My mom worked at Sears for 25 years after 20 years at GE. Loved the catalog and visiting the store on a regular basis. It was around the corner from my high school.

I worked at Sears for 9 years putting myself through college.

We always looked forward to the big Wishbook. We'd circle what we wanted for Christmas. I know we never got the dolls we wanted but we weren't disappointed with the alternatives. Back then you were happy for what you got, even if it was as simple as a new box of crayons and a coloring book.

My mother ordered some of my school clothes from the Sears catalog when I was in elementary school, but what I remember best was the Christmas catalog. My 5th birthday present was a dollhouse from the catalog, but my very favorite was the farm set.

Oh yes - dept. store catalogs in general used to be much more plentiful and welcome. My youngest sister invented a game she called the catalog game. You had to choose one item from each page - that was it 😁

We had a big Sears anchoring our nearby mall, so we didn't have to order from the catalog - and going there was such an excursion. All dept. stores had a toy department back then, and a candy counter, and a garden center - ours even sold gas at their automotive center. I can still recall clearly shopping there, and also the slow downhill slide after the 90s. I was sad when they finally closed.

When I was in high school I bought a new bedspread and curtains from them. I may have also bought a carpet, but can't remember for sure about that now. I also bought a cheap, metal, entertainment center from either JCPenneys or Sears, can't remember which.

Most of my school clothes came from the Alden's catalog. Anyone remember them?

I miss Sears! It's a shame they didn't get with the program, they could be Amazon right now! I would dream of Christmas gifts while looking at the Sears catalog.

My younger brother and I used to pore over the Sears and JCPenney wish books every December. We didn’t really expect to get any of the items, but we spent many hours just fantasizing over the various toys. Our local outdoor mall was anchored by those two stores and one other local department store that was a little higher end.

A library of Sears, JCPenney, and Montgomery Ward catalogs. Muse Technical - Catalogs & Wishbooks

Also WishBookWeb.com

Marshall Field and FAO Schwartz. Dog-eared to the max. I really, really wanted the enormous stuffed Steiff giraffe. Spoiler: still waiting.

Yes, I remember putting checkmarks next to nearly every girl toy in the Sears catalog.

We had a built in swimming pool ordered from Sears. They were heavy duty vinyl liners but full size and depth. Ours was 30' by 20' and went from 3 to 8.5 feet deep. Sand was brought in as a base layer and large concrete blocks formed the walls on a built up ledge. Then the liner was set in and coping added. My dad did most of the work himself except for excavating the hole. Neighbors helped position the liner in place and the local firefighter neighbor filled it from the hydrant. Different times. Today the permit process would kill the project.

We had a large fishpond and a always had a turtle or two living in it too. One old red eared slider would scale the sides every single summer day and make a beeline for that pool. Then the turtle would go and lay partially tucked under the drain plate down at the deep end. Every evening I would dive in and go to the bottom to fetch the turtle and put it back in the pond. By noon the next day it would go back into the pool.

Sears had everything back in the 50s/60s. Need a transmission or engine block, order one from Sears. Craftsmen tools were nothing like the junk carrying the name today.

You could even get a mail order house from Sears! I remember the humorist Jean Shepherd telling a hilarious story about how someone in a small town ordered a house kit from Sears and it came delivered on a train.

This guys friends and neighbors gathered to unload it off the train and they began to pull the house parts off the train and got so excited and it was all so disorganized that, eventually, there was a whole unassembled house strung out all up and down the tracks!

I lived a number of my young years in Alaska, and the Sears catalog was the Amazon of it's day . It was about the only place to shop, really . This was back mid century.

It often times strikes me as ironic that we have once again turned to an order and wait for delivery shopping mode . It is just a bit faster than it used to be.

Is Sears still in operation , or Pennys? I actually spent a couple of years working comminssion sales at Sears at what was the local mall. That mall is gone and with it went the Sears, Pennys and Macys, all gone. There is nothing left locally, by me, but Walmart, Target and Kohls in a shoppin center. Even though I live in a suburb of a major metropolitain city most of our real stores have gone dark, expcept for those in the shopping center. There are miles and miles of exploding neighborhood, but no shoe stores and no furniture stores. You have to go south towards the city to find those kinds of things.

I dont like to shop for many things online. The result is that I dont buy much.

It used to be that SEars was the place where my family shopped and goint to town on Saturdays was always the first stop was a Sears catatlog store, not a real store. Of course there were still the old five and dime stores back then, but not in Alaska, not back then. Mostly it all came from Sears, followed by Montgomery Wards.

My mother used to get Sears, Spiegel, and Neiman-Marcus catalogs. I especially liked looking at clothes in the Spiegel catalog, but I don't remember ever ordering from them for clothes. My mother shopped at a children's clothing boutique for our clothes, and this store had better clothes than what the catalogs had and were also more appropriate for our climate. I remember looking at catalogs from stores that were in Chicago and seeing lots of sweaters and winter coats that I loved, but I didn't need those where we lived.

