Tour the Museum

These two paintings are in the museum building in the stairwell....

A depiction of the butcher shop that Penney bought and operated in Longmont, Colorado. 

After moving to Denver, Colorado, in 1897 for health-related reasons, he worked for Joslin's Dry Goods Store as a store clerk. One year later, he opened a butcher shop in Longmont on Main Street. The biggest customer of this shop was a local hotel. When the hotel's meat cutter demanded a bottle of whiskey weekly as a bribe, Penney gave in to this bribe only once. After that, he regretted giving in to that bribe, and from then on, refused the bribe. Unfortunately, Penney's butcher shop failed because this hotel withdrew its business.

Penney's first Golden Rule store in Kemmerer, Wyoming. The Golden Rule stores that Penney eventually owned became the foundation for J.C. Penney's.

On April 14, 1902, his partners, Callahan and Johnson, helped him open a new Golden Rule dry goods store in Kemmerer, Wyoming at the age of 26. The sales for the first day totaled $466.59 and for the first year totaled $28,898.11.