Closing Isn’t Monkey Business for Wards

Adieu, Monkey Wards.

No one ever meant any slight by the nickname. But when I grew up a Midwest baby boomer, the women called our town’s main appliance store Montgomery Ward, the men always Monkey Wards, with an “s.”

Hard to imagine Monkey Wards no longer part of this country’s retail landscape.

Montgomery Ward, up to its deep freezes in bankruptcy problems, announced a week ago it’s closing its 250 stores across the country. That means the end, after liquidation sales, for its stores in Fullerton, Santa Ana and Huntington Beach. No one knows yet the final day.

Ed Houk, 27 years at its Huntington Center store, found out on the radio while driving to work that he had lost his job.

“I almost ran off the road,” he said.

When he got to the store, he recalls, “everybody was glum, their heads hanging to their knees. When you’ve worked here most of your life, the shock of it really hits you. We’re still dazed.”

The first of the three Montgomery Ward stores here opened in Santa Ana, at 17th and Bristol streets, in 1961. The Fullerton store on Harbor Boulevard came along four years later, and the Huntington Beach store opened soon after that. At the time, all three were considered major, welcome additions to their cities’ business districts.

A Costa Mesa store once operated too, but it closed in 1981, unable to take the pressure of the booming South Coast Plaza nearby. A Mission Viejo store also went under a few years ago.

I headed to the Huntington Beach store to try to get a sense of history about the place.

Not everybody was pleased at my arrival. When I asked to see the manager, a large man in the main office, whose name tag said Vince, told me the manager didn’t want to talk to me. When I asked if he’d mind if I heard that from the manager, Vince told me to get out or he’d call security.

Not wanting the dubious distinction of perhaps being the last person thrown out of a Montgomery Ward in Orange County, I turned to leave. But one of Vince’s co-workers followed me out.

“I’ll find the manager for you,” he said, by way of apology. “You have to understand, we’re all on edge around here. This was so unexpected.”

The manager turned out to be a nice fellow who wouldn’t talk with me, but he did direct me toward Ed Houk, who worked in the service department.

‘I’m a Retail Man’

Houk said he’d never given serious thought to changing jobs, because Montgomery Ward seemed to fit him.

“I’m a retail man,” he said. “I love coming to work. In all my years here, the customers have always treated me with respect; they’ve always been adult.”

I asked if much had changed at the store in 27 years.

“Oh sure,” he said. “And for the better. We’ve become a lot more sophisticated about how we do business.”

Unfortunately, just not enough to avoid bankruptcy.

At the Santa Ana store, a day manager suggested I talk with Bill Thompson in appliances.

I asked Thompson how long he’d been at the store and a fellow employee walking by said with a smile, “A hundred and 10 years. Isn’t that right, Bill?” You knew right away he was someone well liked.

Thompson came to work at the Santa Ana store in 1982. But he’s worked for Montgomery Ward for 35 years, employed first in the Fullerton store and then in Hawthorne. The Santa Ana store has become so much a part of him, Thompson said, that sometimes just driving by he’s pulled into the parking lot out of habit.

It’s not just losing a job that’s so painful, Thompson said, because he’s confident he will find another job.

“What’s so difficult to accept is, we’re like a family here. Some of the customers have become our friends, but also, we employees here have become friends with each other. We say we’ll keep in touch after the store closes, but we all know how that goes.”

At the Fullerton store, all workers were under orders not to talk with the media. When I asked to see the manager, I was told there wasn’t one. Actually, there was, and she found me pretty quickly. Then she politely but firmly dealt me that dubious distinction I hadn’t wanted at the Huntington Beach store, even following my footsteps to make sure I didn’t disobey her command to exit.

But before she tracked me down, several employees did lament the passing of the store. One said the store, now part of a heavily congested shopping district, had once stood proudly as the only major retail business in the area.

Another worker, Martha, who politely declined to give her last name, had worked for Montgomery Ward for 28 years.

“I can only say that I am proud of my company, and I’m very sad to see what has happened to it,” Martha said.

So am I. I asked Houk at Huntington Beach if people ever called it Monkey Wards anymore. He laughed.

“Oh, yes. We hear that all the time,” he said. “In fact, some of us once suggested that they ought to put a brass monkey on top the building.”

Who knows, maybe it would have helped.

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Jerry Hicks’ column appears Monday and Thursday. Readers may reach Hicks by calling (714) 966-7789 or e-mail to jerry.hicks@latimes.com.