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Business & Tech

Magical Mystery Tour Nears Final Stop

After 35 years, the purveyor of costumes, masks and sometimes risque novelties is closing.

There was no funeral dirge playing one recent moring over 's PA system as its going out of business sale continued. Instead it was “Na Na Na Na, Hey Hey, (Kiss Him) Good-bye.”

The song might as well be the 35-year-old store’s farewell anthem. Lifelong Morton Grove resident Randy Israel, an original employee and owner for the past 25 years, is closing the shop. Gone will be Israel’s eclectic collection of novelties, costumes and just plain fun stuff designed to sate the silly palate in eternal kids who patronized Magical Mystery Tour from all over the Chicago area.

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Israel will stay in business until the very last item leaves the shelves in the store set in a little strip mall on the northwest corner of Dempster Street and Austin Avenue. The nostalgia will be thick in that spot once Magical Mystery Tour empties out. Bob Katzman’s Magazine Memories, another cluttered, crowded shop next door, closed two years ago, its decades-old stacks of magazines and newspapers moved to a new location in downtown Skokie. That storefront is still empty.

Israel said he will morph into a manufacturer of novelties and costumes, supplying a couple of large retailers from new offices nearby in the months ahead. But Magical Mystery Tour always will be a big part of entertainer’s persona that began when he was a budding ventriloquist at on the village’s west side.

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From ventriloquist to store owner

“I used to do the talent show at Melzer, and then I did children’s birthday parties,“ Israel said. So it was natural that he’d end up as the biggest purveyor of party accessories and goofball getups. Over the years his customers have included the CTA outfitting crews on its special holiday trains to broadcaster Bob Sirott.

From peak business in the late 1990s – a lot of folks’ economic good ol’ days – Israel said he’s had to swim upstream against the current of computer and hand-held entertainment options enjoyed by twentysomethings. The double whammy of the Great Recession and two-year Dempster road/water main construction did not help matters, he said.

But Israel had a great generation-plus run, having built the business from the ground up starting as an employee.

“We had a magic section, and I was hired as the assistant magician,” he said of founding owner Ray Dreifuss. “Originally it was just records and magic. From there it went on to more novelty. The Halloween industry was just in its infancy. The largest Halloween manufacturer in the world used to come in his Winnebago and offer about 10 or 12 costumes to pick from.”

Eventually, Magical Mystery Tour had its own line manufactured.

“There wasn’t enough on the marketplace to purchase,” Israel said, whether a nanny dress, disco suit or hot-dog costume.

Magical, mysterious – and risque

Business expanded with an adult birthday section and bachelorette party gifts. “Our girls would buy all kinds of gifts, risqué novelty gifts,” Israel said.

Risque, indeed. In the back of the store is a pink “pecker piñata,” a penis-shaped object that party-goers would strike – “ouch” would be some male spectators’ initial gut feeling – like any other more conventional piñata. But Israel will not cross the border into any bondage-oriented novelties.

Advertising 50 percent off many of his items in a clearance sale, Israel has been busy serving customers either looking for bargains or simply wanting costumes in the classic manner.

A good place for wide-eyed kids

Stumbling upon Magical Mystery Tour while driving by was Kristina Chetkovich of Chicago’s Edgebrook neighborhood. She shopped earnestly with daughter Nia, 7, and son Colter, 5, in tow – both wide-eyed at the selection of unusual costumes and masks. Chetkovich had never heard of the store before.

“I saw all the signs out in front (the day before),” she said. “We just like to play dress-up and we have a big Halloween party every year. There are some vintage things for fun.”

Also digging through merchandise was Glenview’s Audrey San Roman.

“I’m a big Halloween person," she said. "My son wanted stuff to play pranks on his friends. I knew there was a lot on the Internet. You don’t see as many (year-round) stores. They’re only open around Halloween. It was nice to have something open all the time in case you need something for a play.”

For its owner, the store was all-consuming. He wanted to move into manufacturing more than five years ago.

“But this kept pulling me back,” Israel said. And all he had to do is take another walk through his crowded aisles to realize how fun his run really was.  

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