The Dixie Square Mall, is a famous abandoned shopping center located in Harvey, Illinois. Not only is it famous for being abandoned for over 25 years, it was also used for the famous mall chase scene from the movie The Blues Brothers.

History

Constructed in 1965 at the cost of $8,000,000, Dixie Square opened in August, 1966 on the site of a former Golf Course. It had sixty-four shops at its peak, plus J C Penney and Montgomery Ward department stores as the mall's two anchors. The Penneys and Wards stores were considered marvels at the time, complete with psychedelic wallpaper and fixtures, especially the Wards store. The mall enjoyed 4 years of sucess, until Turnstyle Department Store was added in 1970. At this point, crime began to plague the town of Harvey. In the early-mid 70's, Dixie began losing more and more stores, including Montgomery Ward in 1977. By 1978 it was down to its last 20 stores. The mall closed at the end of the year. However, Penneys, Wallgreens, and Jewel food store stayed open into 1979, until they too moved out later in the year. Penneys was the last to leave. Only months after Penneys closed, director John Landis rented the vacant mall for 8 weeks for "The Blues Brothers" (More on that later). They left the mall in quite bad condition. Soon, the mall was boarded up once again. It stayed in the same state until 1984, when vandals broke in and basically destroyed the mall. By the next year, any piece of metal worth anything was removed. Weather was harsh on the mall, and the mall sat, decomposing, decaying, and deteriorating more and more every day. By the 1990's, there were full-grown trees in the parking lot, and cave-ins of the roof. In early 2004, the former Montgomery Wards was gutted, and miraculusly, a new tenant is planning on moving in.

The Blues Brothers

In 1979, the mall was rented by John Landis for 8 weeks as part of a scene in the Blues Brothers Movie. Basically, cop cars were driven through the mall, destroying parts of it, boarding it back up, and leaving. Some of the mall's former tennants refused to be seen in the film, such as Hickory Farms and Walgreens Drugstore , so they were either "dressed-up" as other stores (Such as the Walgreens becoming a Toys-R-Us, just for the film), or not featured at all. As of 15 years ago, the fake wall the cars crash through in Toys-R-Us at the beginning of the scene is still there.