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Boise Cascade had lumberyard/home improvement stores in the early 80's around Idaho; Emmett was definitely one of the locations.

In southern caifornia there were many home improvement chains which have been sold or gone by the waist side. a few that i remember were stores like builders emporium which at one time was owned by the company that owned two guys, they had a lot of locations in so. cal. another chain was oles, i belive that they took over all of the b.e. stores. another store was angeles home improvement centers. one other one that went bust was home base. after home depot and lowes came to town most of the smaller chains went by the waist side.

mike t. whittier ca wrote: the smaller chains went by the waist side.

Wayside...

A local chain in So Cal, H&E Hardware began it's death spiral a few months ago. They had locations in Barstow, Palmdale, Lancaster and Victorville and are now down to one Hesperia store, which is apparently up for sale.

When the Handyman chain closed in 1986, they bought some of the trucks and trailers, then painted over "ANDYMAN", added an E and left the logo. At one time they were looking to expand to Arizona, but Home Depot and Lowe's both opened new stores near their locations in the past few years and took most of their business away.

What exactly did happen with Handyman? I remember a few of their locations sitting vacant for years before being taken over by Orchard Supply. I still remember part of their ad jingle...

I forgot about H&E Hardware. i lived out in lancaster and palmdale they were a good hardware store, always had good service. i moved away a couple of years ago, its kinda sad to see them go. one thing about the lancaster store was it was to big in size, and they started to move away and go into other areas like selling furniture. Also were they a part of ace hardware?

RandallFlagg wrote:The only Wicks Lumber I've ever seen or been in was in Ontario when I was a kid. The store was between the railroad tracks that parallel Mission Blvd. and the 163 air national guard base. It was a large outdoor lumber yard with at small office in the center. As a kid it was the only lumber supply in the area with an Angel's home center in Pomona as the other. My dad was with the 163 so we would shop there often. It was on Archibald south of the Ontario Airport. It closed down many years ago in one of the companies reorganizations I believe.

In 2004 it was reported in Prosales that "in a liquidation move that spells the end for Vernon Hills, Ill.-based Wickes Lumber, the pro dealer recently agreed to sell off all of its remaining 59 locations to Redmond, Wash.-based Lanoga Corp.; Broken Arrow, Okla.-based Hope Lumber and Supply; and Avenel, N.J.-based Bradco Supply Corp. Wickes, which reached a high point of 115 locations in 2002, originally filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on January 20, and although the company secured a debtor-in-possession credit line of $115 million in March, it was still unable to reorganize operations sufficiently enough to exit Chapter 11 as originally planned."

It appears that at least some of those stores still operate under the Wickes name; one near me in Menands, NY does.

Bradco/Wickes website: http://www.bradcosupply.com/lumber_main.aspx

Can't remember all the locations, but in Sacramento we had Lumberjack and Handyman stores. Before Home Depot or Lowe's people would go Lumberjack to get all their homebuilding supplies. Handyman was a place where you could get hardware as well as lots of Christmas ornaments. My mom and grandma would have a field day there following the holidays.

carljohnson wrote: It appears that at least some of those stores still operate under the Wickes name; one near me in Menands, NY does.

Bradco/Wickes website: http://www.bradcosupply.com/lumber_main.aspx

Or did - last time I went by there the sign is painted over in black, so I guess they aren't there anymore.

The last H&E in Hesperia, CA closed for good and will reopen as an Orchard Supply. At least most of the employees will still have jobs to return to.

HQ,Builders Square, and Hill Behan. Are ones that come to mind

Grossman's is long gone. They were headquartered here in Mass. I believe.

HQ (Home Quarters) was based in Richmond, VA and went bankrupt sometime in the late 90s. I remember seeing a few of their empty hulks in the Hampton Roads area of SE Virginia. Took many years for tenants to use them. Two turned into Garden Ridge craft warehouses in Norfolk (Military Hwy.) and Chesapeake (Battlefield Blvd.) One is a circa 70s era store along Virginia Beach Blvd near Pembroke and still not filled - will probably be torn down for something else.

ajsanjua wrote:HQ (Home Quarters) was based in Richmond, VA ...

Actually it was based in Virginia Beach. The HQ HQ was over near Lynnhaven Mall and Oceana NAS in that industrial park where all of the streets are named after Navy jet aircraft.

Dave wrote:

ajsanjua wrote:HQ (Home Quarters) was based in Richmond, VA ...

Actually it was based in Virginia Beach.

And in fact, an abandoned store (originally a J.M.Fields Department Store) there still bore HQ signage, at least until last winter, when I visited.

Hey David,

Were you able to get a snap shot of that J.M. Fields (a Food Fair Stores division) building? About how large was it?

:)

Steve