This past Friday was what is now called Black Friday, a day both celebrated and dreaded by retailers as the purported busiest shopping day of the year. This is when mobs of shoppers rise at ungodly hours and stand in pre-dawn lines in the often futile attempt to score some of those wonderful Black Friday discounts. Others do it then just to get the whole sordid ordeal behind them.

It’s a day when the year’s most sought-after gifts — especially toys — are available, but seemingly for only a short time, leading to all kinds of stress and mayhem among the shoppers, even tug-of-war battles over who grabbed it first. After all, the combatants will tell you, not having that special, desired gift under the tree will absolutely ruin Christmas for the children or grandchildren. The problem could be even worse this year, given the ongoing supply chain problems. Maybe it’s time for a refresher course for them on the real meaning of Christmas.

These days, the drama that is Black Friday has been mitigated somewhat by online shopping. My girlfriend is very good at it, abiding by the notion that practice seems to make perfect. We receive packages in the mail regularly from her online ordering, most of them for our grandchildren or for things we really need. Once in a while, there’s even a package for me, so I have cut way back on poking fun at the practice.

Personally, I prefer the old-fashioned shopping method for several reasons. First, no matter what size the shoes or clothing I’ve ever ordered online, either for myself or someone else, it was almost always wrong. Also, when the articles arrived, they weren’t really what I had expected.

I like to be able to put my hands on something before buying it. Finally, having been involved for many years with the Chamber of Commerce of Eastern Connecticut, I am a firm believer in — and practitioner of — shopping local and supporting our community retailers. I think my friend, Tony Sheridan, the Chamber president, has said “Buy local!” so often, he probably recites it in his sleep.

Years ago, when I was a boy, and long before the internet existed for online shopping, what is now Black Friday was known simply as the day after Thanksgiving. Nevertheless, most of the stores were packed on that day. Next to Christmas and my birthday, it was my favorite day of the year. That’s when my paternal grandmother, Myrtle Stanley — Granny Myrt — would take me and a friend of mine to G. Fox & Co. in Hartford for a day of shopping and adventure — not necessarily in that order. Back then, G. Fox & Co. was the largest privately-held department store in the country. Imagine, it was right there in downtown Hartford, only about an hour’s ride from Norwich.

Colchester stop

Our day would begin with my dad driving the three of us to the Colchester Town Green, where we would board the morning bus to downtown Hartford, disembark, and walk the several blocks to G. Fox, the magnificent, magical nine-story department store at 960 Main St. It was a grand building, having been designed by the famed architect Cas Gilbert. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

We would ride the escalators all the way up to the ninth-floor toy department. Once there, my grandmother — in an amazing, though misplaced, display of trust — would leave us there, instruct us to stay for the next several hours, and pick out a gift that she would buy when she returned from her own shopping. The store was mobbed, and to make it easier for us to spot her in the crowd, Myrt would wear a large, ornate hat.

“I will see you in a few hours. Just look for my hat,” she would say as she left to do her own shopping on the lower floors. “And be careful not to break anything.”

We never did break anything, but usually after an hour or so, we had inspected all the toys that interested us and gotten bored. So we’d ride the elevator back down to the first floor, then ride nine escalators back up to the top. Then we would do it again ... and again ... and again.

There was, after all, nothing more fun that riding the escalators up to the ninth floor.

When Myrt finally returned, she was invariably weighted down with large bags full of gifts, her warm desire to give to loved ones probably exceeding what she could afford, but no matter. Myrt’s mission was to bring as much joy as possible into the lives of loved ones, regardless of cost.

Never caught

I don’t think she ever suspected we had left the toy department, but given her cheery, care-free disposition, she probably wouldn’t have cared. It was the holiday season, after all, and a day to buy gifts in anxious anticipation of Christmas morning. She seemed to be having as much fun at G. Fox as we were.

After shopping, she would take us to a nearby restaurant, located below sidewalk-level, where we would have lunch. I can’t remember the name of the restaurant, but know that I ordered its wonderful clam chowder every year. After lunch, it was time for us to catch the bus back to Colchester. I would lag behind to peer into the windows of other downtown stores, but Myrt knew how to get me moving toward the bus stop.

“We must hurry. If we miss the bus, it will be a long walk back to Colchester!”

Would we really have had to walk back to Colchester, I wondered. In youthful ignorance and caution, I decided it was best not to take the chance.

Since then, G. Fox, like many of the retailers in downtown Hartford, has long since closed. Thankfully, the grand building in which it operated for many years has been preserved, re-tooled for mixed use, and is now occupied largely by the Hartford region’s Capital Community College.

I’m glad the building is still in use and serving a good purpose, but it will never begin to approach the excitement and magic that the famed G. Fox & Co. did. There was something there for everyone. How wonderful it would be to share the same excitement and joy with our own grandchildren. Alas, they will just have to settle for the innocent youthful belief that most of their gifts were delivered from the North Pole by Santa Claus.

Bill Stanley, a former vice president at L+M Hospital, grew up in Norwich.