Variety store The originators of the concept were the Woolworth Bros., in July 1879. Woolworth Bros. later became F. W. Woolworth Company or just "Woolworth's." On 21 June 1879, Frank Winfield Woolworth opened his first successful five-cent store in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, after a failed attempt with a store he opened on 22 February 1879, in Utica, New York. Frank soon brought his brother Charles Sumner "Sum" Woolworth into the business. Together they opened a second store in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on 18 July 1879. Before they started their own stores, the Woolworth brothers worked for Augsbury and Moore, a dry goods store in
Charles Sumner Woolworth do more of their shopping in newly built shopping centers, with large parking lots, Woolworth's added new stores in the shopping centers. On March 1, 1933, during the movement to boycott Jewish businesses in Germany, Nazi troops sang in front of the Berlin Woolworth Company store. The Hitlerites believed that the Woolworth brothers were Jewish. Yet, they were in fact, Methodist. There is some evidence that Hitler was very fond of Woolworth's stores, as it was one of the few businesses which Hitler did not nationalize. In 1932, the Woolworth Board of Directors was very concerned about their very successful