Ebbe’s Store, Christiansted – Keeping Faith and Embracing Change with Culture, Festival and Fabric on Company Street
Vivian Ebbesen Fludd at the counter of Ebbe’s Store on Company Street, Christiansted.
by Monique Clendinen Watson
December 2020
When the lights went on in Limpricht Park, Christiansted, St. Croix on the Friday before Christmas 2020, there were many helping hands working behind the scenes to bring the virtual celebration to island holiday lovers near and far. Organizations such as the Crucian Cultural Group, Gentlemen of Jones, WTJX and other community minded individuals joined forces to convey the Christmas Festival spirit to one and all. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced a re-imagination of holiday celebrations without intimate family gatherings and community togetherness. For Vivian Ebbesen-Fludd, one of the movers and shakers behind the Crucian Cultural Group and the owner of the iconic Ebbe’s Store on Company Street re-imagining Festival has been a central concern.
“We are taking a negative and making a positive,” she says, digitizing plans originally imagined for Festival 2020/21. In 2019, the Crucian Cultural Group successfully brought the old-time festival feeling to Christiansted with the Limpricht Park Lighting, Church Choir caroling and the Lantern Parade. “Many of us felt that we were losing our cultural flair and were a part of backroom conversations on how to revive traditions in the town.” The community responded with large crowds and encouragement to do it again. Then came COVID with its crowd size restrictions, social-distancing, and curtailing of celebrations. So, with the assistance of Tourism’s Division of Festivals and Education’s Division of Cultural Education, various traditions were presented virtually, staged on both social and traditional media. The community was able to join in “everything from learning Christmas recipes to participating in a mobile Lantern Parade where people decorated their cars and joined “Lanterns on the Move.”
Scenes from Limpricht Park Lighting taken from WTJX FB livestream with Crucian Cultural Group members Vivian Ebbesen-Fludd and Sandra Gerard Leung.
Ebbesen-Fludd and the Crucian Cultural Group which includes Suzette Bough, Charlita Schjang, Telsaida Josiah, Sandra Gerard, Wanda Figueroa, Pat Browne, Kendall Henry, Teddy Richards, Merlene Lang, Avril George, Karim Sun, Pearline Holst, Chalana Brown, Ramona King, Edna Duzant and Renee Schuster are a committee of the Christiansted Community Alliance (CCA), a non-profit organization of Christiansted residents, businessowners, property owners and others who work together to “revitalize Christiansted town.”
As the owner of the iconic Ebbe’s Store on the corner of Company and King Cross Streets in Christiansted, and a CCA board member, Ebbesen-Fludd is keeping faith with the 275-plus-year-old town as it weathers the tough times brought on by aging, the economic impacts of the 2013 refinery closure, the 2017 hurricanes and now the COVID pandemic. She re-opened Ebbe’s Store, which carries fabrics, notions, infant and children’s clothing and more, just a few weeks before the devastating Irma and Maria hurricanes. The storms gave her a greater appreciation for the sturdiness of the building at 4 King Cross Street. “All I had to do was stack sandbags, pull in my shutters and lock the doors,” she remembers, observing that the people who designed and constructed the buildings in Christiansted town, “knew what we would be dealing with” and created structures that would survive a tropical cyclone.
Ebbe’s Store re-opened in 2017, weeks before the devastating Irma and Maria hurricanes.
Ebbesen-Fludd’s parents opened Ebbe’s Store in 1969. Her mom, Enid Hansen Ebbesen, started by selling school uniforms and a wide variety of fabric. Back then, many people still sewed their own clothing or had seamstresses do it for them. People cut and sewed their own curtains, tablecloths, and other household décor, and Ebbe’s became an iconic part of the Christiansted shopping experience for several decades. Vivian or ViVi as she is known to her friends, and her siblings, Violet and Vincent were part of the effort that managed the family store. “We went there every day after school and had chores folding fabric, wrapping purchases, and closing the large windows. Saturdays were family days at the store. We would get there early in the morning, get our lunch from Brady’s Restaurant and tend to customers who were looking for baby clothes, ribbon, or other specialty items.” Her father, the late George Ebbesen, did the bookkeeping. “He kept us straight, was very organized, clearing our merchandise at the dock and keeping all our inventory labelled and secure.” She got emotional as she remembered that while preparing for the store’s reopening, she found clearly defined notes that her dad had written years before. “He was still looking out for us.”
