Light streams through a skylight onto one of the abandoned Randall Park Mall's seating areas.

A stuffed bear, left over from Randall Park Mall's last Christmas display, triumphantly raises a baton amidst the wreckage of the ongoing demolition.

The entrances to the abandoned Randall Park Mall in North Randall, Ohio are even more ominous by moonlight.

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The Randall Park Mall is a chapter in my book, Abandoned America: Dismantling the Dream.

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| By Matthew ChristopherIt’s hard to believe that Randall Park Mall, once the largest mall in the world, is no more. A massive monument to shopping that encompassed nearly 2.2 million square feet of space and reportedly cost $175 million to build, Randall Park Mall was deemed such a colossal miscalculation that it closed after only 33 years in operation and was demolished before it would reach forty years old. Many of the places I’ve photographed are relics of different eras, but few are so close to my own. I grew up with the blossoming concept of the indoor mall and spent a significant part of my youth in their arcades and book stores, food courts and theaters. In many ways it wasn’t a part of someone else’s past that I was watching fade away at Randall Park Mall, but a part of my own.Located just outside of Cleveland, Ohio, the village of North Randall was known for its race tracks before the Randall Park Mall was built. Called “The Saratoga of the West”, its primary industries were breeding and training horses. The site that the mall would cover was originally the Randall Park Race Track, located across the street from the Thistledown Race Track. Developer Edward J. DeBartolo Sr., who would come to own a tenth of all mall real estate in the United States, purchased both in 1960 and moved all racing meets to the Thistledown. His plans for the future of the area were stymied by court battles and zoning problems for over a decade, but in 1973 DeBartolo started tearing down the Randall Park Race Track and announced plans to build the largest shopping mall in the United States on the 117 acre site. It was to be a complex that would challenge the downtown of Cleveland itself.DeBartolo's bombastic style and love of spectacle were frequently remarked on by reporters, whom he entertained with expensive Italian dinners. Edward’s brother Frank DeBartolo had designed the mall with uniquely tiled floors and ceilings, marble columns, and a distinctive if somewhat confusing system of ramps. Over 400 workers labored to realize the vision, and DeBartolo frequently flew in via a personal helicopter to supervise progress. JCPenney opened in 1975 and the mall itself opened a year later on August 11, 1976 with a terrific gala; Tommy Dorsey's orchestra played in the center, actress Dina Merrill schmoozed with attendees, and according to the Cleveland Scene, 5,000 guests feasted on 1,200 pounds of shrimp, “crab and turkey, crepes filled with chicken and spinach, and trees trimmed with melon and cheese.” There were over 200 stores, four anchoring department stores (Horne’s, Higbee’s, May Company, and JCPenney), a three screen movie theater, and 9,000 parking spaces. In a town of 1,500, Randall Park Mall employed 5,000. The future seemed bright, but the cracks in the façade appeared quickly.Early on, Randall Park Mall developed a reputation for being unsafe - a perception that would eventually lead to its downfall. Though the first year sales totaled $140 million, the murder of Larry Cook, a 23-year-old Father & Sons Shoes employee, just after Christmas in 1977 was an ominous sign. Cook had been shot in the back of the head with a .38 caliber gun and was robbed of the $800 in cash and $500 in checks he had been carrying from the day’s sales. His body was found two days later when a maintenance man spotted his feet sticking out of a snow drift in a little-used section of the mall’s parking lot.Beachwood Place mall opened nearby in 1978 and attracted many of the wealthier shoppers in the area, but Randall Park still managed to remain profitable despite fierce competition. By 1984 it was the nation’s sixth largest mall, with over 170 stores and about 400,000 patrons during the holiday season. The mall’s 9,000 parking spaces and convenient access to Interstate 480 created an unanticipated problem, though: car theft. After his father-in-law’s car was stolen from Randall Park Mall, Charles Johnson invented the famous anti-theft device known as “The Club”; stories also began to spring up about muggings and gang violence, although these may have been exaggerated. North Randall’s economy was deteriorating as the effects of deindustrialization rippled across the Rust Belt and the mall was losing its luster.It’s hard to pinpoint an exact moment when a place like Randall Park Mall begins to decline, but once it starts sliding downhill the momentum picks up rapidly. The entire phenomenon of indoor shopping mega malls faltered relatively quickly compared to the strip malls they replaced. They lacked the flexibility that smaller developments had, rebranding was much more difficult if their image suffered, and security always seemed to be an issue - particularly in gargantuan parking lots. If the surrounding area wasn’t well managed, or competition became too fierce, regaining a desirable status among fickle shoppers was nearly impossible. Once stores start to close, the dead zones created by their absence are difficult to hide and a clear indicator that the management is struggling. Consumer culture is driven by novelty. When a mall loses that but is too big to adapt, its very size works against it. Utility and tax bills pile up, and options dwindle.Whichard Real Estate, who purchased the mall in 2006 for $6 million, was $200,000 behind on property taxes in 2008 and had multiple mortgages on the mall. The next February, Sears announced it was closing its Randall Park location, and with that the mall’s last anchor was gone. The few struggling stores inside the mall, many of which were owned by small business people doing their best to keep the mall afloat, were vacated a month later in March of 2009. The power was shut off in May, and save for the dusty sunbeams streaking through the skylights on sunny afternoons, the mall went dark.In its prime, Randall Park Mall’s motto had been “Much More Than Everything”, and it was so integral to North Randall’s identity that the town seal featured two shopping bags. In its abandoned state it was also emblematic of the town’s decline. Industrial Realty Group purchased the mall for $375,000, and it was finally torn down in 2014-2015. The property is now home to an Amazon Fulfillment Center.