The Mall of Memphis opens to crowds on October 7, 1981


Sweet, sultry, sweat-soaked Memphis, city of the blues and the barbecue, where the Mississippi rolls lazy like a hungover alligator and the air hangs thick with the scent of fried everything. And here we are, on this balmy autumn morning of October 7, 1981, when the whole damn town—White, Black, rich, poor, the debutantes and the factory hands—pours out of their shotgun shacks and split-level ranches like ants from a hill that's been dynamited by the hand of Progress himself. Progress with a capital P, mind you, the kind that wears a hard hat and a grin wider than the Grand Canyon, courtesy of those Memphis land barons James Bridger and Stanley Trezevant Jr., who back in 1972 started snapping up acreage on Cherry Road and American Way like it was the last rack of ribs at Rendezvous.

Picture it, folks: the sun's barely crested the treetops out by Nonconnah Creek, and already the parking lots—five thousand five hundred and sixty-four spaces, each one a concrete promise of liberation from the dusty downtown strip malls—are filling up faster than a televangelist's collection plate. Lincoln Continentals with opera windows and pickup trucks with gun racks nose in alongside the sensible Fords and the occasional VW van plastered with peace stickers that's seen better days. 

Sixty thousand souls—sixty thousand!—are converging on this behemoth, this 885,627-square-foot monument to American consumerism, the biggest damn mall in Tennessee, a title it'll hold like a beauty queen's crown until Chattanooga sneaks up and snatches it in 1988.

The Mall of Memphis! Ah, what a name! Evokes the pyramids at Giza, the cotton fields heavy with boll weevils, Elvis himself rising from Graceland like a sequined phoenix. But no, this is no ancient wonder—it's a bi-level bonanza of beige tile and plate-glass dreams, built on the old landfills of the Depression era, where the ghosts of Hoovervilles might still whisper complaints about the vibration in the upper promenade.

Anchor stores? You bet your blue suede shoes: Dillard's on the west end, gleaming with racks of Calvin Klein jeans and Halston blouses for the ladies who lunch, soon to be joined by J.C. Penney, H.J. Wilson, and Thalhimer's.

But it's the in-betweens, the glittering guts of the beast, that send the crowd into a frenzy. One hundred and forty shops, each one a portal to paradise: The Limited for the coeds in leg warmers, stocking up on Esprit minis; RadioShack for the gadget geeks tweaking their TRS-80s; a food court with seventeen bays slinging Chick-fil-A sandwiches and Orange Bowl pizza slices to the masses, who gobble it down elbow-to-elbow like it's the Last Supper. A glittering Gold Mine Arcade for the gamers. And the General Cinema Corporation's five-screen multiplex—yes, five screens!—flickering with previews of Halloween II and Porky's, the popcorn butter so thick you could spackle a wall. 

Up on the second level, the Ice Capades Chalet, Memphis's one and only public rink, where kids in rental skates—blades dull as a politician's promise—wobble out for figure eights, the Zamboni humming like a contented walrus while parents sip hot cocoa and dream of Dorothy Hamill's Olympic glory. And presiding over it all? Hamill herself! Yes! She was there, too! Skating across the ice, her famous wedge haircut absolutely GLEAMING under the lights! A vision of wholesomeness! A vision of excellence! A vision of the American Dream, right there on skates, just for them, the folks of Memphis, who had come to bear witness to this amazing new thing that had landed right smack-dab in their own backyard.

There! Look! A family of four, the Mom a vision in a polyester pantsuit of a truly spectacular plaid, the Dad with his sideburns and his mustache, both of them staring with a sort of ecstatic terror at the two-story water fountain that gurgled and bubbled in the center of it all. It was more than a fountain! It was a geyser! A monument to American Ingenuity and Good Taste, a monument that shot water TWENTY-FIVE FEET IN THE AIR, and the kids, their little hands clutching at the hems of their parents' clothes, just a-gaping at the spectacle of it all, at the sheer watery prowess of the thing!

And then - they left! They finally, inevitably, had to leave! Out the big sliding glass doors and back into the humid Memphis night, their cars just BURSTING with the sheer, sweet, glorious STUFF of it all! New clothes! New shoes! A new album! A new video game! All of it a sort of physical evidence of their very own American success story! A souvenir from the future!

Yes! The future had landed in West Tennessee! And on October 7, 1981, it had a name: The Mall of Memphis. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Location: 4451 American Way, Memphis, TN 38118, USA

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