Liberty House (department store)

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Liberty House
FormerlyHackfeld's Dry Goods (1849-1852)
B. F. Ehlers (1852-1898)
H. Hackfeld & Co. (1898-1918)
Industry
Parent
Amfac (1918-1988)
JMB Realty (1988-2001)

Liberty House, headquartered in

Honolulu, Hawaii, was a department store and specialty store chain with locations throughout the Hawaiian Islands and on Guam
, as well as several locations on the United States mainland.

History

Tracing its antecedents to Hackfeld's Dry Goods formed by German trader Heinrich Hackfeld in 1849, in 1852 the retail location was renamed for Hackfeld's nephew, B. F. Ehlers. Hackfeld continued to maintain an interest in the store, while he concentrated on his trading, shipping and real-estate interests. In 1881, Paul Isenberg (1837–1903) became half partner in the business. In 1898 the Hackfeld and Isenberg family interests in Hawaii were officially reorganized as H. Hackfeld & Co.[1]

In 1918 at the height of

Amfac) became one of Hawaii's Big Five landowners.[2]

In 1969 Liberty House expanded onto the

mainland with Amfac's purchase of the Rhodes Western department stores, a long-time consolidator of department stores. The former Rhodes' stores were renamed Liberty House between 1971 and 1974. The mainland operation eventually included stores in Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, Texas, New Mexico and Washington. This expansion culminated with the construction of a new San Francisco
flagship store in 1974 at Stockton and O'Farrell streets. Poor results and a scattered footprint caused the rethinking of future investment, and in 1978 Liberty House began winding down the mainland stores, with the remaining ten being sold in 1984.

Liberty House closed nine of its ten California stores in 1984 due to poor sales. The only one not closed at the time was

San Mateo Fashion Island in San Mateo, California, which stayed open until 1986.[3]

In 1988 Amfac was acquired in a leveraged-buyout by

Macy's West. Macy's currently maintains a common law trademark by using the LibertyHouse.com domain which forwards to the Macy's website. The San Francisco Liberty House would become the Men's Store of Macy's Union Square until 2017, when Macy's would close it and it would be renovated for mixed-use.[4]

References

  1. Honolulu Star Bulletin
    .
  2. hdl:10524/462
    .
  3. ^ "June closing set for Oakland Liberty House store". Oakland Tribune. April 20, 1984. pp. C1. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
  4. ^ Itow, Laurie (25 September 1984). "Macy's giant men's store". The San Francisco Examiner. p. 62. Retrieved 2 December 2023.

External links

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