The Bergfeld Center sign on Broadway on April 8, 2013.

 

 

IN THE SPOTLIGHT

 

BY CASEY MURPHY

cmurphy@tylerpaper.com

Julius L. Bergfeld Jr. recalls the excitement of the opening night of Bergfeld Center 64 years ago.

“All the people; to me as a child it was kind of like a carnival atmosphere,” he said. “It was an event everyone in town would attend.”

Bergfeld was 5 when the state’s second-oldest retail center was being constructed, and he recalls walking around the unfinished buildings with his father, Julius “J.L.” Bergfeld Sr. The family’s project was 20 years in the making.

When Bergfeld’s grandfather, J.A. Bergfeld, envisioned developing a shopping center outside of Tyler’s downtown, he knew the area wasn’t yet ready for it. He had learned his lesson from investing in a drive-in movie theater in Dallas before enough people had cars to make it profitable.

So Bergfeld bided his time, working to develop the surrounding residential areas, including continuing what his father, Rudolph, had started – the Azalea District.

When Bergfeld Center held its grand opening in February 1949, it followed only Highland Park Village in Dallas, built in the 1930s, Bergfeld said. “That’s what I’ve been told; it’s the second oldest center in the state and the oldest in East Texas,” he said. “This was the first venture away from downtown for anything retail.”

 

LOOKING BACK

Bergfeld, 69, now sees the third and fourth generations of families shopping at the center. “There’s always been a lot of loyalty from the people of Tyler,” he said.

On Thursday, Bergfeld Center will be presented with a landmark plaque by the city. The plaque, approved by the Historic Preservation Board, represents the historical significance of the property to Tyler, city officials said.

“I think things definitely have evolved where people appreciate the past more,” Bergfeld said. They plan to display the plaque in the median between the Eighth Street shops, on an historic cast iron fluted column coming from Vasser College in New York, he added.

Bergfeld owns the center with his siblings, Bob Bergfeld and Cecile Barr, of Tyler, and Betty Knight, of Austin. “It’s been a family thing all the way,” he said.

Bergfeld’s sons, Andy and Brad Bergfeld, are also involved in the family business.

Recently, Bergfeld recounted how it all was started.

His great-grandfather, Rudolph, owned the land. When his grandfather, Julius “J.A.” Bergfeld, envisioned the center, he felt Tyler needed to develop out first so there would be people to shop there. At that time, the area at the end of town was known for its airport — a landing strip on the hill between South Broadway and Donnybrook avenues. On a 65-acre tract in what was then considered the country came a two-building shopping center running along both sides of East Eighth Street. The Seventh Street strip was added in 1956, and about three years ago, the building on Ninth Street was added.

When Bergfeld Center was planned by J.A. Bergfeld and his son, Julius “J.L.” Bergfeld Sr., it was the only complete “one-stop” shopping center in town, according to a 1962 report.

Wood Brookshire, who opened the first Brookshire’s store in 1928 in downtown Tyler, was one of the first tenants in Bergfeld Center and has had a store there since. “He thought it was really venturing out and taking a chance to go out to a shopping center away from downtown,” Bergfeld said of Brookshire.

Other original tenants that still remain are Bergfeld Agency and Bergfeld Realty, as well as Tidd’s Bakery, which is now Village Bakery. Founding tenants also included Hix Drugs, Shelton’s Variety, and Woolridge Appliances. The center’s original 275 parking spaces were about half of what was available in downtown at the time. By 1962, facilities could accommodate more than 2,000 vehicles.

Since the beginning, there have been a number of changes. A portion of the original 65 acres was transformed into a housing development. Bergfeld Center now sits on 35 acres and includes about 35 businesses – from Bill Day Tires to Luby’s Cafeteria. It spans from CVS Pharmacy on Fifth Street, The Cleaning Co. on Old Troup Highway, to Brookshire’s and Junior League of Tyler on Donnybrook Avenue, to Broadway Avenue, Brad Bergfeld said.

Through the years, businesses in the center have offered appliances, drugs, food, clothing and shoes, jewelry, camera equipment, antiques; and have included barbers, hair salons and movie theaters. Some businesses were housed there for decades before closing, including Joyner-Fry and McClain’s Barber Shop.

“That’s what has made the center unique,” Bergfeld said. “Everybody’s been a part of it for a long time.”

 

PLACE TO BE

“If you’re coming to Tyler, this is the place to be” for retailers, Bettie Smith said of Bergfeld Center. Mrs. Smith, 73, moved to Tyler in 1980 and bought Village Bakery, formerly Tidd’s Bakery.

“When I bought the bakery everyone thought I would ruin it,” Mrs. Smith said. “I met so many good people here.”

Her grandson,David Robbins, is learning the business to one day take it over but Mrs. Smith still does design and sales. “This is my home, that’s my store and I don’t ever want to leave ever,” she said. “It is the absolute best place to be.”

On a recent morning inside her showroom, Mrs. Smith sat with Bergfeld and his son Brad, Robert Johnson and Lenora Clyde, reminiscing about the people and businesses in Bergfeld Center through the years.

Johnson’s dad, C.F. Johnson, started Johnson’s Jewelers in the late 1950s and ran the business until he retired in 1983. “I basically grew up here,” Johnson said of Bergfeld Center. “Even before dad had a store up here I was always in this area.”

He said the drug store at the time had a soda fountain and he had friends who lived in the area. “I ran around a lot up here,” he said. “This was kind of the place where kids did things … It kind of did become the center of town.”

Johnson, 65, worked for his father as a child. A few years after his father retired, he opened RJ’s Jewelers in 1985, and the logical place for the store was Bergfeld Center. “Through the years this has been like home to me,” he said.

Mrs. Clyde has been going to Bergfeld Center since she was a child and recalled that in its early days, Broadway Avenue ended at the retail center. “I loved coming up here,” she said. “It was like home … “I just have wonderful memories.”

Mrs. Clyde said she fell in love with Johnson’s Jewelers, still gets her jewelry repaired at RJ’s and she was “brought up” on Village Bakery. “I wouldn’t miss those decorated Easter eggs,” she said. “You feel like you’re among family … You can’t come here and not know nearly everybody you run into.”

Luci Barrett Mimms, 40, of Tyler, was a toddler when she became a kind of spokes model for Bergfeld Center. Because her grandmother, Julia Faye McMurrey, took her to shop at Tots to Teens, a children’s clothing store there, she was chosen to be in newspaper ads and TV commercials for the center. She said it was a fun time, getting to dress up in seasonal outfits, play with the jewelry at Johnson’s Jewelers and getting a gingerbread cookie from Village Bakery after every commercial.

“I thought everybody in preschool would go to school in the morning … and did a photo shoot or did a commercial in the afternoon,” Mrs. Mimms, who works for her family’s oil and gas business and teaches yoga, said. “There are lots of great memories and people I got to cross paths with.”

Mrs. Mimms also recalled working in several shops formerly housed in Bergfeld Center, including Paper Capers during high school and college, and M.A. Simms & Co. in the 1990s. “I used to joke that I can’t get away from Bergfeld Center,” she said.

Mrs. Mimms still shops at businesses in the center, taking her 12-year-old son to the bakery and stopping by RJ’S Jewelers to say hello to Johnson.

With some businesses moving out of the center and others moving in, the Bergfelds “remain committed to providing this neighborhood retail shopping experience,” Andy Bergfeld has said.

His brother agreed.

“We want to maintain that same feeling that was here when it was built,” Brad Bergfeld said.