Events will help Macomb Mall celebrate 60-year milestone

ROSEVILLE — John Saylor was a junior high school student living in Roseville when Macomb Mall first opened in 1964 at Gratiot Avenue and Masonic Boulevard.

“We’d never seen anything like it. The mall was brand-new and it was pretty amazing,” Saylor said. “The night the mall opened, my whole family piled up in the car and went to see the new mall. There were hundreds of people doing the same thing we were, just walking around, pointing and looking.”

During his senior year of high school, Saylor, now 73, of Clinton Township, worked as a stock boy at Sears, which has since closed.

“All of the guys working there, we had a lot of fun,” he said.

Macomb Mall will celebrate its 60-year anniversary from 12:30 to 3 p.m. Oct. 26. The Eastpointe-Roseville Chamber of Commerce will make an appearance, and the Recreation Authority of Roseville and Eastpointe will set up arts and crafts.

At 1 p.m., things will disappear with a show from magician Cameron Zvara. At 2 p.m., enjoy a Cyr wheel performance by Spinnovation Detroit. There will be cake and goodie bags. Mall staff members look forward to celebrating the mall’s longevity in the community.

“We are the main shopping hub here in southeastern Detroit,” Macomb Mall Marketing Coordinator Elaishia Outley said. “We have stores tailor-made for everyone in the family. Every month we host events and we like to be part of the community.”

The mall currently has about 50 stores, including Kohl’s, Sephora, Dick’s, Hobby Lobby and Old Navy. General Manager Marianne Meyers began working at the mall in 2004. She believes Macomb Mall provides “a great mix of tenants from local, mom-and-pop stores to international chain stores all within a clean, bright, and modern facility.”

“We continue to strive to make Macomb Mall a great environment to shop. Our staff is invested in the mall and many of us have grown up in the area and continue to create partnerships and camaraderie with tenants, customers and community,” she said via email. “During the course of my tenure here, I have built relationships with our loyal mall walkers, tenants, and corporate entities, but I have built a better understanding of the community we serve at large. And that’s what I enjoy and value the most — the relationships we have built with the community. We are always listening to customers and paying close attention to the market to evaluate the ever-changing landscape of retail and if we are meeting relevancy goals.”

 

‘They had all the stores I liked’
Through its history, many stores came and went, including Crowley’s, B. Dalton Bookseller, Harmony House Records and Tapes, Little Caesars Pizza, and an abundance of clothing retailers. The mall became a hangout for teenagers, too, and at one time movie fans could check out the latest flicks at the Silver Cinema.

Jean Wincenciak, who grew up in Roseville, remembers when the mall was built.

“It was so exciting when it first opened,” said Wincenciak, 76, who now resides in Florida. “I used to go when I was single. That was the hot spot.”

Even when she lived in Warren and Royal Oak, she was still a Macomb Mall patron. She liked that it was a smaller size than some of the other malls.

“I would bring my children there. They had all the stores I liked,” she said. “They had a Sears and Winkelman’s. There was a pet store, they had sports stores, and little oddball stores. It was my favorite mall at the time.”

The Eastsider also heard from readers via email after a message about the 60-year anniversary was posted on the Roseville Michigan Historical Group Facebook page. The mall was a big part of Paula C. Laroway’s life. When attending Eastland Junior High School, she and her brother Hugh often walked to the mall.

“I probably went there thousands of times over the years, and at 72, I still pop in to see how the mall is doing,” she said via email. “Winkelman’s was a weekly favorite, they had all the styles, and I shopped diligently for low priced high fashion sales.”

One of her “most precious finds” was a black full-length wool coat cape with a large black tassel hanging from the hood. The cape’s shoulder was clasped by a large Chinese knot frog. With a $40 price tag, Laroway used up most of her babysitting money for the purchase.

“But I had also bought a pair of knee high black boots that laced up the front,” she said. “I called it my ‘Black Sabbath’ outfit. Definitely kept miniskirted legs cozy on a winter day.”

Another tie to the mall was the years Laroway worked at the Kresge’s counter. She was pregnant with her second child, and sometimes her boss gave her jobs so she could sit down.

“I made a lot of milkshakes while working the counter, and taking orders,” she recalled. “In the morning I made egg salad and tunafish salad sandwiches, wrapping them in cellophane that I sealed on a heated pad.”

One of Sharon Nummer’s earliest recollections in the mid-1970s was telling Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, at age 5 or 6, what she wanted for Christmas: a Neil Diamond album. Another highlight was the Roseville High School Rock-A-Thon fundraiser in which students rocked in rocking chairs for 24 hours straight.

And four generations of the family all found jobs at the mall. Nummer’s grandmother worked in the Sears cafeteria in the 1960s and ’70s, her mom worked as part-time seasonal help at Kohl’s in the 1990s, and Nummer, now of Clinton Township, got her first job at the Gap in 1988. Her son got his first job in 2021 working at the Del Taco in the mall’s parking lot.

Some of Pat Craik’s happiest times at the mall were seeing “2001: A Space Odyssey” with his dad and “Westworld” with a group of friends at the movie theater. Macomb Mall also came in handy when Craik needed a sports jacket for formal events. He wasn’t sure where to get started, so he headed for Hughes & Hatcher.

“Mr. Lang fixed me up perfectly with a complete suit,” Craik emailed. “I got several compliments. Pretty cool experience.”

Macomb Mall is located at 32233 Gratiot Ave. in Roseville. Call (586) 293-7800 for more information.