Rankin's was a department store at 117 West Fourth Street at Sycamore in downtown
Santa Ana, California
Santa Ana (Spanish language, Spanish for ) is a city in and the county seat of Orange County, California, United States. Located in the Greater Los Angeles region of Southern California, the city's population was 310,227 at the 2020 census. As ...
. The Rankin Building is listed on the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
on its own and also as a contributing property of the
Downtown Santa Ana Historic Districts
Downtown Santa Ana (DTSA), also called Downtown Orange County, is the city center of Santa Ana, the county seat of Orange County, California. It is the institutional center for the city of Santa Ana as well as Orange County, a retail and busine ...
.
The store had its origins as the Rankin Dry Goods company, founded in 1894. Mr. J. H. Rankin of
Bloomfield, Indiana
Bloomfield is a town within Richland Township and the county seat of Greene County, Indiana, United States. The population was 2,405 at the 2010 census.
Bloomfield is part of the Bloomington, Indiana metropolitan area.
History
The area whe ...
, together with T. D. Huff & Sons opened up the dry goods store on the site of Swanner's Grocery Store. The store was enlarged three times before moving into the , three-story space at Fourth and Sycamore in 1917.
Locations
In 1956, Rankin's announced plans to open a branch in
Orange County Plaza
Orange County Plaza, later Garden Grove Mall, Garden Promenade, now The Promenade at Garden Grove, was upon its expansion in 1959, with sixty stores, the largest shopping center in Orange County, California, and at the time billed itself as "Oran ...
at Chapman Avenue and Brookhurst Street in
Garden Grove, now site of The Promenade at Garden Grove. The branch was to measure .
In addition to its Santa Ana store, Rankin's had a location in Fullerton at
Orangefair Mall
Orangefair Marketplace is a community shopping center in Fullerton, California which when built was one of the earliest large shopping centers in Orange County, California. along with Anaheim Plaza and Orange County Plaza. It is located at the s ...
from 1958.
Advertisements promoted the Orangefair branch from May 3 through September, 1959.
Rankin Building (1917)
The 1917 building is a rectangular sand colored brick building featuring a grey pressed metal cornice, modified Chicago style upper level windows, and blue-grey ceramic brick on the first story. The building was rehabilitated in 1982 and the present storefront design dates from that rehabilitation program. The building is individually listed on the National Register (1983).
The architects were Elwing and Tedford of Santa Ana.
When opened on November 9, 1917, the building was referred to as the "Rutherford" building, structure or block. It was characterized as "metropolitan in nature" and "the most beautiful in the entire county".
Gallery
File:Rankins, Santa Ana, exterior, 1917 OCHS.jpg, Rankin's Department Store
File:Rankins, Santa Ana, interior, 1917, OCHS.jpg, Interior of Rankin's
References
{{History of Retail in Southern California
Defunct department stores based in Orange County, California