K&B Number 5 on St. Charles Avenue

K&B Number 5 on St. Charles Avenue

by | Aug 4, 2024 | 1920s-1930s, Katz and Besthof K&B, Uptown

K&B Number 5 was the store at St. Charles and Broadway.

k&b number 5

K&B Number 5

Ad in the Times-Picayune, 4-August-1928, announcing the opening of K&B Number 5, the store at St. Charles Avenue at Broadway. The ad features a drawing of the new store as well as the previous four locations.

From the ad:

You’re Welcome Today — and Every Day at K&B No. 5–and at every K&B Store! Today! Meet the folks who will be pleased to serve you. The K&B spirit of Service and the K&B standard of quality–ONLY THE BEST–which has been part and parcel of the success of this institution since 1905–the very beginning, dominates this store like it pervades each other K&B Store! We’ll be glad to see you and serve you today and every day thereafter!

The ad promoted Whitman’s candy, and a “Dandy Bag of Useful Miniatures” given to customers who made a fifty-sent purchase.

The store

k&b number 5

Store number 5, St. Charles and Broadway

K&B Number 5 serviced the university district. While there were other, larger, stores in the chain, K&B was all about making it easy to pick up your prescriptions. The store included a soda fountain, featuring “Freshly made sandwiches of the best the market affords.”

Previous stores

k&b number 5

Store No. 1, 732 Canal Street

Katz and Besthoff opened their first store at 732 Canal Street, across from the Touro Buildings. While this was a popular location (pick up things then jump on the streetcar to head home), Simon Shwartz of Maison Blanche presented a problem for K&B. When Shwartz opened the “new” MB Building, with its eight floors of office space, a lot of doctors of all specialties moved in. Shwartz opened a pharmacy in the building. The tenants could pick up the phone and a runner would bring prescriptions down to the pharmacy. The patient picked it up before they returned to Canal Street.

k&b number 5

732 Canal Street, now a Foot Locker Store (via Google Maps)

The location is now a Foot Locker.

k&b number 5

Store No. 2, 841 Canal Street (at Dauphine)

K&B responded by opening a store at 841 Canal, across Dauphine Street from MB. Additionally, K&B enabled patients to transfer their scrips to the stores further uptown. So, you could see the doc on Canal Street and maintain your prescriptions near the house.

k&b number 5

Store no. 2, Canal and Dauphine Streets (streetcarmike.com photo)

The location later became the “Camera Center”

k&b number 5

Store number 3, St. Charles and Louisiana Avenues

K&B opened their third store at St. Charles and Louisiana. The building in the illustration was later demolished to make way for a more-modern store.

k&b number 5

NOPSI 926, heading inbound on the St. Charles Line, passes K&B store number 3 in the 1980s. (Streetcarmike.com photo)

The Louisiana Avenue store housed the chain’s photo-processing lab/operation on the second floor.

k&b number 5

Store number 4, S. Carrollton Ave. and Oak St.

The fourth store extended the reach of K&B out to the Oak Street retail area. They opened a store at S. Carrollton Avenue and Oak Street. The building is Still There More, as a Canseco’s Market.

1905-1997

k&b number 5

Chuck’s on the Avenue (Infrogmation photo)

Katz & Besthoff Drugstores operated from that first store in 1905 until 1997. The chain sold out to Rite-Aid at that time. The building remains, and is now a liquor store, Chuck’s on the Avenue.

Rex Dumbo 1960

Rex Dumbo 1960

by | Feb 24, 2022 | 1960s, Carnival, CBD, Katz and Besthof K&B, Maison Blanche, Retail

Rex Dumbo 1960 – the flying elephant appeared in the big parade.

rex dumbo 1960

Rex Dumbo 1960

“Dumbo, the Flying Elephant” in the 1960 Rex parade, 1-March-1960. This photo, by Howard “Cole” Coleman, offers a great “unpack.” It features several Canal Street stores, Maison Blanche, Katz and Besthof, Chandler’s Shoes. The K&B had been converted to the “Camera Center” by this time. The parade rolled down St. Charles Avenue from Uptown. It turned left going the wrong way up Canal, then made a u-turn at Rampart. Rex then rolled down to the river.

901 Canal Street

Maison Blanche dominates the 901 block. The store boasted five floors of retail space. The two towers of the “Maison Blanche Office Building” rose up an additional seven floors. The store’s entrance was at the corner of Canal and Dauphine Street (right behind Rex Dumbo 1960 here). The “office building” entrance stood at the other side of the building. A separate set of elevators lifted you up to a myriad of doctors, dentists, and other businesses above the store. The Ritz-Carlton New Orleans uses the old office building entrace as the main entrance of the hotel.

Katz and Besthof

K&B opened their store in the 800 block of Canal in the 1920s, to service those going to doctors in the MB building. By the late 1950s, the store became redundant, as the chain also operated a store across the street. So, K&B created the “Camera Center.” They sold cameras and photographic supplies on the second floor. The Camera Center grew in popularity, to the point where it took over the first floor as well.

Chandler’s to Baker’s

The Edison Brothers opened the first in their chain of Chandler’s Shoe Stores in 1922. By the 1930s, they expanded to New Orleans. They opened a Chandler’s in the 800 block, next to Lerner’s, just up from Gus Mayer and D. H. Holmes. The Edisons opened a second chain they called Baker’s Shoes. The New Orleans Chandler’s became a Baker’s in the 1970s. Baker’s eventually moved out to the malls. The chain closed the CBD location. The retail front of the building is now a spa/massage place.

King of Carnival

While many of the retail outlets on Canal Street erected grandstands, the stores in the 801 block chose not to. That offered prime parade-watching spots to folks who just wandered around. Cole Coleman stood on the neutral ground to get his photos. Additionally,Coleman crossed the neutral ground to take shots of the parade on the other side of Canal. At this time, Rex toasted his queen and the court at the Boston Club at 824 Canal.

The streetcars stopped, as they do today, at Liberty Street. They “switch-back” there, beginning their outbound runs.