Phelps-Terkel

{{Short description|Defunct men's clothing store based in Los Angeles}}

File:Miracle Mile 1960s Postcard.jpg and Mullen & Bluett stores]]

Phelps-Terkel was a Los Angeles based department store specializing in men's clothing.

The store was founded by Richard (Dick) B. Terkel and David S. Phelps{{cite news |title=Phelps-Terkel will become Phelps-Wilger |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/31097340/phelps/ |access-date=1 May 2019 |publisher=Pasadena Independent |date=22 September 1965}} in 1923.{{cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/31097306/phelps_terkel/|title=Phelps Offers Long Tradition of Fine Menswear (advertising supplements) |access-date=1 May 2019 |work=Los Angeles Times |date=12 February 1987}} Dick Terkel, a haberdasher, hailed from Wisconsin and moved to Berkeley then Los Angeles. He played banjo and led a band. He rented half of his store at the entrance to the University of Southern California (USC) to David Phelps, musician, who sold music there.

On September 15, 1926, the retailer opened a store in Palo Alto, California near Stanford University at 524 Ramona Street.{{cite news |title=Advertisement |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-peninsula-times-tribune-advertisemen/145685229/ |access-date=19 April 2024 |work=The Peninsula Times Tribune |date=13 September 1926 |pages=3}} Later it would operate at 219 University Avenue.

Its 1936 Miracle Mile, Los Angeles Modernist store at 5550 Wilshire Boulevard, corner of S. Burnside Avenue, designed by Morgan, Walls and Clements and shared with Desmond's department store and other tenants. The Los Angeles Conservancy remarked that together with its neighbor Mullen and Bluett, the stores "helped secure the Miracle Mile's reputation as a shopper's paradise".[https://www.laconservancy.org/locations/mullen-and-bluett-demolished "Mullen and Bluett", Los Angeles Conservancy]

In 1949 it opened a store in North Hollywood on Lankershim Boulevard, and 4 years later on December 7, 1953, it opened a new store next door to the old one, twice as large.{{cite news |title=Open Stores in N.H., Los Angeles near S.C. |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/valley-times-open-stores-in-nh-los-an/145675898/ |access-date=19 April 2024 |work=Valley Times |date=7 December 1953 |pages=7}}

In mid-1953 the retailer opened a store at 512 Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica. Later that year, they opened a new USC store at 3406 S. Hoover Street to replace its original store, which the university needed in order to expand.

In 1965 the firm became part of Phelps-Wilger chain, based at 10924 Weyburn Avenue in Westwood Village; together the new chain had stores in:

• Miracle Mile, 5550 Wilshire Blvd., later Phelps-Meager, closed c.1976
• Pasadena, 422 S. Lake, later Phelps, closed c.1979
• Westwood Village
• Sherman Oaks Fashion Square - later Phelps-La Crosse, closed c.1982
• Newport Beach (Fashion Island) - store was to open in 1965. Closed after 1987.

There was at one time also a store in Lakewood Center.{{cite news |last1=Woodyard |first1=Chris |title=Retail |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-06-11-fi-454-story.html |work=Los Angeles Times |date=11 June 1992}}

Tom Selleck was once a salesclerk at the Sherman Oaks store.

In its final years, Phelps-Wilger was renamed Phelps, and closed in 1992.