Boston's Enchanted Village of St. Nicholas
The Enchanted Village at Jordan Marsh
... girls and boys,
... and even making toys.
There are carolers who look so fine
And a big revolving tree,
Everybody is invited,
No admission charge you see,
Jordan's gift to all New England
And you and you and me.
(radio commercial)
(we forgot some of the words)
In 1949, Jordan Marsh Co., a large Boston department store, broke ground for a new 7 story building fronting Summer St. and Chauncy St. and located behind their main store building at 450 Washington St. It was opened in stages starting in 1951. It was originally referred to as "the new store" but later, "Main Store" referred to all of the buildings in the Washington-Summer-Chauncy-Avon block.
On the seventh floor a large level floored auditorium was built and used for fashion shows. It was called the Fashion Center. This writer has not attended any of the fashion shows but the auditorium was well suited for holding a raised runway running from the stage through the center of the seating area.
(Pictured above: A row of dioramas)
Jordan Marsh presented its Enchanted Village of St. Nicholas beginning ca. 1960. For most of the years the Enchanted Village was set up in the Fashion Center.
A continuous row of nearly life sized dioramas with many animated figures including animals was set up around the perimeter of the auditorium. A perimeter viewing walkway was just inside. The entrance and exit were at one corner, at stage left (right front). The dioramas depicted home life and work life (including stores, post office, blacksmith, etc.) in the U.S. in the early 20'th century.
(Above: A typical subject for a Norman Rockwell painting.)
Some accounts say that some of the dioramas were built in the 1940's. If this were the case, the dioramas must have been displayed in the store's large windows facing Washington Street and Summer Street. Other dioramas and scenes of a similar character, which may or may not have been exchanged periodically with the Enchanted Village, were displayed in these windows.
The center of the auditorium was open with a large Christmas tree dead center and various smaller decorations around it. I don't recall electric model trains running around the tree although there was a large display of electric trains in the toy department on a different floor.
As you got off the escalator on the 7'th floor, the entrance to the Enchanted Village was ahead on the left. For those who rode the elevators, they would take a left into a corridor and, coming out into the open area, they would find the entrance on the right. Once inside, visitors would immediately take a left to go around the room clockwise. On some weekends the Enchanted Village drew such great crowds that zig zag queuing areas had to be roped off outside the Fashion Center auditorium. This writer does not recall but additional queuing areas could have been placed inside the auditorium near the entrance. Staff had to direct traffic since staff and other customers passed through the area outside the Fashion Center to get to the elevators and escalators and some offices, and visitors leaving the Enchanted Village had to pass through to get to other floors including the toy department.
At least as far as this writer can remember, there was no admission charge.
The holiday season layout in the open space with the escalator landing differed from year to year. At least for one year, Santa Claus had his meet and greet photo booth there. At least for one year, stocking stuffer gifts, in large quantities with a very limited selection, were sold there as Enchanted Village visitors exited.
(Above: Young visitors enjoy a middle class parlor scene.)
In the late 1960's this writer did notice a decrease in holiday season crowds in downtown Boston. By this time Jordan Marsh had at least ten "branch" stores in other locations about greater Boston, most in shopping malls. "Branch" stores is what Jordan March referred to them as. They were much smaller than the downtown Boston store and did not display all of the merchandise sold in the downtown store.
Around 1972, the Fashion Center was converted into office space. The ceiling was high enough that a "temporary" floor deck could be built dividing the space into two "stories" for the offices. This appears to have coincided with the end of a major lease of office space elsewhere in the city. As a result, the Enchanted Village was discontinued.
Reportedly, parts of the Enchanted Village were used to decorate the various branch stores, either as displays in the selling areas, or in show windows.
Around 1990 Jordan Marsh re-opened the Enchanted Village on one of the middle floors (I think the fourth floor) of the Main Building. There was some makeover, particularly since the figures and sets had deteriorated over the years. The overall Village was not as large as the original Village. Several dozen light brown teddy bears were added, one or a few in each scene. They were named "Eben and friends" after Eben Jordan, one of the store's founders. Visitors were invited to find and keep count of all of the bears. I forget how many there were.
