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Abraham & Straus (or A&S), now defunct, was a major New York City department store, based in Brooklyn, New York. Federated Department Stores eliminated the A&S brand shortly after its 1994 acquisition of R.H. Macy & Co. Most A&S stores took the Macy's name, although a few became part of Stern's, a Federated division that was based in Paramus, New Jersey, and offered lower-end goods than did Macy's or A&S.

Early History

The first Brooklyn store, opened in 1865, was 25 feet by 90 feet, and was at 285 Fulton Street, which Abraham Abraham, age 22, opened with Joseph Wechsler with $5,000 contributions each. After the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, Abraham studied a store nicknamed Wheeler's Folly at 422 Fulton Street and bought it. In 1893, Wechsler retired and Isidor Straus (of R.M.S. Titanic fame ) and Nathan Straus joined the company, with the name becoming Abraham & Straus. The Straus' had run the leased china department; the brothers later gained control of Macy's . The company that year had 2,000 employees, and that year A&S also made Abraham's sons in law, Simon F. Rothschild, son in law Edward Charles Blum and son Lawrence Abraham into partners. By 1900, the company had 4,650 employees. From the 1890s to the 1920s, A&S utilized a system of catalog store agencies across Long Island to serve customers.

Beginning in 1928, the company embarked on a $7.8 million expansion of the Fulton Street Store, which included excavating a new basement without disturbing customers above. The renovated store opened October 10, just days before the Wall Street Crash of 1929. In 1929, the company also joined Filene's, Lazarus and Bloomingdale's to form Federated Department Stores. To economize during the Depression, the company began scheduling employees according to hourly sales. In addition, all employees took a 10 percent pay cut. No employees were laid off.

In 1937, Walter N. Rothschild led the company, and would be president and chairman until 1955. Following Rothschild, Sidney L. Solomon became the company's first non-family president. At the timie, the company had 12,000 employees. The company grew after World War II. Its first new branch store opened in 1952 in Hempstead, following the 1950 purchase of Loeser's Garden City store. In the following decades, the company the company expanded throughout the New York metropolitan area.

Historic A&S Store

From the beginning, the company had high aspirations. In 1885, the company hired architect George L. Morse to work on the Fulton Street store. For their 1928 to 1930 renovations and additions, the company hired architects Starrett & Van Vleck to build an Art Deco addition that faces Fulton, Hoyt and Livingston Streets. In 2003, the Brooklyn Heights Association and the Municipal Art Society put the building on a list of 28 historic buildings in downtown Brooklyn that needed to be protected.

Timeline

• 1865 - Founded in Brooklyn as Wechsler & Abraham by Abraham Abraham and Joseph Wechsler
• 1893 - The Straus family, who acquired a general partnership with Macy's department stores in 1888, buys out Joseph Wechsler's interest in Wechsler & Abraham, changing the store's name to Abraham & Straus. While Abraham & Straus did not become a part of Macy's, the two stores did share an overseas office and maintained close ties.
• 1929 - Federated Department Stores, Inc. is formed as a holding company by several family-owned department stores, including Abraham & Straus and F&R Lazarus (along with its Cincinnati-based subsidiary, Shillito's) and Filene's of Boston. Corporate offices established in Columbus, OH, later moved to Cincinnati.
• 1992 - Federated Department Stores, Inc, merges with Allied Stores Corporation. A consolidation of the A&S and Jordan Marsh divisions results in the A&S/Jordan Marsh division, headquartered in Brooklyn, NY. Early in the new year, Macy's files for protection under Chapter 11.
• 1994 - Federated Department Stores acquires the now bankrupt R.H. Macy & Co. and combines Macy's, headquartered in New York City, with A&S/Jordan Marsh.
• 1995 - The name Abraham & Straus is dropped in favor of the more widely known name Macy's, and Macy's East is formed. Other A&S locations were converted to Stern's.

Former locations

Connecticut

• Trumbull - Trumbull Shopping Center (opened 1978 as Read's, became Jordan Marsh 1987, Abraham & Straus 1992, Macy's 1995, closed 2006)

• Companies established in 1865
• 1995 disestablishments
• Defunct department stores of the United States