Cash Penney and his visit to Iowa

The story goes that James Cash Penney, back in the late 1930s, walked into one of his southwest Iowa department stores. He struck up a conversation with a sales clerk, circulated, chatted with other employees. He soon realized that not a person in the place had the slightest idea of who he was.  

A chagrined Mr. Penney left Atlantic, returned to his corporate office in New York and issued a directive. Effective immediately each and every J.C. Penney store was to display a prominently posted portrait of the founder.  Penney was older than the portrait, grew older, yet the likeness never changed.  

It probably did not serve the purpose intended.  

While Bob Tidgren of Red Oak can't vouch for this story, he has no doubt that Penney himself was the type who did not forget a face.  Tidgren's great uncle, Oscar F. Shepard, went to work for Penney back when the chain was just beginning.  They were then called “The Golden Rule” stores.  Shepard, known as “O.F.,” went west where he did quite well. He managed four stores and was able to retire at the age of 39.  

Years later Tidgren's mother and Oscar Shepard traveled to Missouri to attend a livestock show and sale.  Penney, who was raised in Missouri, owned land there and had an extensive cattle business.  At the stock show Penney spotted Tidgren, called him by name and greeted him warmly.  

Penney (1875-1971) was an interesting man.  The son of a minister he was told, at the age of eight, that he would have to buy his own clothes.  While his parents were hardly well-to-do, they could afford the boy's apparel.  Their purpose was for him to learn values and thrift. 

Young J.C. raised and sold pigs and watermelons, and watched what he spent on shoes.    

His biography tells us that following high school he went to work as a clerk in a Hamilton, Mo., dry goods store. He was paid $25 a month. He saved, bought a butcher shop and promptly went broke. He took a job with the Golden Rule Mercantile store and eventually built his own company.  

By 1929 Penney had nearly 1,400 stores. When the Depression hit he went broke a second time, losing an estimated $40 million. He borrowed money and, at the age of 56 started all over again.  

While Penney at different times had headquarters in both Utah and New York, his Missouri roots frequently drew him to the Midwest.  He was liable, as store employees in Atlantic had learned the hard way, to drop by unannounced.  

On one of his trips through Iowa in 1940, he visited a Des Moines store and watched a trainee wrap packages. Penney, showed the 22-year-old how to do the job with less ribbon.   

The young trainee was Sam Walton.  

The Red Oak Express

2012 Commerce Drive
P.O. Box 377
Red Oak, IA 51566
Phone: 712-623-2566 Fax: 712-623-2568

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