Photographs
CHAMPAIGN. Blums Inc. Lamson pneumatic tube system. (Lamson brochure, 1952)
CHAMPAIGN. Lewis dept store. "Lewis' and Willis' had the "tracks" to send your money to the office and the change came back the same way." Champaign High School Lendales website
CHAMPAIGN. Willis dept store. See above.
CHICAGO. Helbing's (dept store), 105th and Ewing. "Overhead trolley baskets that would transport cash from various departments to the cashier's desk up front". South East Historical Scoiety News, vol. 16, no. 2 (Oct. 2002)
CHICAGO. Marshall Field. Pneumatic tube system installed in 1893. (Pasermadjian). Photo of Helen Sarros, "queen of the mighty basement console", working the new system in Chicago Sun-Times, 26 Nov. 1947
CHICAGO. Schesinger & Mayer, N.E. corner of State and Madison Streets. "Many difficulties were encountered in shifting and readjusting the .. cash conveyor tubes ." Carol R. Bolon. The nature of Frank Lloyd Wright. Papers presented at a symposium organised to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988) p. 165
CHICAGO. Sears, Lawrence Avenue. "On November 2, 1925, Sears opened two new retail stores, one on Lawrence Avenue, and the other on 79th Street in Chicago. Today, these two stores represent the oldest, continuously operated stores in the Sears retail store system. Both stores were built under the old style model of retail stores. They were two story [sic] buildings... Money and receipts were sent from the sales floor to the office via pneumatic tubes." Sears Archives website
CHICAGO. Sears, 79th Street. See above.
ELGIN. Theodore F. Swann, Du Page and Spring Streets (now Commerce Building). "The first Elgin merchant to introduce the 'cash railway system'." Elgin History website
ERIE. Burchell. "Robert L. Burchell, dealer in dry goods, clothing, boots and shoes, hats and caps, notions, groceries and queensware... In 1868 he came to Erie and opened a dry-goods store... He employs in his store eight clerks and a bookkeeper, and has put in the Lampson [sic] Cash Railway System." Portrait & biographical album of Whiteside County, Illinois (Chicago: Chapman, 1885)
FREEPORT. E & W [Ennenga & Wagner] Clothing House, 9 W.Main Street. "Before the days of cash registers in stores, money was put in a cup, then clipped to a wire and propelled to a cashier's desk usually on a balcony of a store. E & W had such a constant running track. Then the money was put in a cup and sent upstairs to where the boys department was. Here the cashier would take care of the money and send the change back in the cup. Tom Ennenga described his cash carrier as 'a sling shot-driven carrier with rollers on a wire'. His system was in use from before 1920 until the store closed the last day of July in 1990." Zoominfo website
• The store is now LeBaron & Miller Interiors. In 2008 the Baldwin Flyer was unpacked, renovated, and re-erected. Photographs - also in Journal-Standard (Freeport) , 12/10/08.
GALESBURG. O.T.Johnson's department store. Pneumatic tube system. Email from Lawrence Martin, 5/1/02.
LASALLE. Blakely's department store. Basket system. (Joliet Public Library website)
McLEANSBORO. The Grand Leader store. "They have the National cash register and Barr cash carrier systems." McLeansboro Illustrated, 25 May 1900 (special supplement to the McLeansboro Times)
MINONK. Vissering Mercantile Exchange. Pneumatic tube system. Mononktalk website
MOUNT VERNON. Mammoth. "The Mammoth had a cool pneumatic tube that would take your money and send it to the banker, kind of like Deal or no Deal... It would poof back to you with the correct change and green stamps." On the QT blogspot
PANA. The Leader. "New fixtures are being put in the hat and men's furnishing goods departments of "The Leader", Pana, Ill., and the firm will use an overhead wire system for handling the cash." Clothier and Furnisher, 1887?, p.45
QUINCY. Tenk (hardware). Lamson Air-Line system. Photograph in Lamson brochure shows cash desk in the centre of a long narrow store.
STREATOR. Cooperative Society. "We employ .. eight clerks in the store and two teamsters to deliver goods, and have lately put in a patent cash-carrier." Amos G. Warner: Three phases of cooperation in the west. Publications of Amer. Econ. Ass. 2(1) 1887, p.78