Collecting memories from Marston’s Department Store.

Remembering Marston's Department Store. Please help the Save Our Heritage Organisation gather artifacts and memories to preserve a part of San Diego history.
Please help the Save Our Heritage Organisation gather artifacts and memories to preserve a part of San Diego history. (Click this photo to enlarge the flyer for easy reading.)

I recently tood a photo of a flyer that I spotted in the Senior Lounge in Balboa Park. Please click the above image and read it.

Save Our Heritage Organisation (SOHO) is seeking memorabilia, ephemera, merchandise and memories from Marston’s Department Store, which for nearly a century was the most elegant place to shop in San Diego. The department store was founded by George Marston, who is often referred to as San Diego’s First Citizen. As a civic leader and philanthropist, he was instrumental in creating Balboa Park, Presidio Park and the San Diego Historical Society.

Marston began as a clerk at the Horton House Hotel and eventually built the Marston Company, which ran a department store in San Diego. When earlier locations became outgrown, the large, elegant Marston’s Department Store on C Street, between 5th and 6th Street, built in the Renaissance Revival architectural style, opened in 1912 and became a popular downtown shopping destination. In 1961 it was sold by his family to The Broadway, which has since closed.

Artifacts related to Marston’s Department Store will be used by SOHO in a permanent exhibit inside their Marston House Museum in Balboa Park. Items that you contribute can be sent or delivered to the SOHO offices in Old Town. Recorded memories are also sought. The 2018 exhibit celebrates the 140th anniversary of the store’s founding!

Do you know anyone who shopped at Marston’s Department Store those many years ago? Perhaps they can help the Save Our Heritage Organisation with this very cool project!

George Marston, circa 1907-1908, San Diego businessman, civic leader and philanthropist. Public domain photo from Wikimedia Commons.
George Marston, circa 1907-1908, San Diego businessman, civic leader and philanthropist. Public domain photo from Wikimedia Commons.
Photo of The San Diego Union newspaper from Monday Morning, January 1, 1912. Depicted is the brand new Marston Department Store. The headline reads: Modern Mercantile Emporium One of Best Three on Coast.
Photo of San Diego Union newspaper from Monday morning, January 1, 1912. Depicted is a brand new Marston Department Store. The headline reads: Modern Mercantile Emporium One of Best Three on Coast.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

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Richard Schulte

Downtown San Diego has been my home for many years. My online activities reflect my love for writing, blogging, walking and photography.

13 thoughts on “Collecting memories from Marston’s Department Store.”

      2. I’m with a friend and he was hair dresser for women in Marstons department store in downtown San Diego at the age 18 years old in 1950 He was born in 1937 his name Edward Roberts whom still live in Kensington San Diego he says he was payed $ 3.00 for a shampoo and set and received tips high as $1.00. He’s a wonderful man with a good memory. Sincerely John Zevely

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    2. My grandfather, Ross Thiele, Interior Designer, worked for George Marston from 1920 to 1930 and designed all of the Marston’s store windows along 5th Avenue and catered to the wealthy clientele fitting the interiors of there homes during this roaring 20’s of San Diego’s growth by architects Requa, Gill, and Lillian Rice. In 1928 George Marston sent my grandfather to Spain to purchase furnishing for the Serra Museum that Marston had just completed with William Templeton Johnson. I just found a 1929 San Diego Magazine Article that Ross Thiele authored about that purchasing trip to find “Treasures from Spain ” The furnishings still exist somewhere in the History Center basement.

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      1. Hopefully those furnishing make their way out of the basement some day and we can all view them! (I see the painting of the old Gymnasium is coming along. I just walked through Balboa Park!)

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  3. I remember shopping there as a young woman. They had great clothes – $20.00 could buy a nice dress – this was about 1969. My sister worked on the first floor for awhile during the early 60s and I remember entering the store on C Street and seeing all the display cases. It was a really beautiful store. The store was moved to the Fashion Valley after Mission Valley became the hub of shopping in San Diego. It was eventually sold to The Broadway.

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  4. My mother took my sister and I there to buy our back to school clothes. It was a big deal as we lived in National City, it was going to the big city. My best memory is getting the warm cashews. That was a real treat.

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