Chicago at its Most Touching

 

The Classic Marshall Field’s Tree 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Megan McKinney

 

This Christmas feature is especially for our viewers who were raised in Chicago—or were brought to the city as children each year during the Christmas season—and taken to Marshall Field’s to experience the holidays as only that greatest of all American department stores could present it.

 

It began outside. Every store had Christmas windows, but none came close to the stories told by those at Marshall Field’s.

 

Your parents, grandparents, and even further back, may have loved those State Street windows. Here is one from1928.

 

This was a favorite in 1941

 

And this in 1943.

 

This could also be from the forties.

 

They’ve supplied this one in color—probably midcentury.

 

Another midcentury window

 

And this window gave bows to the Salvation Army activities during the holiday season.

 

credit: AP photo by Brian Kersey

The magic continued inside the store.

 

The grand finale: Christmas lunch in The Marshall Field’s Walnut Room.

 

Merry Christmas!

 

 

Author photo: Robert F. Carl