The opening of a new, modern department store was a major event a century ago just as it is today. An estimated 10,000 people, including Maine’s governor, turned out to welcome the Besse-Fox Department Store to downtown Bangor on Saturday, March 24, 1906.

“The topic of conversation everywhere was: Are you going to the new store,” according to the Bangor Daily News. Despite the cold, a large crowd of people were milling around out front, looking in the big display windows even before the 9 a.m. opening at 27-29 Main St. across from West Market Square.

Manager Dorr L. Fox stood by the front door greeting people and conducting tours. Every visitor was given a souvenir booklet containing a list of Bangor’s fire alarm boxes as well as the names of the other Besse stores – 27 in all, concentrated mainly in the Northeast. They were also offered “useful little vulcanite shoe horns.” By afternoon, the crowds had grown so big that the front doors had to be locked for awhile.

Bangor people weren’t used to modern department stores. The reporters from the city’s two daily newspapers wrote in awed tones. This store presented “a metropolitan appearance.” It was “one of the handsomest in the state” with “new modern equipment.”

In an age when stores were often dark and dingy, the lighting was of particular note. “The system of illumination is perfect. Every corner, in fact every part of the store is lighted,” the BDN writer noted. “This illumination shows off well the handsome and certainly elaborate furnishings, and the mirrors and plate glass, resplendent at all points, make the place a scene of beauty – a spot good to see.” And “the richly carpeted floor … makes walking noiseless.”

Remember, this was in the days when many people were still using gaslights and kerosene, and plush carpeting was seen only in mansions.

There was nothing particularly lavish about the decorations, though – only palms, wreaths and cut flowers arranged artistically on the stairs and in the windows. The owners said they wanted people to see how the store would look on a daily basis.

Besse-Fox sold “Ready-to-Wear Garments, Boots and Shoes,” said a newspaper advertisement, reflecting the fact that many mothers still made some of the family clothes, or had them made by tailors or dressmakers.

The ad promised that the store and the “Besse-System of Merchandising” would be another “gigantic stride forward for Bangor.” It promised “High-Class and Medium-priced Merchandise,” and everything 30 percent off.

The Bangor Daily Commercial noted that all shoppers were treated well by the clerks no matter how they were dressed, but, of course, there were parts of the store that were of more interest to some classes of visitors than to others.

The store was on three floors, but the most popular spot was the “balcony” between the first and second floors where people could stand and look out over the first floor all the way to the front doors. “It is like a reviewing stand,” commented the Commercial’s writer, where one could watch everyone coming and going.

There was something for everybody. “The beautiful showcases and their contents of waists, lace collars, etc. and the finely appointed cabinets in which suits and shirts are hung threw the ladies into raptures,” said the Commercial.

Men eyed “the magnificent cases for collars and the glass shirt cabinets.” But they were equally interested in how the elevators worked and the dimensions of the “great plate glass windows and the magnificent plate mirrors.”

During his visit, Gov. William T. Cobb, who was in town as a guest of Nathaniel M. Jones, a member of his Executive Council, was “the cynosure of all eyes.” Cobb, who was running for re-election, knew a good place to press the flesh when he saw one. The opening of the store “will be long remembered,” predicted the BDN.

I hurriedly traced the store’s future through the City Directory. In the years to come it was renamed the Besse-Ashworth Store, the Besse-System Store and possibly other titles. The last reference I found appeared in 1957, when it was located across the street at 98 Main St. and called the Besse-System Store or just The System Corporation. It sold “exclusive women’s wear.”

By then, other stores had new systems. Bangor shoppers were less impressed by carpets, big windows and illumination than they used to be.

Just what the “Besse merchandising system” amounted to I have no idea, other than “high-class and medium-priced merchandise” at bargain prices. Somewhere along the line, though, it was outmaneuvered by the systems developed by Sears, J.C. Penney, Marden’s and other department stores.

Dick Shaw contributed information for this column. Wayne E. Reilly can be reached at wreilly@bangordailynews.net.