The Daily Mall Reader: West Acres Shopping Center

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Malls fuel retail surge

The Forum - 07/18/1999

(Excerpt) Twenty-seven years ago, sitting along a gravel township road in the middle of fields, West Acres Regional Shopping Center opened its doors for the first time.

"On the land where Carl Rabanus raised oats, wheat, corn and barley for 34 years, the mirage has become a reality," The Forum wrote on the eve of the Fargo mall's grand opening.

"The deep, black, fertile soil of glacial Lake Agassiz lies covered beneath parking lot asphalt, and like a dot on a domino, the West Acres building awaits its customers and a harvest of another sort."

At the time, some considered Bill Schlossman's 15-acre innovation so ludicrous they labeled it Schlossman's Folly.

Now an estimated 10 million people visit West Acres every year.

The modern concept of stores sharing the same roof first arrived in Fargo-Moorhead in 1950.

Read the full article here.