Accustomed to hard work, Nordstrom toiled in the gold fields for two years before striking pay dirt. When another miner challenged his claim, Nordstrom sold his share to the other miner rather than fight him in a corrupt arbitration process. He returned to Seattle with $13,000.
Settled in Seattle
Nordstrom, who had changed his given name to John, married Hilda Carlson in 1900. The couple had five children: Everett, Elmer, Lloyd, Mabel, and Esther.
Nordstrom wanted to invest his earnings in a business. A Klondike friend, Carl F. Wallin, worked as a shoemaker and suggested that he and Nordstrom open a shoe store. Nordstrom invested $5,000 in the business; Wallin added $1,000. Their store, Wallin & Nordstrom, opened in 1901 in a 20-foot-wide Seattle storefront. The two Swedes, who barely spoke English, began their business with a $3,500 inventory of shoes, ranging in price from $1.95 to $4.95. Nordstrom knew nothing about selling shoes, as he recalled in his memoir, "Opening day, we had not had a customer by noon, so my partner went to lunch. He had not been gone but a few minutes when our first customer, a woman, came in for a pair of shoes she had seen in the window.
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