(photos by Lee Bey)
I just ran across a batch of photos I took in 2005 and 2006 of the decaying Dixie Square Mall in Harvey, IL. The mall opened in 1966--and closed about 10 years later---is best known for getting trashed by the Jake & Elwood Blues in the 1980 movie "The Blues Brothers." This trailer shows the scene at the 1:10 mark. But the whole thing is worth watching.
Dixie Square was the first shopping mall I ever saw. I remember my Aunt Essie, a beautiful woman inside and out, took me and my cousin Derrick there to buy Derrick some shoes in about 1973. A very abdriged history: It was one of the nation's largest malls when it opened in 1966, with Montgomery Wards, Woolworth and a host of other stores and restaurants. Harvey suffered economic decline in the 1970s and 1980s--like many of Chicago's then-segregating south suburbs--and the malls fortunes suffered. It closed in 1979. For a quarter century, Harvey dreamed of resurrecting the mall. Housing has been built on a portion of the site since I took these images.
Comments
Though it's hard to watch the econimic decline, lately it's hard to shed a tear at the loss of a shopping mall.
Out here where I live someone had a sign on the wall that said: "This mall would make a nice place for a cornfield".
Posted by: Marty | February 8, 2008 11:10 AM
If I ever understood correctly whenever the city of Harvey talked about redeveloping this site they never seemed to get their act together.
Posted by: Levois | February 8, 2008 09:35 PM
I don't know. Nothing natural about a cornfield. It's simply mono-culture agriculture.
Posted by: curtsy | February 10, 2008 08:02 PM
I agree with Curtsy. a prairie would be even better.
Posted by: marty | February 10, 2008 09:16 PM