It’s been decades since Gable’s Department Store ceased offering goods to local patrons, but the shopping center was popular once again Saturday morning when dozens gathered to share memories.

The reunion in front of the former store at the intersection of 14th Street and 11th Avenue was orchestrated by Robert Jeschonek, a Johnstown-based author, who plans to soon release a book about the once-popular store and its employees and patrons.

“I know there is a deep love for the store in Altoona,” said Jeschonek, who has written and is writing fiction and nonfiction about former shopping centers in the Johnstown and Altoona areas.

Gable’s was opened in 1884 by William F. Gable and saw nearly a century of success before it was closed in 1980, Jeschonek said.

“It was the commercial hub in Altoona back in the day,” he said. “They called it ‘the people’s store.’ And people here have never lost their love for Gables.”

That claim was reiterated by numerous members of the crowd, including Nancy Mills, who said she worked at the store’s blouse counter while in high school.

She remembered groceries being sold in the basement, and mentioned multiple times that her uncle used to sing for a radio station located within the building’s upper floors.

“It was like a mall with everything in it,” Mills said.

Her daughter, Sarah Mills Miller, said she too worked at the store, but she only learned of her mother’s employment when they spoke about attending Saturday’s event.

“I never knew she worked here,” she said.

Miller said she worked in the store’s credit department, but her fondest memories were from when she was a child and her parents would buy her treats, likely from a candy shop.

“We dream about it, literally,” she said. “It wasn’t just the square box that Wal-Mart is today.”

Linda Querry DeHaas said she was a Gable’s employee throughout high school, and her father was a longtime display manager.

He was so good at his job that the store’s owner would have her father decorate his house for Christmas, she said.

MaryCatherine McGregor, a 15-year Gable’s employee, said she got her start in the dress shop and eventually worked her way up into the display department.

“The Christmas displays were the most beautiful displays that ever happened here,” she said. “People would come around from everywhere to see the display windows.”

Sometimes, McGregor and her friends would have fun at those visitors’ expense.

She told stories about how she and her coworkers would sit in the windows and pretend to be mannequins, moving only slightly when onlookers would turn away.

The store also would hold fashion shows, using area high schoolers as models, McGregor said, adding that Gable’s was the first store in Pennsylvania to include a lingerie display.

“We thought, ‘The mayor is going to freak,'” she said.

The city’s downtown was much more popular at that time, DeHaas said.

“When you would come out of the store to go down the street it was like a conveyor belt,” she said of the people passing by. “You had to wait for a little space and jump out.”

DeHaas also remembered watching the city’s Christmas parades from her father’s office.

“That was it. Christmas began,” she said of the tradition.

Christmas time at Gable’s was on Marea Mannion’s mind, as well.

“Every year my parents would take us there to get our picture with Santa,” she said.

Her mother, Beatrice Lambour Mannion, at 102 years old, attended the reunion, too.

The 102-year-old said she worked in the store’s basement before the start of World War II. Later, she directed singing groups and played an organ at the store.

Throughout Saturday’s event, photographers shot photos and took video. Jeschonek said that material would be used as a companion to his upcoming book, “The Glory of Gable’s,” which is to be released in November.

“One of our goals in this book is to preserve the history of this store for future generations,” he said.

Mirror Staff Writer Sean Sauro is at 946-7535.