John Gillespy Myers (1831-1901) [Section 30 Lot 1]
Owner of Myers Department Store, President of Albany Hospital, Governor of Albany Orphan Asylum, Director of Albany Railway, Vice-President of National Savings Bank, Trustee of Albany Female Academy (Albany Girl’s Academy), Vice-President of Commerce Insurance Company, trustee of Albany Rural Cemetery
John Gillespy Myers was born on August 4, 1831, in Mt. Marion, N.Y.. present-day Saugerties, to John Benjamin Myers and Arriet Gillespy. His family lived there for a while before moving to Montezuma, Cayuga County, where he worked on the family farm. Around 1846 he moved back to the Hudson Valley, living with his uncle in Saugerties and working his general store as a clerk; while at the while attending school.
Working in his uncle’s store prompted him to go into the business of wholesale and dry goods, working in several stores around the state. Around 1852 he worked at a store in Port Byron, about five miles from his family in Montezuma; however, the store closed by 1857. While living in Cayuga County, he married Mary Augusta Young; together, they had three children, Margaret, Jessie, and Georgina.
The Myers family moved to New York City where John worked for Clapp & Kent, but by 1860 he established his store on the corner of Bleecker and Christopher Street around the same time as the NYC draft riots. By the mid-1860s the family moved to Albany where John established a partnership with William Whitney taking over the North Pearl Street business, Ubsdell, Pierson & Lenox, which was also known as The New York Store. This partnership continued for five years when the company was dissolved. Both opened their own department stores, located almost next to each other on North Pearl Street, John’s was known as Myer’s Department Store.
John died on December 1, 1901, in Albany at his home at 240 State Street. He is buried in the Myers family plot located near the Cypress Pond. Within the Myers family plot lays one of the most recognizable bronze sculptures within the cemetery. Italian sculptor Giuseppe Moretti was commissioned to do the piece, which was one of his favorite works; he kept a smaller copy of it in his studio, and it later added to Moretti’s own monument in Italy.
Upon John Myer’s death, an editorial to the Albany Evening Journal stated: "Not only to the business community of Albany but to the city as a whole, the death of John G. Myers causes a loss that will be felt. He was one of the city's most enterprising, progressive and successful businessmen, and because of the interest which he took in any movement for the promotion of Albany's welfare, one of its most highly valued citizens. The record of his life presents at once a model and an incentive to young men. He achieved conspicuous personal prosperity through honesty and liberality in his dealings with his fellow men; he was a kind employer, a generous giver to the poor — a liberal contributor to every worthy project; in short, a type of the best citizenship. His death has brought sorrow to a large circle of friends and acquaintances, and regret to many who were not personally acquainted with him, but knew him by repute."
Throughout his life, John was dedicated to many civic organizations around Albany, as well as being adverse to publicity. In addition to being a Presbyterian and a Republican, he had a deeply vested interest to the Albany Hospital where he had served as their president. He was a member of the Fort Orange Club; Philip Livingston Chapter Sons of the Revolution; the Holland Society; as well as governor of the Albany Orphan Asylum; a director of the Albany Railway; vice-president of the National Savings Bank; vice-president of the Merchants' National Bank; and a trustee of the Albany Female Academy, later known as Albany Girls' Academy. In 1891 he served as one of four special commissioners which looked into securing a purer water supply to the City of Albany.
Myer’s Department Store suffered a severe fire on August 8, 1905, at 8:45 am which left 13 dead, injuring around 100. The building was undergoing extensive improvements, which included the creation of a sub-cellar. However, the workmen dug too close to the main supports which resulted in a weakened foundation an eventual collapse of the five-story structure. The event made its way to the front page of the New York Times, citing it the worst catastrophe in Albany since the Delavan Hotel. Many of those affected were women and girls who became entombed in the rumble with rescuers hearing moans in the debris. Whitney’s Department Store closed their store that day where it served as a temporary hospital.
Myer’s consisted of two existing structures which was described as a network of confusing narrow hallways which made evacuation of the structure next to impossible. However, this catastrophe resulted in the creation of the City of Albany Bureau of Code Enforcement.
The store reopened in the same location served as a commercial anchor until the 1970s when it eventually closed due to the rise of suburban shopping malls. Myer’s Department Store garnered the nickname “the Macy’s and Gimbels of Albany.”