Beneath the Salvation Army bonnet, the woman’s cheeks are too pink — as if she needs to come in out of the State Street cold. And her blue eyes express the pleading weariness of someone whose work helping the poor is never done.
“Think about how many people were examining these things — literally peering through the glass. … They’re going to be scrutinized by tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people over the course of the season,” explains Gabe Fajuri, owner of Potter & Potter Auction House on the Northwest Side.
Fajuri is talking about the remarkable attention to detail of some of the three dozen or so animatronic figurines plucked from the Marshall Field’s Christmas window displays of the early 1980s — all of which will go on the auction block Sept. 12.
There’s a woman in elegant flapper attire whose stiff, upright posture and haughty expression suggest she’s accustomed to getting what she wants, when she wants it. There’s a man in a heavy tweed suit reading a newspaper (not the Chicago Sun-Times, alas) in the famous “Walnut Room.”
Animatronics that were used in Marshall Field’s window displays in the early 1980s are stored at Potter & Potter Auctions in Belmont Cragin. One figurine features a man reading a newspaper in the department store’s Walnut Roon, while another shows a young Victorian-era boy getting his dog to “sit up” for a treat.
The figurines — about half human size — were on display at Field’s from 1982 to 1984. The theme for those years was “Christmas at Marshall Field’s,” with each window representing a different era in the store’s holiday history.
Amy Meadows was a window trimmer in her early 20s and part of the team that installed these figurines in 1982 and 1983.
“It was challenging because you are working in a very tight space,” says Meadows, now 65. “You had to work with the carpenters to assemble the set pieces, the backdrops, the walls, the raised platforms.”
Part or her job, Meadows says, was keeping the windows well stocked with “snow,” actually kosher salt.
Meadows’ job often meant she was on her hands and knees and working 10-plus-hour days. But even she succumbed to the Christmas magic.
“When you came (to Marshall Field’s) for Christmas, it was chicken pot pie under the great tree, it was visiting Santa in Cozy Cloud Cottage, it was the Salvation Army,” Meadows recalls. “There was so much sentiment and pride and joy that people found.”
Bundled-up children press against the windows of the Marshall Field’s store on State Street on Nov. 26, 1982. The wagon figure is now part of an auction.
Keith Hale/Sun-Times, file
It wasn’t uncommon, she says, for a young man to want to propose to his girlfriend outside the Christmas windows. So the Field’s staff might arrange for a model train to emerge from a tunnel puffing smoke and with a sign sitting atop a car that read: “Will You Marry Me?”
The items going on the auction block don’t include a train, but there’s a horse-drawn Marshall Field & Company delivery wagon, its glassed-in carriage filled with gifts.
A horse-drawn delivery wagon filled with gifts is the single largest object from the early 1980s Marshall Field’s Christmas windows. The wagon alone is almost four feet long.
And what’s likely to draw lots of attention: a model of the store’s famous exterior clock, which is about three-feet tall. It’s not waterproof, so it would have to be installed inside.
“That is something anybody can identify with, whether or not it’s part of the Christmas window display. People still see that every day when they go downtown on State Street. … If I was a betting man, I’d say that’s the piece that will bring the highest price,” Fajuri says.
Fajuri says the motors work on about half of the figurines that are to be sold; the others, he says, would be relatively easy to repair.
A replica of the iconic Marshall Field’s clock, which will be auctioned off, awaits its fate at Potter & Potter Auctions. This one is made of wood and is about three feet tall.
But walking through the gloriously cluttered Potter & Potter warehouse at 5001 W. Belmont, you might wonder what someone would want with a bunch of 3-foot-high, old-timey Christmas figures.
“Maybe set up your own Christmas display. How many houses have you been to where people have made a real commitment to the season and set up their own exhibit?” Fajuri says.
The auction pieces didn’t come from a Marshall Field’s — or rather, a Macy’s department store — basement. They were housed most recently at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry in storage. For a time, during the 1990s, they were included as part of the museum’s annual Christmas display.
“Having a collection is a little bit like having a garden: You periodically change out and do new things,” says Kathleen McCarthy, the museum’s director of collections and head curator, explaining why the figurines are being sold.
To learn more about the upcoming auction, go to www.potterauctions.com.
A collection of animatronic figures that were used in Marshall Field’s window displays are stored at Potter & Potter Auctions. The auction is set for Sept. 12.
