Sibley's Advertising Graphics Collection

For decades, Sibley’s was the largest department store in Rochester, New York. Its origins, however, were in Boston, where Masschusetts native Rufus Sibley and two Scottish immigrant co-workers, Alexander Lindsay and John Curr, met while working at Hogg, Brown and Taylor. The trio decided they would like to join together in starting a business of their own. After a visit to Rochester, they decided the city would be an ideal location for them to enter the dry goods business. With $12,000 of their savings, they opened the “Boston Store” in 1868 at 73 East Main Street. A small operation with only 13 employees, the store grew quickly on the basis of its men’s shirts. By 1873, the company employed 100 seamstresses in its tailor shop. After 3 years of construction, Sibley, Lindsay & Curr moved in 1894 to the Granite Building, a 12-story structure at East Main and St. Paul Streets replete with mahogany counters and electric lighting.

Their days in this new home were limited. In the early hours of February 26, 1904, the Granite Building caught fire. The massive blaze destroyed the entire Sibley, Lindsay & Curr store on the lower floors of the building, along with the offices above and most of the surrounding block. Of the resulting $3 million in damage, half was suffered by Sibley’s. The massive fire not only inspired improvements in fire protection in Rochester and around the country, but also led to Sibley’s moving one more time. While the Granite Building would be reconstructed as office space, Sibley, Lindsay & Curr moved further east on Main Street, to a building that opened in 1905. This massive new store – 6 stories and over 20 acres of floor space - occupied an entire city block at East Main and North Clinton Avenue. This building became an enduring element of the Rochester skyline, and a major part of Rochester’s commercial and social life. The store housed Rochester’s first elevator and offered its first charge cards. It served as a downtown hub, selling not only dry goods but also housing a bakery (1910) and grocery store (1926). The store’s annual Christmas decorations were immensely popular, while the sixth floor Tower Restaurant (originally the Tea Room) was an elegant space frequented by the city’s wealthy citizens.

Sibley’s expanded beyond its flagship store starting in 1955, with a store at Eastway Plaza in Penfield. Ultimately, the chain would expand to 15 stores in the Rochester and Buffalo areas. However, the business slowly declined, especially as suburban malls drew shoppers away from the downtown flagship store. In 1980, the fifth floor of the downtown location was vacated and leased to the Rochester Products Division of General Motors. The bakery closed that year, and the grocery followed in 1981. The May Department Store chain purchased Sibley’s in 1986, the downtown store reduced to three floors in 1988, and ultimately went out of business in 1990. The suburban stores, still owned by May, were consolidated into May’s Kaufmann’s department store chain. The downtown building would soon be converted into a city campus for Monroe Community College. When the College left for a former Eastman Kodak building in 2017, the building became Sibley Square and (as of 2020) has been converted to apartments.