Totem Lake Mall: An Update and Info Dump

 Update:  Yeah, it’s still empty.  The fly-by-night ink store in the lower mall shut down and it looks like a small closeout store is currently occupying the former Grab Bag location for the time being, but there’s not much to report.  The City of Kirkland hasn’t reported anything  new with regards to the redevelopment plans, and the DDR webpage for the mall hasn’t even bothered to update to reflect the closing of the CompUSA store more than a year ago. 

With that out of the way, I would like to go ahead and give a quick summary of what I have been able to learn so far with regards to the history of this mall.  When I originally wrote my Totem Lake Mall profile, just about all I had to work with was a mostly empty mall sitting in the middle of Kirkland and a few random facts from a Wikipedia article.  Since I wrote that post, it has become one of the more popular ones on my Blog, since information on this mall seems to be rather scarce on the Web.  Since then, I have begun doing some research into the mall and its history in order to show the mall in better days, and give some more insight into how the property has reached its present state.  I intend to do the same with the other malls in the area (I am trying to collect info on the history of Crossroads now, although I haven’t found a lot there yet.  Factoria Mall and Bellevue Square will come later.)  Most of what I have found so far has come from some (admittedly brief) searching in microfilm archives from the East Side Journal, which was a weekly newspaper based out of Kirkland at the time.  The summary can be found after the jump.

 What I have been able to find out so far:

• The mall was originally known as Totem Lake Center.  The picture above shows the mall’s original logo, and is one of the few things that I have been able to get a clear picture of from the microfilm.
• The mall was originally scheduled to open on May 1st, 1973, but the opening was delayed.  A few of the larger stores opened on May 12th, while the mall itself had its ribbon-cutting ceremony on May 31st.
• When the mall was first opened, the Lamont’s store was still under construction.  It would not open up until October 17th, 1973.
• The newspapers from the time when the mall opened include a number of advertisements for the newly opened mall.  Among these can be found one with a complete listing and map of the stores which were in the lower mall when it opened, and another provides a few details on those stores.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get the whole thing onto one page, so I will probably need to go back to make more copies and make an image that I can stitch together. 
• A significant portion of the mall was originally occupied by the various brands of the Pay ‘n Save corporation, which included Lamonts, Pay ‘n Save Drugs (which later became first Thrifty, then Payless, then Rite Aid), Ernst Hardware and Garden (which closed down in 1996,) Malmo Nursery (later integrated into Ernst, with the same fate)  and Schuck’s Auto Supply (which is the only former Pay ‘n Save subsidiary to remain in operation today, under the CSK Auto corporation.)  The Ernst store occupied the space that currently has the Ross, Famous Footwear and Car Toys stores, and used to have a mall entrance which was removed when the space was subdivided.  The former CompUSA space was originally occupied by Olson’s Marketplace, a local grocery store chain that was merged into QFC in the late Nineties, which was subsequently purchased by Fred Meyer in 1997, which was then purchased by Kroger a couple of years later.  In fact, the QFC in Bella Bottega where I do much of my grocery shopping these days was an Olson’s when I first moved here.
• The whole entire mall was decorated to look like an Indian longhouse, and included a number of totem poles, including a very large one which served as the mall’s sign.  According to Loita Hawkinson of the Kirkland Heritage Society, the original wooden totem pole is still underneath the current Totem Lake Mall sign in the front.  The sign itself exceeds the current height regulations for signs in the City of Kirkland, but this particular sign was grandfathered in.

What I still need to research:

• The history of the Upper/East Mall.  It appears that this was completed roughly a year after the lower mall was opened, but I need to see if I can determine what businesses were there at the time.  I haven’t gone into the 1974 microfilm yet, so there should still be some good info to find here.
• Key milestones.  I am told that the decline of the mall began when Bellevue Square was rebuilt as an enclosed mall in the late Seventies, and was hastened by the decline of Pay ‘n Save. 

 What I would really like to find:

• Good pictures of the mall in the early days.  There are pictures in the microfilmed newspapers, but those are basically xerox copies of xerox copies at this point, and most are too indistinct to really be useful.  I have just found out that the Redmond Historical Societyis receiving a donation of archived copies of the Sammamish  Valley News (another newspaper based out of Redmond) which should cover this time period, so I will have to check to see if this might include anything that might be of interest.  In fact, any older pictures that people might have of this mall would be interesting.  If you happen to have any; please let me know (my e-mail address is found on the sidebar.)

I still intend to put together a more comprehensive post on the history of this mall when I have completed more research and found more info, and this is just an incomplete summary of what I have found so far.  At the same time I am also trying to find similar info for Crossroads, although I think I should have some leads for that one.  Again, any info people might have would be greatly appreciated.