The Retailing Horderns
The Hordern family once controlled the largest Department Store in the World. The store Anthony Hordern & Sons built on a small hill in the Southern part of the Sydney CBD known as Brickfield Hill covered an area of 52 acres (27 hectares ).
The company was founded by Anthony and Ann Hordern in 1823 from a small bonnet and corset shop in King Street, Sydney with a saddlery located at the rear.
The business eventually grew into a department store located in George St Haymaket. With a growing family most of whom went into the retail trade, some starting their own retail businesses of which at one time amounted to six stores operated by members of the Hordern family.
Eventually many were merged into the one company of Anthony Hordern & Sons. In 1926 the site of Anthony Hordern & Sons was sold to a public company of the same name with the family having only one store of Hordern Brothers in Pitt St. Sydney.
The public company of Anthony Hordern & Sons was sold to Waltons Ltd.in 1970. The Brickfield Hill store closed in 1973 and is now the site of World Square, The Hordern name is remembered as part of the World Square site was named Hordern Tower.
In 1962 two brothers, Hunter and Ross Hordern, fifth generation descendants of Anthony and Ann Hordern, decided to look around for another retail business and settled on a company based in Windsor named M H Pulsford & Co. which operated a department store on the corner of George & Fitzgerald Sts which promoted themselves as the Friendly Corner Store.
The brothers renamed the Windsor store as H & R Hordern – Value Department Store. Maurice Pulsford had operated the store at the site since 1935 prior to that the original Pulsford store was located next to the old Post Office (now the site of the Post Office Arcade) later in 1910 Pulsford acquired the adjoining William Beard’s Ironmongery before moving the business to the George & Fitzgerald Sts. site in January 1920.
A feature of a number of early department stores was a ”cash railway” or ”cash carrier” and such a system was in use at Windsor during both Pulsford’s and Hordern’s times and both customers and staff had to be careful not to be struck by the wooden cash cup which caried the customer’s cash to the cashier and the change and receipt back to the sales desk for the for sales assistant to hand to the customer.
Goods were delivered to outlying customers at Wisemans Ferry, Ebenezer and other locations by the use of buses going to those areas.
The store sold everything from foundation garments (underwear) to hardware and has also sold guns, ammunition and explosives such as gelignite.
Hunter Hordern speaking to a journalist back in 1998 said “We keep the old philosophy of good value and good service” Hunter went on to say “I think that Windsor is a wonderful town for trading. The Windsor people are loyal to the local traders in the town and we have enjoyed giving them the best service possible.
When brothers Hunter and Ross Hordern decided to retire towards the end of the 20th century they sold the business in three lots. The Hardware section was sold in1996, ladies wear in 1998 and finally menswear in 1999.
Several of the fittings and fixtures were donated at around the turn of the century to the Hawkesbury Historical Society and formed the basis of the museum’s 2013 exhibition.