120-Year Fields Tradition To Close After Business Saturday

Pat Clark, her husband Tim, and her mother Geraldine Schwesinger have been meeting friends on Tuesdays for years at Fields of Pikesville.

These days, Tim orders the Spanish omelette nearly every time. But their gathering this past Tuesday was different.

It would be their last meeting there—forever.

That's because, after business Saturday, the 120-year-old store will close for good.

There simply haven't been enough customers during the past two years to sustain business, . 

"We were just talking about that, about where we will meet next week," Pat Clark said. "It's our last time at Fields. It's sad."

Clark isn't just one of the weekly regulars. She's been visiting since she was a child. And so has Schwesinger, age 92.

"My mother was born in 1919 and Fields was here then," Clark said. "She's been coming here ever since she's been living."

Schwesinger recalls walking to Fields after school to buy a Coke.

"It was just a little store with little, round tables, and you could get sandwiches, eggs, Cokes," she said, recalling Fields from her school days.

Later in the 1980s and 90s, Schwesinger recalls being among the coffee club members who met daily at what had become the pharmacy, eatery and gift store.

"It's terrible," Schwesinger said of the store's closing this week.

Clark, too, recalls walking up to the old Fields site from Pikesville Elementary School—formerly on the land at the Pikesville Branch Library—to get a small glass of Coke for a nickel, just as her mother had also done. "It's a tradition that's gone," she said.

Earlier this month, owner Jeff Levin said business just hasn't been good enough lately to remain open.

On Tuesday, Dani Levin, Jeff's wife, explained that "Small stores can't survive any more."

She runs the cosmetics department, and took a look at the barren shelves, many announcing "50% Off" on remaining products.

"I never thought I'd see the day when I don't have a (single) moisturizer, foundation, blush or eyebrow pencil to sell," she said, reviewing what's in stock after the store's closeout sales this month.

"There are no colors left."

During the past month, many former customers have been returning, after hearing of , Levin said. "Where were they the past couple of years?"

However, she indicated that she knows the answer. "They were at the mall."

The Levin family opened Fields in 1892 as a small pharmacy—the town pharmacy—and it's been in business ever since, expanding in the 1970s into high-end cosmetics—including Chanel products—and gifts, as well.

Taking a stroll around the four areas of Fields of Pikesville is like traveling through time.

In the cosmetics department are two built-in, floor-to-ceiling phone booths—sans phones these days.

Formica-and-steel shelving is barren. There are specialty hair combs for sale, greeting cards, and small, dime-store treasures such as plastic dinosaurs and model cars.

On special for 50 percent off are Ty Beanie Babies, as well as "Hanes Too" pantyhose in colors such as 'Bare Buff,' both staples of the 1990s.

There are specialty items, including bags of milk chocolate-covered potato chips. And there's a small Lance snacks display marketing a variety of crackers and cookies.

Most items are on sale.

Back at Fields Counter, a dining area that includes a diner-style counter with stools, Carroll Phillips has arrived. He's one of the friends the Clarks were meeting.

He said he'll miss the crab soup in particular, but "the quality of food" in general.

Fields make the best milkshakes in town, he said.

Susie Hagins of Catonsville has been working here for the past six years.

The stationery department clerk and waitress was taking orders Tuesday afternoon at the Fields Counter and Fields Court areas of the store.

She said she hasn't looked for another job yet.

"It hasn't sunken in," she said. "We are here til the end," she said of herself and other employees. "We haven't ventured out to look for anything."

When asked why not, she explained it's a matter of loyalty.

"He's a good boss," she said of Jeff Levin. "He looks out for everybody, and it's worthwhile staying. It's a pleasure."

Fields, located at 1401 Reisterstown Rd, is open through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Read more about Fields:

When was your last visit? What did you do, and what did you order?