The Paris of Montana

The Paris of Montana – a Department Store

It all started with a hat box we found in an antique shop in Montana. The box proudly displayed the slogan « The Paris of Montana » and of course we were intrigued. After quite a few years of researching every now and again we learned of a Dry goods store called Paris – in Montana.

‘Dry goods store’ is the collective noun for textiles and manufactured articles and can also include some non perishable grocery items such as tobacco, sugar, flour, and coffee. (A General Store which is a more common word, though similar, had all sorts of groceries, hardware and dry goods.) Dry goods were big business. Over one million people worked in the dry goods trades in the United States in the late 1800s ; there were hundreds and thousands of dry goods stores in American towns and villages.

One such store was called The Paris Dry Goods store. It was in Great Falls Montana and originally established in 1894 as a partnership between two Romanian pioneers Fred A. Fligman and Samuel S. Singer. Singer was also the head of the Paris Realty Company and he married Fligman’s sister Dora.  Fligman’s wife Rhea was the daughter of Butte Montana’s first Mayor (who also ran a clothing company) and a French woman named Adele Levy Jacobs. Perhaps Adele influenced the selection of the name Paris. In any case it had cachet !

In the 20th century with the rise of department stores and catalog sales, the decline of dry goods stores began, and the term has largely fallen out of use. Some dry goods stores became department stores. The Paris Dry Goods store took this track  and became simply « The Paris ». The Paris prided itself on offering the finest imported fashions and brands to Montana. So naturally they used the name “The Paris of Montana,” to set the standard for fashion in Central Montana. And this is where our vintage box with the slogan  The Paris of Montana came from.

The Paris suffered some setbacks along the way. On January 20, 1919, The Paris and two businesses were destroyed by the worst fire the city had ever seen. The Great Falls Fire fighters were met by thick, impenetrable smoke which barred them from accessing the center of the store with fire hoses. An hour after the discovery of the fire, “an explosion within the Davis store [next door] followed by a crash of glass and outpouring of smoke proved the loss of the building.”

“…thousands of dollars of fabrics were piled about the counters and shelves and all proved a veritable tinder box for the flames.” –-Great Falls Tribune, January 21, 1919.

Add combustible drugs, acids, and other materials burning in the drug store and there was complete chaos. The buildings’ wooden structures with brick veneers were no match for the flames, and within two hours, the stores were consumed.

Undaunted, a few years later construction on a new Paris began in 1928. The new Paris building was a fully developed department store with multiple stories of shopping, a fountain, luncheonette, and a beauty shop. All this grandeur cost $750,000 (over 13 million in today’s dollars.)

In 1955 The Paris was purchased by a national company, which announced a remodel and built an additional floor. The modernized Paris was of a sleek mid-century modern style with little ornamentation. But the new store manager embraced the original vision for the store – to provide the finest brands to Montana at the best prices.

In 1974 the storefront of the Paris was launched into stardom in the movie premiere of Thunderbolt and Lightfoot. The film starred Clint Eastwood as Thunderbolt a notorious bank robber and « minister » and Jeff Bridges as Lightfoot a ne’er do well kid. The story throws them together in a chase taking them all over Montana. The shooting mostly took place in Great Falls in September 1973. About 300 spectators gathered in downtown to watch a stunt scene : a classic police chase in which a 1951 Mercury careens up a ramp designed to look like a flower display and crashes into The Paris’ storefront to be stopped by a hidden reinforced table inside. The film – a funny, tough crime comedy with an edge of drama – did respectable a box office business and The Paris was famous.

The Paris was purchased by a national chain in 1978 and became « The Bon » [Marché]. The Paris closed in 1998 but the building still stands in downtown Great Falls, sadly much emptier than it was in decades past.

By the way The Bon (another name with French cachet !) was a chain in the Pacific Northwest started in Seattle by Edward Nordhoff, who was a native of Germany, and who had lived in Paris as a young man. He worked for the Louvre Department Store in Paris, but he greatly admired the service, integrity, and merchandising strategy of its rival, Le Bon Marche Maison Boucicaut. His ambition was to open a store that would emulate the standards set by the Bon, but that’s whole ‘nother story.

Now read about the Hotel de Paris near Denver, Colorado