Lima, Ohio’s Lima Mall will get a sorely needed shot in the arm when its new Target superstore opens on November 8th. For people who prefer shopping inside vibrant businesses instead of taking photos of abandoned ones, Target’s entry into the market is great news! I just wish Lima’s landmark Lazarus didn’t have to be demolished to make it happen.
Lima is an oil town, and it boomed in the years after World War II. By the time the 1960s rolled around, the city was home to more than 50,000 people! Two competitors -the Edward J. DeBartolo Corporation1 and William Cafaro Associates2, both of Youngstown- decided to build malls. Sears at DeBartolo’s Lima Mall opened in September 19653, while Bailey’s at Cafaro’s American Mall three miles south came online two months later4.
The rest of Lima Mall opened in November 19655, while American Mall -named for the township both malls stood in, not the country at large- followed in October 19666. Lima’s head start, combined with what was arguably a stronger lineup of stores, quickly established a pecking order between the two properties. Lima Mall endured, and American Mall didn’t. Today, little more than a grassy footprint amidst a thirty-acre sea of concrete barely suggests that American Mall ever existed. I’ll write about it soon.
At the beginning, the $12 million Lima Mall was said to be the largest shopping center ever built in a city Lima’s size7. Anchored by a 100,000-square-foot Sears, a 100,000-square-foot J.C. Penney with a partial second floor8, Woolworth’s, and local department store The Leader9, Lima Mall featured thirty tenants. Pangle’s Master Market was a big one, but Thrift Drugs, Zales Jewelry, Richman Brothers, Paul Harris, Kinney Shoes, Abraham’s, and, later, a theater rounded out the mix10. At the center of the T-shaped structure stood an enormous fountain beneath greenery suspended from a twenty-foot ceiling. Each of the mall’s three concourses were designed to evoke the atmosphere of a park11.
Lima Mall’s first major change came when Lazarus was added to its west side. The gargantuan 165,000-square-foot building was the Columbus-based chain’s sixth branch and only its second outside of Franklin County. Lazarus featured a complete fashion store at mall level, a Lazarus Budget Store with its own entrance, a second-floor Children’s World, and a third-floor home department with electronics. Even its massive dome was put to use: the Sky View Restaurant and Inn-A-Hurry Coffee Shop were situated beneath it12.
Lima’s new Lazarus dwarfed the rest of the mall. The exterior featured glazed Wyandotte blue brick and aggregate concrete panels, while its domed tower rose a whopping ninety-six feet13 above the mall’s parking lot. That’s nearly three-quarters the height of the Allen County Courthouse downtown! Others in Mansfield and Kingsdale, near Columbus, were contemporaries.
After Lazarus opened, many changes came to Lima Mall over the years. The Leader became a subsidiary of Dayton-based Elder-Beerman in 197414, and Woolworth’s closed in 1997. Inline tenants came and went, while Lazarus became Lazarus-Macy’s in 2003. The combined brand dropped the Lazarus name altogether two years later15. Elder-Beerman’s parent company, Bon-Ton, closed its Lima store in 201516, then Sears finally shut down along with seventy-eight others in 201817.
Macy’s hung on in the old Lazarus space until 2021, when its parent company announced plans to close forty-six stores18. The closure left J.C. Penney as Lima Mall’s only remaining traditional anchor and the landmark Lazarus building as a sitting duck. Fortunately for shoppers -but sadly for folks like me- that’s where Target stepped in. In February, the Lima News announced that the company had acquired a nine-acre portion of the mall -the old Lazarus/Macy’s- for $4.5 million19.
Rumors of Target’s entry into the Lima market -a big deal- had churned for decades20. Demolition of the old Lazarus/Macy’s began in April 2025. At least Allen County Commissioner Brian Winegardner threw us retail history fans a bone before it came down, calling the old Lazarus “an iconic building” at an event held before the destruction commenced21.
Today, less than two months before Lima’s new 126,000-square-foot Target is scheduled to open22, the building looks great! As for the rest of the mall, though -ehh, I’m not sure. Much of it speaks to its MCM history, and I love that, but jarring transitions separate the recent and the elderly. That said, a new owner -Maryland-based Rocky Companies- bought the mall in 2023 and has big plans for the place.
