These first appeared in March of 2012 and I’ve added a few memories to them . . .
After losing my job at Lee Wards in 1983 and staying home with my son for two years, I decided I needed to get back to work if not just for financial reasons, for adult conversation.
My best friend in art school, Miki Catron (a Japanese girl who married a blond, blue-eyed Hoosier) was an art director in advertising at L.S. Ayres, so I talked to her about helping me get a job there. Even though I hadn’t majored in commercial art, I knew enough about design and could draw, so I thought I had a chance. Working at Service Engraving all those years in college had taught me production work and I could paste-up advertising pages.
They had an opening in Production doing paste-ups of newspaper ads and catalogue pages. That was in 1985, before computer graphics was widespread. We literally had to draw every box that the clearance copy went in and rubber cement down every piece of type. It came printed off in long sheets (galleys) from our typesetter.
The Advertising department was on the 5th floor of the downtown store, behind Housewares. There were 50 people in that department, from a staff of writers and editors who wrote the copy for the catalogues and newspaper ads, to layout artists who hand drew all the pages of advertising. It was a very creative place to work and I just loved it.
After a year in Production, I moved over to layout, which meant I designed and drew the ads with all the type indicated and the artwork sketched in. The buyers for all the merchandise were located in the downtown Ayres store and they supplied us with samples of all the merchandise to be advertised.
We would pick up our merchandise and hang it in our office to draw from, to get all the details. Many times we had to try on merchandise and model for each other, so we could see the fit of the clothing for our drawings. Pictured is Norma Dollar (she was an Ayres model in the Tea Room in the 50s) and I in one pair of 3X ladies shorts.
Our columnist, C.J. Woods and I were a team at Ayres for awhile. He was a very good supervisor, who worked hard to make our projects effective and creative. He’s an amazing artist, as well as a darn good writer. Did I tell you he can sing too?
Back then many of the newspaper ads were illustrations in pen and ink drawings done by our in-house illustrators. The catalogues were all photos, which were photographed in New York City, because that’s where all the modeling agencies were and the headquarters for the different clothing designers.
After a few years in Layout, I finally got to work on my friend Miki’s team and do catalogues — we were a great team. I got to go on a couple of photo shoots to New York with Miki and it was an amazing experience. We would share a room, so we had more per diem (spending allowance for the trip) to spend on cabs and dinners out.
We would go through our photographer’s model book and pick out models to book for the catalogues. These models were very professional. Often, we used one light complexioned black man (beautiful skin tone) who went by one exotic name — Jamel. You would have thought he was from Jamaica, but he was from Wisconsin. He’d show his baby daughter’s photos every time we booked him — he was so down to earth.
When we needed children for a photo shoot, they would have a “cattle call” and lots of moms who were signed up with the agency, would bring in their little ones. You couldn’t pick from a catalogue because kids grow too fast and the clothing had to fit. The child’s mood and how well the clothing fit determined whether the child got the job. Most photographers were not happy shooting children’s clothing.
When I would go on a photo shoot with C.J., we would eat at the corner deli and bring home money and with Miki we would go shopping and spend too much.
I remember Miki took me to Barneys which was the most expensive store I’ve ever been in. You know the kind of place that carries $700 Manolo Blahnik shoes. I wanted to bring home something from there so, I found a little leather napkin ring with a copper buckle, which fit around my skinny wrist. I bought it for $14 and wore it as a bracelet. It looked very chic! (Years later my son wore it in high school.)
I remember one holiday season I had a sock slipper to draw and I slipped my hand in it and it looked like a sock puppet, so I drew that on the page as a joke for Miki. When she saw the finished layout page she got a chuckle out of the drawing, but said be sure you change that before it goes to New York — well of course, I forgot and it went. They hired a hand model instead of a foot model, so it didn’t get shot — so guess whose foot ended up modeling that slipper? Mine!
There were a few years at Ayres where I did mostly Home Store catalogs, which were shot in a local photo studio. I got really fast at drawing pots and pans and I knew all the china patterns by heart. I would draw up the layouts for the catalogue and then go to the studio to supervise the photo shoot. Ayres was very picky and we would have to OK a Polaroid of the merchandise before they would shoot the film. The lighting and the placement had to be perfect.
We had a great copy machine in the Art department that would enlarge or shrink copies. I became very good at making up funny cards and posters of bodies and faces and such. When the president of Ayres was on medical leave for a very serious ailment, the managers had me do up one of my funny cards which ended up being more of a whole catalogue of what was happening while he was gone. It turned out very funny and he loved it and showed everybody who visited him. It helped that I was good friends with the Advertising cameraman Dana Harrison, who helped a lot with needed photos. He was a jokester himself and we had such a fun time at Ayres.
When the President recovered and got back to work, he started requesting Going Away cards for Vice Presidents and managers who were being transferred or leaving, etc. I became the official “funny card maker.” The president of Ayres would call me into his office and have me take notes on the card recipient. I never met the person, but they would give me a photo of them and their bio. At one point, the work got so frequent, they had to hire a freelancer to do my job, so I could make the cards! I remember one day watching the freelancer working on the Christmas catalogue and for a brief moment I wanted to work on that catalogue, but quickly I realized I’d rather do funny cards!
One year, one of the layout artist Becky was pregnant and I had everyone bring in baby pictures of themselves and I put together a fashion catalogue with these babies dressed up with hats and accessories and it was fun just trying to pick out which chubby cheeked baby was who.
Like Lee Wards, I would be working there still if May Company in St. Louis hadn’t purchased Ayres and let all of us go — 1,200 people lost their jobs and that was 1992. We got a three month notice, as they transitioned all the work to St. Louis. May Co. was smart enough not to change the Ayres name, but it was not really Ayres after 1992. We were all shocked and distraught.
This was a tough year for me to lose my job, since my daughter was starting college.
My friend Miki and C.J. ended up in St. Louis with May Co. until Macy’s bought them 9 years ago and they all lost their jobs for good (most were at retirement age). Miki had started with Ayr-way right out of college and stayed with the company until they forced her retirement.
Those last three months at Ayres, it was hard to keep busy. They had us inventory everything in the store and take the store apart. I was the one who took all the men’s silk ties out of their little slots and laid them on the clearance table for the liquidation. It was all so sad to see.
I was at the Ayres Tea Room the last lunch they were open and had my last bowl of Chicken Velvet soup.
That last week at Ayres, to relieve pressure and boost the spirits, we planned an all department water pistol fight. Everyone came with raincoats or plastic bags over themselves and loaded water guns. What a wet, glorious time it was!
Ayres was like no other store in Indianapolis and could never be duplicated. Back then, they had every department you can think of — cameras, shoe repair, drugstore, sheet music, watch repair, candy shop, wine store, etc.
I loved the EOM sales (End-of-the-Month). The basement had a clearance center and I shopped nearly every day.
Ayres will always be that special place you took your kids to Bunny’s Barnyard around Easter or rode the Christmas Train. The windows at Christmas were always decorated and you felt special when you swung through that revolving front door. I still miss that L.S. Ayres…. Every year for the past 12 years those of us that worked in the Art Department get together for a reunion.
Next time: Working at Hook Drugstore’s Art Department