30 April 2008 | California, Dead Malls | Caldor

In honor of my recent cross-country move, I figured we should offer up a slice of Americana with a lesser-known Route 66 landmark: the Barstow Mall.
Barstow is a notoriously isolated city located in the Mojave Desert, near where I-15, I-40, and CA-58 all converge. It’s also a spot along historic route 66, and as a [...]

31 Comments

26 February 2008 | California | Caldor

The mailbag arrived the other day, stuffed with a bunch of (very touching, I assure you) notes expressing some grave concern about my whereabouts. I figured that I might as well come clean.
Many of you noticed that I haven’t been around as much, and that poor ol’ Labelscar just hasn’t had quite as much content [...]

25 Comments

27 January 2008 | California, Dead Malls | Caldor

Santa Monica Place is one of the latest enclosed malls to meet with the grim reaper: the place is scheduled to close up shop at the end of this month! Socal Labelscarrers: act fast if you want a chance to say goodbye!
Santa Monica Place is a three-level, 570,000 square foot shopping mall located in the [...]

36 Comments

12 December 2007 | California, Dead Malls | Caldor

I was in California last month, and I had a few hours to kill one afternoon when I was in the East Bay area so I swung by the Eastmont Mall in Oakland California. I didn’t do any research beforehand, I just saw it marked on my Rand McNally map so I toodled by.
It was [...]

23 Comments

20 December 2006 | California | Prange Way

All malls which bear the name Galleria are modeled, in theory at least, on the Galleria Vittorio Emmanuele, a four-story glass-enclosed mall in Milan, Italy.  South Bay Galleria is no exception.  Opened in 1985, South Bay Galleria appended a 3-level modern mall to an existing Robinson’s-May location which had operated as a department store in some capacity [...]

29 Comments

19 July 2006 | California, Dead Malls | Prange Way

Long ago, on the not-so-distant planet called California, a mall opened as part of an urban renewal project in downtown San Bernardino. The year was 1972 and the mall was Central City Mall (later Carousel Mall). It opened to popularity and fanfare with anchors Harris’, JCPenney, and Montgomery Ward. Not too long passed before the [...]

30 Comments