Remove ImagesRemembering when
Gately’s — The people’s store
July 22, 2008
It's been a while since Gately's department store closed up shop. It's hard to believe that the building that now houses the SouthtownStar was once the only department store in Tinley Park. It wasn't like the department stores that you see nowadays, either. It was an old-fashioned department store, like you see in old films. Stepping into Gately's was like stepping back into the 1950s.
Gately's Department Store came to Tinley Park from the Roseland area, from where a lot of the inhabitants of the area in the 1970s also hailed. It opened its doors in the mid-1970s and was the main anchor store of what was once the Brementown Mall. The remains of the Brementown Mall are now Menards and will be talked about in future columns as this is where I spent what turned out to be the best years of my life.
I was never into department stores when I was young and preferred the more trendy stores like Stuart's and Brooke's that were in the Brementown Mall or the very newly built Orland Square Mall. But the older folks loved Gately's. It took me a long time to realize why.
I can still remember how that store looked. They had an escalator in the center of the store. Each department had a counter and a person working behind the counter who would drop what they were doing and help you. In the upstairs they had kids' clothes and the downstairs had women's clothing as well as a section for gloves, scarves and hats.
It's hard to imagine now, buying a pair of gloves from a person behind a counter. I normally buy those dollar gloves at Walgreens that my kids have been losing for the past 15 years. I buy them in black so when they lose a glove, they can just replace it with another. What I now buy in bulk, in the mid 1970s, you purchased from a person working behind a counter.
I remember buying a pair of gloves in 1980 for my boss for Christmas in Gately's. The person behind the counter was an older woman who helped me choose the gloves and then wrapped them in tissue paper before putting them in a box. My boss was an older lady who only liked stuff from the very best stores and Gately's was on her list as an acceptable place to shop. They always said, "Thank you for shopping at Gately's" to close the sale. There was a notion back then that stores were glad to get your business and thanked you for shopping with them.
Mr. Gately was always on the premises watching how his employees were acting. If a customer had a problem, Mr. Gately would be there to try to solve the problem. You had top notch service every step of the way. The only problem was that it is easier to get an act of Congress passed than to return something to the store.
When Gately's closed up, we lost an era. The last of the old-time department stores to grace the area. You won't get that service any longer. Buy a pair of gloves at most stores today and they will toss it in a bag for you and give you the bum's rush out the door. The entire closing of a sale is a thing of the past. We sold stores like Gately's, which really was "the people's store" out for convenience, speed and the ability to save a dollar.