One of Rocky Companies’ site plans included with the mall’s leasing materials shows a mix of indoor and outdoor-facing tenants, an approach malls in places like Kokomo and Fort Wayne have successfully employed. The plan also calls for subdividing the old Sears into three spaces through renovation or replacement23.
I didn’t have time to venture in, but, for what it’s worth, Lima Mall still seems pretty vital -at least from the outside. Its website lists stores like Aeropostale, American Eagle, and Bath & Body Works, although that last one is never a great sign of a mall’s vibrancy. There’s also Cinnabon, Claire’s, GNC, Hot Topic, Kay Jewelers, Lids, Maurices, Old Navy, Shoe Dept. Encore, Spencer’s, The Children’s Place, and J.C. Penney. More than sixty years after it opened, Lima Mall still has a lot to offer!
To that end, some of the mall’s exterior has been remodeled with flat gray paint, an occasional mural, and contemporary flat-topped roofs, but the old anchors seem not to have been touched. That creates those incongruous transitions between the parts of the mall that are viable and those areas that aren’t. Even the New Formalist J.C. Penney’s tie to the new Target is a little harsh!
Still, at this stage, I lament the loss of that landmark Lazarus. I understand why Target needed a clean slate, and I’d rather see Lima Mall adapt to the realities of modern retail than join American Mall as another grassy footprint surrounded by acres of empty pavement. Target gives the property something it desperately needs: a major retailer people will actually make a special trip to visit.
That’s good for Lima, and I hope it’s good for the mall’s next sixty years. At the same time, though, progress has a habit of erasing the very buildings that made a place distinctive, and that ninety-six-foot dome was about as distinctive as they came. I’m glad Target is coming to Lima. I just wish there had been room for the future without completely bulldozing one of the most memorable pieces of its past.
Sources Cited
1 Allen, E. (1965, August 18). October’s Opening Of Lima Mall Sees 1st of 30 Firms, Services. The Lima News. p. 13.
2 New American Mall Stores Ready Grand Pre-Opening (1966, March 22). The Lima News. p. 6.
3 Store Opening Gives Public First Glimpse Of Lima Mall (1965, September 29). The Lima Star. p. 3.
4 Bailey’s Department Store Opening In American Mall (1965, November 9). The Lima News. p. 18.
5 (See footnote 1).
6 American Mall Plans Opening (1966, October 11). The Lima News. p. 18.
7 Lima Retail Firms Blazing Many New Trails (1965, September 8). The Lima Star. p. 6.
8 (See footnote 7).
9 Leader Opening Second Store With New Outlet At Lima Mall (1965, November 17). The Lima News. p. 18.
10 (See footnote 1).
11 (See footnote 1).
12 Lazarus Lima Mall Store Debuts (1971, July 29). The Lima News. p. 17.
13 (See footnote 12).
14 Leader Becomes Subsidiary Of Dayton’s Elder-Beerman (1974, February 13). The Lima News. p. 1.
15 Linn, A. (2005, March 4). Regional stores disappear as Macy’s usurps local lore. The Lima News. p. 23.
16 Bon-Ton closing stores in W. Virginia, Ohio and New York (2015, October 21). The York Dispatch. Web. Retrieved September 26, 2026.
17 Nelson, C. (2018, June 1). Lima Mall Sears to close after 53 years. The Lima News. p. 1.
18 Macy’s to close 3 more Ohio stores (2021, January 11). The Lima News. p. 3.
19 Higgins, C. (2025, February 8). Target store coming to Lima area. The Lima News. p. 1.
20 Trinko, D. (2025, December 27). Top stories of 2025. The Lima News. p. A1.
21 Trinko, D. (2025, April 2). Demolition begins at former Macy’s. The Lima News. p. 7.
22 Perry, A. (2026, September 10). Target is opening a new Ohio store this fall. Here’s where. The Columbus Dispatch. Web. Retrieved September 26, 2026.
23 Trinko, D. (2025, April 19). New hope for the Lima Mall: Management group brings optimism to aging retail site.
