- department store (n.) - 1878; a store that sells a variety of
items, organized by department. The "Department Store" is the
outgrowth of the cheap counter business originated by Butler
Brothers in Boston about ten years ago. The little "Five Cent
Counter" then became a cornerstone from which the largest of all
the world's branches of merchandising was to be reared. It was
the "Cheap Counter" which proved to the progressive merchant his
ability to sell all lines of wares under one roof. It was the
Five Cent Counter "epidemic" of '77 and '78 which rushed like a
mighty whirlwind from the Atlantic to the Pacific and all along
its path transformed old time one line storekeepers into the
wide-awake merchant princes of the present day. It was this same
epidemic which made possible the world famed Department Stores
of Houghton, of Boston; Macy, of New York; Wanamaker, of
Philadelphia; and Lehman, of Chicago. ["American Storekeeper,"
1885]