Gump's is a

luxury Luxury may refer to: * Luxury goods, an economic good or service for which demand increases more than proportionally as income rises *Luxury tax, tax on products not considered essential, such as expensive cars **Luxury tax (sports), surcharge pu ...

American home furnishings and home décor retailer, founded in 1861 in

San Francisco, California San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

. The company was acquired by the Chachas family in June 2019 and announced that it would be opening a San Francisco location for the holiday season as well as an e-commerce business.

History

S & G Gump was founded in 1861 as a mirror and frame shop by Solomon Gump and his brother, Gustav. It later sold moldings, gilded

cornices In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

, and European artwork to those recently made wealthy from the California Gold Rush. The business flourished; the store sold products ranging from

jewelry Jewellery ( UK) or jewelry ( U.S.) consists of decorative items worn for personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, pendants, bracelets, and cufflinks. Jewellery may be attached to the body or the clothes. From a w ...

made from jade, precious gemstones, and

cultured freshwater pearls Cultured freshwater pearls are pearls that are farmed and created using freshwater mussels. These pearls are produced in Japan and the United States on a limited scale, but are now almost exclusively produced in China. The U.S. Federal Trade Comm ...

to products from luxury designers such as

Hermès Hermès International S.A., or simply Hermès ( , ), is a French luxury design house established in 1837. It specializes in leather goods, lifestyle accessories, home furnishings, perfumery, jewelry, watches and ready-to-wear. Its logo, since ...

and

Buccellati Buccellati Holding Italia is an Italian jewellery and watch company formed by the merger of two previous companies with existing brands ''Mario Buccellati'' and ''Gianmaria Buccellati'', which corresponded to the names and surname of two master ...

. Customers included

Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

, who bought

model ships Ship models or model ships are scale models of ships. They can range in size from 1/6000 scale wargaming miniatures to large vessels capable of holding people. Ship modeling is a craft as old as shipbuilding itself, stretching back to ancient t ...

and smoking jackets there, and Sarah Bernhardt, who bought a 17th-century bronze Chinese snake in preparation for playing Cleopatra.Bill Van Niekerken
"Ode to Gump’s: Memories flow from archive as SF’s oldest store says goodbye"
''San Francisco Chronicle'', December 19, 2018. It was eventually passed on to Solomon's son Alfred Livingston Gump. The fire following the 1906 earthquake destroyed the store and all of the merchandise, but thanks to Dodie Valencia, A.L. received $17,000 for one of his paintings, which allowed funding for the rebuilding and restocking of the store. A.L. was fueled by his passion for

Oriental art The history of Asian art includes a vast range of arts from various cultures, regions, and religions across the continent of Asia. The major regions of Asia include Central, East, South, Southeast, and West Asia. Central Asian art primarily co ...

and began selling his exotic collectibles from the Far East. He sent his buyers to Japan and China, bringing back exotic rugs, porcelains, silks, bronzes and jades to California's new millionaires. Richard Gump, one of A.L.’s three children, eventually became president of Gump's after his father's death in 1947. He continued the family legacy, running the company's overall operations until his retirement in 1975. Gump's was sold to publisher

Crowell Collier Crowell-Collier Publishing Company was an American publisher that owned the popular magazines '' Collier's'', ''Woman's Home Companion'' and ''The American Magazine''. Crowell's subsidiary, P.F. Collier and Son, published ''Collier's Encyclopedia ...

, which after further mergers became

Macmillan Publishers Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publ ...

. By June 1989, Gump's had again been sold,Isadore Barmash
"Business People; Gump's Specialty Stores Said to Fill Top Position"
''The New York Times'', August 1, 1989. this time to an investment group including Japan's Tobu Department Store and the

Charterhouse Group Charterhouse Group is private equity firm focused on leveraged buyout investments in the US. The firm, which is based in New York City, was founded in 1973 and is one of the oldest buyout firms in the US. Since inception, the firm has raised m ...

. In 1993 Gump's was in financial trouble when the catalog company later known as

Hanover Direct Horn & Hardart was a food services company in the United States noted for operating the first food service automats in Philadelphia, New York City, and Baltimore. Philadelphia's Joseph Horn (1861–1941) and German-born, New Orleans-raised Fra ...

bought it. They reduced the product lines, holding a liquidation sale on May 24, 1993, and revived the business, then in 2005 sold it to an investment group for $8.5 million.Sophia Kunthara
"With Gump's closed, beloved Buddha statue pulls vanishing act"
''San Francisco Chronicle'', December 25, 2018. The company began catalog sales in the 1950s and , more than 75% of its sales were through the catalog or online.Roland Li
"Gump’s, a 157-year-old SF retailer, files for bankruptcy protection"
''San Francisco Chronicle'', August 4, 2018. Gump's filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on August 3, 2018. On August 10, final liquidation sales began on the retailer's official website and at its remaining storefront in San Francisco; the store closed on December 23, 2018. In 2019 the newest Gumps owner the Chachas family reopened Gumps in its former long time location 250 Post Street Union Square. However the Chachas closed Gumps for an indeterminate period in 2020 due to the City of San Francisco's regulations on Covid. Gump's is now open Monday thru Saturday in 2022.

Buddha statue

A statue of

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in L ...

was displayed inside the San Francisco store. The original statue was bronze, acquired in 1928; in 1949 Gump's donated it to the San Francisco Parks Department in memory of Alfred Livingston Gump, and it is in the

Japanese Tea Garden are traditional gardens whose designs are accompanied by Japanese aesthetics and philosophical ideas, avoid artificial ornamentation, and highlight the natural landscape. Plants and worn, aged materials are generally used by Japanese garden desig ...

in Golden Gate Park.Bill Van Niekerken
"A history lesson from the Buddha at SF's Japanese Tea Garden"
''San Francisco Chronicle'', July 7, 2015, updated December 10, 2018. It was replaced at some point by an unusually large

Qing Dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-spea ...

gilded wood Buddha. This was carved in the

Chengde Mountain Resort Chengde Mountain Resort in Chengde (; Manchu: ''Halhūn be jailara gurung''), is a large complex of imperial palaces and gardens situated in the Shuangqiao District of Chengde in northeastern Hebei province, northern China, about 225 km northea ...

, the summer capital of the Qing Emperors in the early 19th century, and was the largest of its kind outside a museum. It was bought by one of the 2005 purchasers, New York investment banker John Chachas, who loaned it to the store until the liquidation.

Notes

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References

External links

*{{official website, http://www.gumps.com 1861 establishments in California Buildings and structures destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake Companies based in San Francisco Furniture retailers of the United States Retail companies based in California Union Square, San Francisco