My mother would not buy clothes at Sears (except work overalls and underwear for my father) because she considered it lower class. One of the main things I remember about Sears (in the town where I was born) was that it had segregated restrooms and water fountains, labeled "white" and "colored." This puzzled me as a child, and I wondered what would happen if someone went to the wrong restroom or drank from the wrong water fountain.

My hometown has a few Sears kit houses. I used to wait for them to go on the market and have an open house so I could visit, but never got to do that.

Just to show how 'ornery' people are, I remember there being a staunch divide between people who favored Sears or "MonkeyWard". (That's how my childhood friend pronounced Montgomery Ward.)

Chicago publishing empires nearly bit the dust when catalog business came to an end. The US Mail must have also taken a hit. I suppose the urbanization of America had a lot to do with the changes. Malls sprung up where the new suburbanites could feel the merchandise. Instant gratification beat anticipation.

My DM shopped at Marshall Fields and Carson, Pirie, Scott -- both gone now. I remember those department store catalogs. We could easily visit those stores in downtown Chicago, and eventually their branches in even closer malls. We eventually went to a mall Sears for hardware or appliances after the malls put an end to small town stores.

An early lesson for me was to be very careful trying on clothes. "They don't belong to us yet, Sue. They belong to Marshall Fields until we decide what to keep." DM was also a pre-Costco mom, ordering a year's supply of hand soap, tissues, and toilet paper 'on sale' from Fields. The big dark green Field's truck delivered whatever we bought in store or by phone. Adults often had store-specific credit cards before they had general bank cards.

I do remember the Sears Christmas catalog and remember studying it and marking all the things I'd like to have. We had a brick and mortar (literally and downtown) Sears store too but I don't remember buying a lot there. We had a Penneys and it also had a catalog department where you could order things they hadn't stocked. There was a Montgomery Wards that was only a catalog store where you could place and receive/pick up orders. Those are all gone now - closed. I miss our Penney's. It was my go-to for basic baby things, sometimes towels, and they had the best sales on window coverings. Made to measure drapes, curtains, blinds in all the brand names and would even send someone to do the measuring, install when order complete. For additional fee of course but it still worked out to bargain costs compared to the furniture stores (most of those are gone now too).

My mother worked in a Montgomery Wards store (actual store with merchandise and good sized) in a city a couple of hours from here after DH and I married. She sold hundreds of mattresses and Lazy Boys over those years. Employee perk, she was allowed one free mattress of her choosing every year. All of us had new high end mattresses at no cost but our drive to pick it up 😊

You can still order from JCPenney online. We have one here at the local mall. It's at one end and Sears used to be at the other. There are 2 other dept. stores as well - Macy's and Dillards.

I've always liked Penneys for classic staples - men's dress shirts, 100% cotton sportswear, etc.. Sadly, it's been mismanaged over the past decades and is definitely not as successful as it once was. Sears suffered a similar fate.

We had a Sears outlet here too, and you could get appliances and tools there for really good discounts.

I am old enough to remembeer Sears catalogs. We always looked forward to the arrival of the Christmas catalog.

I wish Sears was still around. Those Craftsman tools were the best. This summer the oven coil of our 27-year-old Sears Kenmore range blew up and knocked out the control panel so we couldn't just get a new oven coil. If Sears was still around I would have gotten another stove just like it (if they were still making them.) Instead, we had to get a radiant heat stove because no one makes a coil stove that would fit in out space except by special order. I really miss that Kenmore with coils.

What I really remember? The Toys"R"Us catalog.

Of course it's remembered. It really hasn't been that long--even my kids used to look through the Christmas Wish Book! We bought a lot of clothes and shoes from the catalogue, housewares you name it.

rob333, I never thought that I would hear myself say this, but I miss the toys r us store.

In a way, I think that it helped the level of toy quality stay higher.

What I think is that, if the item/toy could be actually experienced in person, in the store, that the more obvious junk would be revealed before you buy it sight unseen from Amazon.

I just miss having real stores . When shopping online I feel as if I am trying to view something large through a small port hole with one eye.

One difference from when the Sears catalog was king and now when Amazon reigns is that, back then, quality was not always as much of an issue as it is now. There were fewer really junky items back then, for a number of differnet reasons.

Still, I hated ordering clothes. Still do hate it and wont do it.

Sears Wishbook Christmas catalog. loved it as a kid, picked out things for my own kids, now in their 50’s. As children we made Christmas lists, my kids did too.

My grandmother used to use the Sears Wishbook as a way to distract me when she was busy.

I remember Sears too. The mall where it was located was going downhill. But once, DH and I went there to buy a new axe...we felt pretty safe wandering around the mall with an axe over his shoulder! I really miss the Craftsmen tools though...they were the best.

Best part of the EARLY toy catalogues coming: My kids would make their lists in October, later when I was shopping those things they still talked about/wanted is what I chose from so they got what the REALLY wanted. Worked every time!! Now they are all 20/30 somethings and they learned to spend money on lasting wants not impulsive desires.