McCrory Stores his last name so he would not have to pay for extra letters on his store signs. McCrory died in 1923 having built McCrory Stores Corporation into a success. However, in 1933 the company declared bankruptcy and was dissolved, but it was eventually re-established as McCrory Stores and resumed operations. One of the early investors was Sebastian Spering Kresge, who later founded the S.S. Kresge chain, which became Kmart. In 1899, Kresge traded his interest in the McCrory's Memphis, Tennessee store for McCrory's interest in the Detroit, Michigan, store, giving him control there. In 1987, the Kmart Corporation sold its
Kresge-Newark Kresge-Newark Kresge-Newark was an upper-middle market department store based in Newark, New Jersey. The firm was started in the 1920s when its founder Sebastian Kresge purchased the L.S. Plaut Department store in downtown Newark and rebranded the business Kresge-Newark. This store had no management connection to the S.S. Kresge 5 & 10 chain based in Detroit, Michigan. In 1926, Kresge replaced the original Plaut store, nicknamed "The Bee Hive," which had been built in 1891, with a larger flagship store that occupied the entire city block, between Broad and Halsey streets, and Cedar Street and Raymond Boulevard. It contained more