I remember that there were a few antique shops down on Cherokee Street in St. Louis, Missouri when I was growing up. The block on Cherokee from Jefferson Ave. to California was a collection of dime stores, an old Boxer clothing store and a JC Penny. A little further south was where the antique stores were located. The 5 and dimes are gone now, but the area has attracted quite a few more antique stores as well as Mexican restaurants for some reason, and is now known as St. Louis Antique Row. The stores that I remember were small, cramped, dark places and the people who worked there seemed to be older than the antiques. They cast a suspicious eye on any child that came into the store, whether they were with their parents or not. The other thing that I wondered about was how they stayed in business, because I never really saw anyone buy any of the stuff. Like an old used bookstore, people just seemed to come in and browse.
The first antique mall that I was ever in was in the early nineties. I was living and working in Eureka, Missouri at the time, and speculation was that Wal-Mart was going to build a 24-hour super center on the outer road, right before you got to the Six Flags Amusement Park. There already was a Wal-Mart in town just about a half of a mile further on up the road. It had been there for quite a few years and occupied the space next to a National Supermarket. This was at the time that Wal-Mart was deciding to expand a lot of its older units to include Sam’s Clubs and Lowe’s Home Improvement Stores to compete with union hardware stores and supermarkets. There was a lot of talk about what was to become of the old Wal-Mart building and eventually it was turned into the area’s first antique mall.
There were over a hundred booths in the place and I remember not being able to get all of the way through it the first time I tried. I wasn’t a serious collector, but I had always been interested in antiques and was a serious watcher of the Antiques Road Show on PBS. But this place was huge, and I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to spend an entire day wandering through it. Obviously some people did. One lady told me that she would spend an entire Saturday afternoon there after going to all of the flea markets and yard sales in the morning. Now if you’re a serious antique mall shopper, you may be interested to know that on Old Highway 66 on the other side of the river in Illinois, the mining for antiques is just as rich:
Six antique malls line Highway 55 (Old Route 66) between St. Louis and Springfield, Illinois. And there’s another one in Springfield itself. Here they are, in order from south to north:
The Pink Elephant Antique Mall (618-637-23666) is in Livingston, Illinois just about 40 miles from St. Louis. The Pink elephant is smaller than some of the other malls on the list, but the folks who run it are pleasant and offer free coffee. They offer a nice selection that runs from junk to the higher end items. Just look for the big pink elephant out front pulling the trailer with ANTIQUE MALL written on it.
Both the Lighthouse (217-324-6111) and Lisa’s Antiques and Collectables (217-324-0846) are in Litchfield right across the street from each other. One suggestion though, hit them early in the winter as they close at 5 p.m.
Lisa must be a pretty big name in the antique mall business as further on up in Divernon there is Lisa’s Antiques #1 (217-628-1111) and #2 (217-628-3333). They are also across the street from one another, and between them they offer some 40,000 sq. feet of shopping and browsing space. You may want to get a map before heading in.
When you almost get to Springfield, off of Toronto Road sits The Barrel. The Barrel (217-585-1438) just happens to sit across from a Cracker Barrel restaurant and has a craft mall attached.
Sangamon Antique Mall (217-522-7740) is on East Sangamon rd. in the town of, you guessed it; Sangamon, Illinois. This mall is a neat little three-story building with each of the floors crammed with potential treasures. The higher you climb, the junkier the stuff gets, but that’s what makes it fun.
