I checked your link and what you've posted is great!
Oh by the way, my dad's name is "Ernst" (no second e): he could be a little imposing as he had a heavy German accent... he designed and installed the sound system when Crawford's was rebuilt across the street. He'd also set-up for weekly Wednesday night drawings outside in the parking lot facing Mountain View. Pending how much you bought, you would receive drawing tickets; you'd tear it in half on your way out and drop one side of the ticket in a big drum and keep the other and hope your number was called. You had to be present to win.
The Santa Claus landing was around 1957-58. (Helicopters didn't come into commercial use till the mid 1950's.) Wish I could tell what movie was playing at the Tumbleweed, then we could nail down the year by googling the movie...
I have to chid you: you left out one very important department: the toy department! I think that is where my first Barbie Doll came from in the early 1960's. Crawford's really were ahead of their time by being a true "department" store: everything you could need. But even more, they cared about the community.
And of course the Red Goose Shoe Store to the left of the Valley side entrance. When I was about 6 years old, mom took me and my older sister to buy new Easter Sunday shoes for church. The manager would hide a plastic golden egg in a children's shoe box and if the shoes you bought had the egg, you'd win a stuffed animal. I won a big rabbit once! (It's tattered and old, but it's in a box in the attic.)
These pictures are from Crawford's 20th Anniversary. That's my dad in the white shirt; he was helping-out. A few years ago I shared these pictures with a classmate's elderly parents; her mom gasped and laughed; she recognized herself! She was in the picture holding her daughter, my friend Stella Costanza; she was standing right behind my dad. What a small world: but to discover that now!
I'll get the newsletter to you this weekend.
Regards,
Kathy Andreas