttons from one of the Gorton Coy’s manual elevators

Gorton Coy hatboxes, c. 1940s-1960s

The flood of June 1972 did considerable damage to the basement and first floor of the Gorton Coy. As a result, the store closed and its forty employees were laid off. In September of that year, Lane Bryant announced that the store was closing for good. In October, Luckey-Platt & Co. purchased the company and continued operating the store with marginal success under the Gorton Coy name until 1975 when it finally closed its doors for the last time. In 1988, the words “Gorton Coy” were removed from the building and in April 1991, the building was renamed the Komer Center.

Elmira Star-Gazette, November 6, 1972