(Pictured above: Store front with some of Eben's bear friends)
The Enchanted Village was closed again around 1996 when the parent company (Allied Stores) reorganized again and all of the Jordan Marsh stores were renamed Macy's. The Boston store completed its downsizing to occupy just the basement, first floor, and second floor of the Washington-Summer-Chauncy block (main building). The Enchanted Village was taken over by the City of Boston and reopened sporadically up until 2006 in different locations including in a large tent on City Hall Plaza and in the Hynes Convention Center about two miles away. Unfortunately the displays in storage were subject to theft and pilferage, damage notably from moving, and overall deterioration.
In 2009 Jordan's Furniture acquired the Enchanted Village at an auction. It was said that about a quarter of the original displays survived intact to that point in time. Other well known entities bidding included Canobie Lake (amusement) Park in Salem NH and Patriot's Place (a shopping mall next to the New England Patriots' stadium).
During the heyday of the Enchanted Village in Boston, Jordan's Furniture was a small but quite well known entity given it's advertising slogan "Not to be confused with Jordan Marsh." Originally with a single store in the center of Waltham, Jordan's Furniture expanded to a chain of stores around the Boston area but the Waltham store was closed down. The Enchanted Village makes its home at the Avon store which also has a 3D movie theater with vibrating seats, a laser show, and an artificial ice skating rink. It is set up permanently and is open approximately from Thanksgiving until New Years.
The Enchanted Village sets and figures have gone through a complete restoration and some who have seen it back in the 1960's will insist that the sets look very different. Notably, the original Christmas lights with one inch solid color "C7" lamps had been replaced by "miniature" pinpoint lights that were first introduced in the 1960's. Today, much of the decorative lighting has been upgraded to light emitting diode technology with an appearance similar to "miniature" lights although all white lights were selected over multicolored lights. Also, various figures were refinished to reflect a more mixed racial and ethnic population. The moving parts have kept their original electromechanical technology. Electric motors by themselves provided rotary motion and, together with crankshafts, provided back and forth or up and down movements.
This writer has visited museums with collections of large articles including antiques and automobiles. Some museum sized collections (in terms of number of items) were in private homes, sized to contain the collections. We are unsure whether the Enchanted Village is owned by Jordan's Furniture or is the personal property of Eliot Tatelman (CEO of Jordan's) who attended the auction and effected the purchase of the Enchanted Village.
The Bridge and the Subway
An interesting part of the Jordan Marsh buildings in Boston was the multi-level bridge across Avon St. connecting the "Main" buildings with the "Annex" buildings. Ultimately it had six levels and was wide enough that it could be used for additional merchandising space. The main building floors did not match up with the annex building floors and for most levels there were some stairs at both landings. A top to bottom stairwell at the southwest corner (middle of Avon St.) of the 1950's main buildling (new store) served as the landings for the bridge on that side. Fifth floor main connected to both fifth floor and sixth floor of the annex, with two sets of stairs at the main building side of the bridge. The level below connected with the main building complex in two places, with a few steps up to the stairwell (fourth floor new store) and a few steps down to the fourth floor of the 1880's building complex. Seventh floor main connected with eighth floor annex via the uppermost level of the bridge. If this writer recalls correctly, only this uppermost level had no stairsteps all the way from the main building to the annex.
In the early part of the 20'th century, "subway" also referred to an underground walkway, and that terminology is still used outside the U.S. Some accounts of the history of Jordan Marsh refer to "a marble lined subway" connecting the main building with the annex.
This writer does not recall the exact location of the "marble lined subway" At that time, only the first part of the annex complex existed at the Chauncy St. end of the Avon-Bedford block and it did not line up with the Main buildings at the Washington St. end of the Summer-Avon block . In later years (ca 1950 if not earlier) there was a two level tunnel under Avon St. for movement of merchandise and for other support activities, approximately under the bridge or slightly to the east.
There were three merchandising divisions:
* Store for Fashion, code letter M for Main, occupying the above ground floors of the Summer-Avon block,
* Store for Homes, code A for Annex and occupying the above ground floors of the Avon-Bedford block,
* Great Basement Store, code B for Basement, occupying the first floor of the Bristol building and the below ground merchandising space in all three blocks.
Last updated June 2018
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All parts (c) copyright 2014-2018, Allan W. Jayne, Jr. unless otherwise noted or other origin stated.
Photographs were taken by this writer and are of the 2009 reincarnation of the Enchanted Village, at Jordan's Furniture.
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