1892 - Retail, Trade

Retail, Trade

May Company founder David May and his three brothers-in-law pay $150,000 in cash to acquire the St. Louis store Famous Company (see Denver, 1888). They will buy a Cleveland store in 1898 (see Cleveland, 1914).

Abercrombie & Fitch has its beginnings in the small, waterfront sporting-goods shop and factory opened in New York's South Street by Baltimore-born merchant-inventor David T. Abercrombie, who has worked as a trapper, prospector, and railroad surveyor. Most of the customers for his camping, fishing, and hunting gear are professional hunters, explorers, and trappers, but they will soon include Kingston, New York, lawyer and outdoorsman Ezra Fitch.