L.L. Bean's flagship store only ever closed for JFK's assassination, the death of its executives, a fire, and the pandemic. Now it's closed for a mass shooting.
Portland Press Herald via Getty Images.
- Over a century after its founding, the L.L. Bean flagship store has only closed a few times.
- Those closures came after presidential assassinations, executive deaths, and fires.
- Now, the store has closed after a mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine.
In 1917, L.L. Bean opened its flagship store in Freeport, Maine.
Over a century later, the store is still standing and sees more than 3 million visitors each year. It is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The only times it has ever closed are for the death of its executives, a fire, the assassination of JFK, and the pandemic.
Now, it has added one more American tragedy to the list of things that have forced it to close: a mass shooting.
The store closed out of an "abundance of caution" on Thursday, CNN reported, as Maine authorities search for the man accused of killing 18 people and injuring 13 others in a mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine on Wednesday night.
Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Robert Card, the man police suspect is the gunman. He is a firearms instructor who serves in the US Army Reserve, Insider previously reported.
A spokesperson for L.L. Bean told CNN that the company has closed four of its stores in Freeport, as well as its corporate headquarters.
The last time L.L Bean closed its stores in southern Maine was during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Portland Press Herald. Before that, in 2015, it closed its doors after the death of the company's longtime president and chairman, Leon A. Gorman.
Otherwise, it only closed after the death of its founder, Leon Leonwood Bean, in 1967, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963, and a store fire in 1981, USA Today reported. Maine has so-called "blue laws" that force businesses to close on major holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving. But the state has exempted L.L. Bean from those laws since the 1960s.