8 stores Boomer mothers dragged their kids to that felt like torture at the time

Picture this: You're seven years old, it's Saturday morning, and your mom announces you're going shopping. Not to the toy store or the candy shop, but to some endless maze of beige walls and fluorescent lights where nothing remotely interesting exists.

If you're a child of Boomer parents, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

These weren't quick errands. These were expeditions. Multi-hour odysseys through stores that seemed specifically designed to drain the life force from any child under twelve.

The funny thing is, now that I'm in my forties, I get it. Those stores served a purpose. They were where households ran, where families got what they needed.

But back then? Pure torture.

Here are eight stores that every Boomer mom seemed contractually obligated to visit, usually with kids in tow.

1) Sears

Sears was the everything store. Tools, appliances, clothes, tires, you name it.

For parents, it was one-stop shopping. For kids, it was purgatory with a catalog department.

The worst part was how massive these places were. You'd walk through what felt like football fields of washing machines and lawn mowers before finally reaching the toy section, only to be told you weren't buying anything today.

My partner's mom used to make them sit on display furniture while she browsed kitchen appliances. For hours. The trauma is still real.

What made Sears particularly brutal was the false hope. You'd see the toy section from across the store and start mentally claiming that G.I. Joe or Barbie dreamhouse. Then your mom would spend forty-five minutes debating which wrench set your dad needed.

2) JCPenney

If Sears was the everything store, JCPenney was the clothing store that thought it was fancy but really wasn't.

The stores moved from downtown locations to shopping malls in the 1960s, which meant Boomer moms could now trap their kids in temperature-controlled environments with no escape route.

Back-to-school shopping at Penney's was a special kind of hell. You'd spend what felt like days trying on stiff jeans and scratchy sweaters while your mom debated whether you'd grow into a size or out of it before winter.

The fluorescent lighting made everything look worse than it actually was. And those dressing rooms with the weird three-way mirrors that showed you angles of yourself no child needed to see.

3) Montgomery Ward

Montgomery Ward was basically Sears' slightly less successful cousin, which somehow made it even more depressing.

The store made a catastrophic mistake in the postwar boom by not opening new locations for seventeen years. By the time they started expanding in the late 1950s and 1960s, they were already behind.

For kids, this meant the stores often felt outdated and sad. The toy selection was never quite as good as Sears. The clothes were never quite as trendy as Penney's.

But your mom shopped there anyway, usually because it was closer or had a sale. You'd wander the aisles in a daze, wondering what you'd done to deserve this fate.

4) Jo-Ann Fabrics

If you've never been dragged to a fabric store as a child, consider yourself lucky.

Jo-Ann Fabrics opened its first stores in Cleveland in the 1940s and expanded throughout the Midwest in the following decades. By the 1970s, they were everywhere.

The stores smelled like polyester and broken dreams. Aisle after aisle of fabric bolts in patterns no child could possibly care about. Buttons. Thread. Pattern books that looked like instruction manuals for engineering projects.

Your mom would spend an eternity deciding between two nearly identical shades of blue while you contemplated whether running away was a viable option.

The only remotely interesting part was watching the fabric get cut, and even that lost its appeal after the first thirty seconds.

5) Levitz Furniture

Furniture stores were psychological warfare disguised as retail.

Levitz pioneered the warehouse-style furniture store in the 1960s, which sounds innovative until you realize it just meant more square footage of absolute boredom for kids.

You weren't allowed to jump on the beds or couches. You couldn't play with anything. You just had to follow your parents around while they tested chair firmness and discussed whether the coffee table matched the drapes.

The stores were set up like little room displays, which meant you'd walk through dozens of fake living rooms and bedrooms. It was like touring houses you'd never live in, except somehow more tedious.

6) Ethan Allen

If Levitz was boring, Ethan Allen was boring with delusions of grandeur.

These were the "nice" furniture stores where everything cost twice as much and you definitely weren't allowed to touch anything.

The stores featured colonial-style furniture with names like "Circa 1776" that meant nothing to a kid who just wanted to go home and watch cartoons.

Your mom would carefully examine wood finishes and discuss thread counts with salespeople who acted like they were selling fine art instead of dining room tables.

Meanwhile, you'd be standing there trying not to accidentally knock over a lamp that cost more than your family's car.

7) Kinney Shoes

Shoe shopping with your mom was a unique form of torture because it involved not just waiting, but participating.

Kinney Shoes was one of the biggest shoe retailers in the 1960s and 1970s, right alongside its competitor Thom McAn. They were everywhere, usually in malls or shopping centers.

The process was excruciating. First, someone would measure your foot with that cold metal contraption. Then you'd try on approximately forty-seven pairs of shoes, most of which your mom rejected because they weren't "sensible" or "good for growing feet."

You'd spot the cool sneakers with the racing stripe, only to end up with boring brown oxfords that looked like something your grandfather would wear.

8) Thom McAn

Thom McAn was the other major shoe chain, and it was basically interchangeable with Kinney in the minds of most kids.

Same fluorescent lights. Same uncomfortable benches. Same sad salespeople measuring feet all day.

The stores proliferated through malls in the 1960s and 1970s, making them inescapable. Your mom probably had strong opinions about which chain was better, even though they both sold essentially the same shoes.

What made these shoe stores particularly rough was how long the whole process took. It wasn't like today where you grab a box off the shelf and try them on yourself. Someone had to go into the back, find your size, bring it out, and then watch you walk around in them.

If they didn't fit? Back to the stockroom. Repeat until your mom was satisfied or you'd lost the will to live.

The bottom line

Looking back, these shopping trips were just part of life. Families needed clothes and shoes and furniture, and in the pre-internet era, you actually had to go to physical stores to get them.

But man, as a kid, it felt like cruel and unusual punishment.

The strange thing is, a lot of these stores don't exist anymore. Montgomery Ward closed in 2001. Thom McAn shut down its retail locations in 1996. Jo-Ann just liquidated all its stores this year.

Part of me feels nostalgic for that era, even though I spent most of those shopping trips wishing I was literally anywhere else. They were shared experiences. Everyone had been dragged to Sears. Everyone had suffered through shoe shopping.

Now my partner drags me to furniture stores sometimes, and I finally understand what my mom was trying to do in those Ethan Allen showrooms all those years ago.

The torture, it turns out, was preparation.