Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!

I should’ve stuck with my first thought.

When I did my series on my mother’s beauty shop, my initial thought was to call it Arlene’s Beauty Shoppe because that’s how I seemed to remember the wording on the sign that hung on our house for those several years. But I wasn’t sure, as it seemed a bit twee, to use a Britishism, so I checked with my sister, and she wasn’t sure either. 

So instead of going with my first thought, or with my gut, so to speak, I chickened out and used the more conventional spelling of shop, as I couldn’t verify it one way or the other. The sign was long since gone, and my mother was no longer with us to ask.

Then a few days ago I came across this in a 1960 advertisement for the Richland Carnaval:

I don’t know why Arlene decided to use Shoppe instead of Shop. Presumably it was just to set her business apart of other places. Marketing 101.

A quick check of the relative frequency in the Lebanon Daily News between 1950 and 1970 reveals about 800 instances of “Beauty Shoppe” vs. over 5000 of “Beauty Shop”.

Whether she got the idea on her own or whether someone suggested it to her, I have no idea.

Anyway, I just wanted to set the record straight.