Famous Department Store
department store in Los Angeles, California
The Famous Department Store was a department store in Los Angeles, California.
History
Famous had its origins with the Cal Hirsch & Sons Mercantile Co., founded in 1860 or 1871. The business ran Army and Navy surplus stores in St. Louis.
The company opened stores in Los Angeles in 1913 and later moved its headquarters there. It operated the "Army and Navy Store" at 526 South Main Street then in December 1916 moved to a larger space next door, advertised as the "world's largest Army and navy store", at 530-532 South Main Street starting. In 1917, the company advertised another branch store in San Diego.
In 1929, the company opened a location in downtown Long Beach. Morgan, Walls & Clements designed the building, which is now a is a city landmark.
U.S. Hirsch was president of the company during the 1930s.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Famous Department Store” is department store in Los Angeles, California. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Famous, Department and Store, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “department store in Los Angeles, California” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q65066682. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1860, 1871, 1913 and 1916.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Famous Department Store”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Famous Department Store primary sources, Famous Department Store archive and Famous research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Famous Department Store”?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Famous Department Store” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.