Enid and George Ebbesen opened Ebbe’s Store on the corner of Company and King Cross Sts. in 1969 and served the St. Croix community for over 50 years.
Enid and George Ebbesen ran their fabric store with two employees and were there in person part time. She was a nurse who worked first at the Peter’s Farm, then the Charles Harwood Hospital and finally at the Juan Luis Hospital from which she retired as operating room supervisor. George worked at the Virgin Islands Lottery and the Department of Labor. “My parents did everything as a team,” Vivian remembers. “My mom was an entrepreneur. Whenever she had an idea, like opening the store or selling Avon, my dad was right there organizing the business end of the operation.” Except for the 2011 closure for renovations which stretched out as her dad fell ill, Ebbe’s has been a presence in Christiansted for 51 years, downstairs of the Pedersen family residence. “We became family,” says Vivian of the Pedersens, reminiscing about days when Christiansted was a town filled with families and neighborhood relationships that stretched across generations. She recalls sneaking upstairs for lunch and for walks downtown to Alexander Theater (now St. Croix Foundation) where the Pedersen daughters Shellie and Debbie worked. “We never looked at our time at the store as work. When our chores were done, we would walk down to the wharf and visit Ms. Val at the National Park or go to the Library.”
L – Mrs. Eulalie Pedersen, owner of 4 King Cross Street – with Mrs. Enid Ebbesen, owner of Ebbe’s Store. The Pedersen’s live upstairs of the iconic fabric store. R – Vivian Ebbesen Fludd carries on the tradition. Pictured here with mom and sister Violet.
Vivian and her sister Violet followed their mom into nursing, with Vivian serving as Director of the Frederiksted Health Center and as Commissioner of Health during her career. Her brother Vincent went into the Navy where he learned about computers and has since worked for the Legislature and FEMA. Vivian inherited her mom’s entrepreneurial spirit and felt the tug to re-open Ebbe’s in 2017. She relied on her network of family and friends to bring the store back to life. “It was a family project. We painted and re-did the floors, and our cousins were the contractors.”
Ebbe’s, like many family-owned stores in a small town like Christiansted, St. Croix was, pre-pandemic, not just a place to shop, but a place to show up and have a conversation. “We sell, but we talk whole day,” Vivian says of her relationship with her customers. She was pleasantly surprised at how much nostalgia the re-opened store generated. “A mother and adult daughter came in and the mother told her daughter, ‘I used to buy your baby clothes here.’ Someone visiting for the holidays came in and said, ‘my mother used to buy our school uniforms here.’” Nostalgic customers returned in search of baby vests and booties, madras cloth, ribbon, elastic and plastic by the yard, crochet yarn and thread and curtain fabric. “There has been a renewed interest in sewing, and while people can order from the internet, they want to touch and feel the fabric before they buy it. What you order on the internet is sometimes not what you expect, they feel they have a better chance if they come in and shop.”
Community gathers at Ebbe’s Store re-opening in 2017.
Vivian grappled with the balance between nostalgia and the experience that would appeal to 21st century shoppers when she re-opened the store. “My vision was to open a new, little old store, with old time offerings and modern technology. It was important to maintain the quality of merchandise that Ebbe’s had been known for. What do you hold on to and what do you let go?” she asked herself often as she decided not only what to sell, but how to upgrade the ambience of the store. She wanted air-conditioning but settled on fans because the building design made installation problematic. With a corner lot location, a cross street breeze and ever-present trade winds, it has been cool enough inside for customers who have to find parking in town and then walk to the store.
The COVID pandemic has come three years later and Vivian has had to re-imagine, once again, how Ebbe’s could serve the community. As a former public health official, she knew the importance of mask wearing and social distancing so the signs on her store clearly read: Mask Up – Mask On. “Ninety-nine percent of my customers have my cell phone number, so they call their orders in and I stagger their appointments to drive by and pick up or we deliver it to their homes.” The demand for thread and yawn and fabric and elastic to make masks or to just keep busy has grown. “Fabric stores are essential businesses, so we stay opened from 1:30 to 5:30 pm daily, except on Wednesdays and Sundays.”
