Sol Nayman was a 20-year-old McGill University student in 1955 when he snagged a summer job in the hardware department at Simpsons.

The plan was for him to go back to night school, but that evaporated over time as he began rising through the ranks at what was then one of Canada’s pre-eminent department stores. His employee number turned out to be prophetic: S50. The S stood for summer and 50 ended up being the number of years he worked for Simpsons, and its successor, The Bay.

On Tuesday night, as the sun was setting over the city, Nayman and more than 70 other former Simpsons employees gathered at the Royal Canadian Military Institute on University Avenue to say goodbye to each other and an era.

The managers, salesclerks, copywriters, buyers, merchandisers and maintenance men and women, who met working at Simpsons and became friends, got together for one last toast. They raised their glasses and shouted hurrah together, in the direction of the venerable old building where they worked. The building still stands, now occupied by Hudson’s Bay Co. and Saks Fifth Avenue.

Simpsons, which began life in Toronto on Yonge Street in 1872, was phased out as a brand in 1991 by Hudson’s Bay Co., which had purchased the company in 1978.

After meeting annually for decades, former Simpsons employees decided that it was time to put the tradition to rest in a way that would have meaning. The onward march of time has made it more difficult for them to meet.

Nayman’s career path was not unusual for the time. After starting in hardware, he moved on to sporting goods, toys and confectionary, rising to become a vice-president in merchandising. The time he remembers most fondly was his tenure as general manager of the Queen Street flagship store during the 1970s.

Prince Charles visited. Charlton Heston signed books in the furniture department of the store, which had been cleared for the event.

“I’d like a bloody scotch,” Heston said, when asked if he needed anything.

“I happened to have a bottle in my office because I’d been forewarned,” said Nayman.

Sophia Loren visited the store for a promotional event, and so did Jacyln Smith, one of the original Charlie’s Angels.

Nayman’s wife, Queenie, shopped there.

“It was like shopping at your neighbourhood store. Everybody cared. There were ample staff,” said Queenie. “I could call any department, they knew what I liked and wanted and it was delivered. The delivery man had a key to my house so he could deliver when I wasn’t home.”

She still has the bedroom furniture — solid wood, not particleboard and veneer — she bought from Simpsons, paying what her parents thought was an astronomical sum at the time, $2,500. She is still using it 55 years later.

At Simpsons on Queen Street, there was a book department on the ground floor and a Christmas choir over the holidays. Avon Galleries sold fine furniture, the Treasure House sold china, antique and unique collectibles and The Room was where Toronto women with an interest in high fashion shopped. Room buyers would travel to Europe with a little black book, filled with details of what customers wanted to wear to the Royal Winter Fair or an upcoming wedding.

“When I worked at the Room, all the shoes were from Italy and they were all leather,” said Bridget Boggs, who worked there for 10 years.

“The Room had a steady clientele, by appointment. People would spend $10,000 to $15,000 at a time. People would come in from Bermuda to shop there. There were so many staff in there it was almost one-on-one.”

The Bay on Queen Street still sells special occasion wear in a section of the store called The Room.

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Rules were strictly adhered to, Boggs remembers.

“When pants for women first came in, if someone wore pants to work they were sent home and docked pay until they came in properly dressed.” Women wore hosiery at all times. Sleeveless blouses were not allowed.

Organizer Jamie Burton, whose father, grandfather and uncle led the company for decades, worked at Simpsons for 16 years at just about every job in the building. He attended couturier shows and met Coco Chanel, André Courrèges and Yves Saint Laurent on buying trips. He remembers when department store buyers, not celebrities, got front-row seats at fashion shows. He remembers buying knitted wool sweaters that were actually knitted together, not sewn.

“Quality was very much a factor,” he said.

“It was a very patriarchal society, but we were a very strong bunch of women in the ad department,” said Jane McKinnon, who worked in advertising at Simpsons from 1969 to 1976. “We made these strong friendships.”

“It was in the old days when you could take a coffee break and enjoy your friends. It was like a family.”

Peter Hooker remembers sourcing clothing from Japan, which emerged from postwar reconstruction, eager for foreign contracts that helped build their fashion industry.

Hooker was a navy man at 22 when he got a job selling socks at Simpsons, which offered management training courses — eventually the company would send Hooker to Harvard for an advanced business management course.

“I had met someone who wanted to get married and I thought a naval life wasn’t suitable for a family,” said Hooker, who was general manager, stores, when he resigned from the company in 1978 to pursue other opportunities in retail.

They’re still married. They have three children, 11 grandchildren, and one great-grandson.

Hooker spent 35 years at Simpsons, travelling the world in the early days to find the best materials, clothing and styles for Simpsons customers: knitwear and dresses in Rome, skiwear in Austria and Switzerland, cashmere in Scotland and everything in France.

“They were the halcyon days,” said Hooker.

“It was getting to know your customer and buying for that customer, knowing the trends, which today I think that is lost. A lot of merchants seem to be buying, not for their customer — they’re trying to buy for a group of people.”

“There’s no question. We had the glory years. We had the very best of times.”

Correction - September 20, 2016: This article was edited from a previous version that misspelled Sophia Loren's surname. As well, the photo caption under the archive photo misspelled Yonge St.



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