RIP #4: Foley's Department Store Traditional Cache
teamCull: It's been a good run here, but all available spots are gone and I can't keep it going. Like Foley's, I will miss it.
RIP #4: Foley's Department Store
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(micro)
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The RIP series is dedicated to help us remember places and institutions gone from the Houston scene.
You need not get them in order or all in one day. Nab them at your convenience.
Well, here’s another piece of Houston’s history that has bitten the dust.
Foley’s Department Store was Houston’s most famous homegrown retail name. Federated Department Stores acquired the local legend and Foley’s was morphed into Macy’s in 2006.
The first Foley’s, Foley’s Brothers Dry Goods Co., opened in 1900 and carried calico, lace, linen and furnishings. Twenty-two years later, it was Houston’s largest department store.
Foley’s was always an integral part of the Houston community. Foley’s wasn’t just a business, it was a way of doing business. During the holiday season, nobody quite decorated their windows like Foley’s. If there was a parade downtown, you wanted to be in front of Foley's because that was where something exciting might happen. The individual department store is basically now a dinosaur, but these older stores had character and history that the newer national retailers will never, ever come close to imitating.
Foley’s even had its own ghost. During the Christmas season of 1994, a temporary employee was on the 9th floor, late one evening, when a little old lady in a pea green skirt outfit with a pea green felt hat with a feather in it came into the worker’s area. She had two bags full of Christmas gifts (wooden, not plastic toys) that she sat down by a stall. She told the worker to watch her bags and to have a warm damp towel ready for her when she got out. She then went into the stall. A few minute later when another employee came into the worker’s area, they called to the lady. After they got no response, they went into the stall but she was gone. When they looked for the bags, they were also gone.
My experience with Foley’s wasn’t so spooky. When I was a kid, I was always excited to go downtown. If I behaved myself, Mom would take us to the restaurant. I can’t remember which floor it was located on. I still have the Christmas photo of me, age 5, sitting on Santa’s lap. I had my favorite red flannel shirt on, the one with the rockets and Saturns on it. We didn’t go shopping downtown as much when the malls started popping up. But if I was down town, Foley’s was a place to browse.
At the time the downtown Foley’s was built, it was the largest building without a window above the first floor.
The cache is a magnetic key holder. It only has enough room for the log scroll, so bring your own writing implement. Look along Dallas Street, but it is not located on the building itself.
We're talking downtown, so muggles will be a constant nuisance. Stealth is definately required.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
xpno sb grrufarret!
Treasures
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