Company Street view of Ebbe’s Store at 4 King Cross Street.
Being a fabric store owner and a cultural revivalist has put Vivian right in the middle of the movement to design a specific madras pattern to represent the Virgin Islands. The colorful fabric that originated in India and was traded during the colonial period and adapted by the enslaved and their descendants to enhance or accent their style is part of traditional dress throughout the Caribbean. Tasked with finding a weaver to produce the fabric, she worked through her distributors and has been working with a weaver in India for over a year. “We have been sending it back and forth to get the colors just right,” she said, adding that the final product, which is finally ready, is distinctive and beautiful. “There is nothing like it on the market. I believe that it is going to be a unifier, especially when people learn the symbolism behind it.”
Bolts of madras fabric line the shelves at Ebbe’s Store. A pattern that officially represents the Virgin Islands is in development.
The idea for a Virgin Islands madras originated with St. Croix tradition bearer and quadrille grandmaster Bradley Christian, of the St. Croix Heritage Dancers, who got a grant from the Virgin Islands Council on the Arts to develop a design. Through Mary Dema of the Christiansted Community Alliance, he worked with Christiansted textile designer Debbie Sun to develop a pattern that is symbolic of the Virgin Islands experience. According to a www.gotostcroix.com article, Sun describes the design as turquoise and blue for the Caribbean Sea, pink for the conch shell, yellow for the Ginger Thomas flower, green for the natural environment, white for the sun-defying fabric that many wore during the colonial period and red as a color that represents love and strength and is present in all seven flags that have flown over the Virgin Islands. Former Senate President and Cultural Committee Chair Myron Jackson and other Virgin Islands senators are working to legislatively adopt it as the official design. It is before the Legislature for a vote this week.
Running a family-owned fabric store in a centuries-old town that has been ravaged by physical and economic storms amidst a pandemic while pumping new life into cultural traditions with collaboration and technology speaks of a certain level of resilience and faith in Company Street, Christiansted, St. Croix, and the U.S. Virgin Islands as a whole. “We have to maintain the core of who we are,” says Ebbesen-Fludd. “We have to be creative and invest and support each other as we develop plans for the future,” she continued. “The future is not possible without the input of those who know and love the history and culture of this place.”
To learn more about Ebbe’s Store you can find them at the corner of King Cross and Company Street, Christiansted or find them on Facebook or contact them at ebbesstoreinfo@gmail.com or at 340-773-3020. To learn more about the Crucian Cultural Group you can find them on Facebook @CrucianCulturalGroup or contact 340-643-9888. To learn more about the Christiansted Community Alliance you can find them on Facebook @ChristianstedCommunityAlliance or cca@christianstednow.org or 340-513-2081.
As the world we live in is global and interactive, I would like to hear from you who know and love St. Croix who may have stories, pictures of memories to share about Company Street or any other aspect of Virgin Islands history and culture. You can find this and other blogposts at www.companystreetchronicles.com or visit our Facebook page @companystreetchronicles or Twitter @companystreet59. You can email me at mcw@bluegaulinmedia.com.
Monique Clendinen Watson is a writer and public relations specialist who is from the U.S. Virgin Islands and who lives in Virginia. She owns BlueGaulin Media Strategies, LLC, a public relations firm and can be found at www.bluegaulinmedia.com. Photos courtesy of Vivian Ebbesen Fludd. Company Street Chronicles © and BlueGaulin Media © are copyright protected. December 2020. All rights reserved.
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One Response to “Ebbe’s Store, Christiansted – Keeping Faith and Embracing Change with Culture, Festival and Fabric on Company Street”
Love the nostalgic journey of Ebbe’s.What wonderful memories of the caring and the wonderful products and assortment of goods available. I also appreciated the great conversations with mom. Keep up the great adventures of a company store as we navigate the 21st century.
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