Scruggs, Vandervoort & Barney was a department store founded in

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis ( , sometimes referred to as St. Louis City, Saint Louis or STL) is an Independent city (United States), independent city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It lies near the confluence of the Mississippi River, Mississippi and the Miss ...

in 1850, by M.V.L. McClelland and Richard Scruggs as ''McClelland, Scruggs & Company.'' The company started out as a

Dry goods Dry goods is a historic term describing the type of product line a store carries, which differs by region. The term comes from the textile trade, and the shops appear to have spread with the mercantile trade across the British Empire (and Common ...

store, with the first store opened on North 4th street in downtown

St. Louis St. Louis ( , sometimes referred to as St. Louis City, Saint Louis or STL) is an independent city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It lies near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a populatio ...

, later expanding. In 1860, William L. Vandervoort joined the company. Then, in 1870, McClelland retired and Charles E. Barney replaced him in the company. In 1907, the company moved to

The Syndicate ''The Syndicate'' is a British television drama series. It was written by Kay Mellor and is broadcast on BBC One. It sees five members of a betting syndicate win the lottery. Each series follows a different syndicate. The first series is se ...

at Tenth and Olive streets. Ten years later, they acquired the ''Mermod Jaccard King Jewelry Company'', incorporating themselves into its downtown location. They were well known for holding several varieties of

fashion shows Fashion is a term used interchangeably to describe the creation of clothing, footwear, accessories, cosmetics, and jewellery of different cultural aesthetics and their mix and match into outfits that depict distinctive ways of dressing ( style ...

. In the 1950s, then known as "Vandervoort's," they opened a branch store in

Clayton, Missouri Clayton is a city in and the county seat of St. Louis County, Missouri, and borders the independent city of St. Louis. The population was 17,355 at the 2020 census. Organized in 1877, the city was named after Ralph Clayton, a citizen who donated ...

, and, later Crestwood Plaza in

Crestwood, Missouri Crestwood is a city in south St. Louis County, Missouri, St. Louis County, Missouri, United States, part of the Metropolitan Statistical Area known as Greater St. Louis. The population was 12,404 at the 2020 census. In 2011, Bloomberg Businesswe ...

. The company was picketed by the

NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American civil rights organization formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du&nbs ...

for having unfair hiring practices, like many companies at the time. Vandervoort's suffered financial pressures and shuttered operations in 1969. The Crestwood Plaza branch would be taken over by

Famous-Barr The Famous-Barr Co. (originally Famous and Barr Co.) was a division of Macy's, Inc. (formerly Federated Department Stores). Headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, in the Railway Exchange Building, it was the flagship store of The May Departmen ...

the same year.

In popular culture

* Vandervoort's is referenced in episode 6 of ''

Masters of Sex ''Masters of Sex'' is an American period drama television series that premiered on September 29, 2013, on Showtime. It was developed by Michelle Ashford and loosely based on Thomas Maier's biography '' Masters of Sex''. Set in the 1950s thro ...

'', which is set in the late 1950s.

References

{{reflist Defunct department stores based in Missouri Companies based in St. Louis 1850 establishments in Missouri 1969 disestablishments in Missouri Retail companies established in 1850 Retail companies disestablished in 1969