Memoirs of a Mall kid

My name is Ryan Towle, born in 1987. This is my love letter to Burlington — although I grew up in Woburn, at 45 Robinson Road, in a little pocket that doesn’t quite feel like Woburn or Burlington or Lexington. It honestly feels like an amalgamation of all three, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. My father, however, was raised in Burlington. He and his five siblings grew up at 42 Bedford Street.

Remember the Burlington Mall fountains? It’s such a shame that they’re gone. I swear, as a child, it seemed like they nearly reached the skylights.

I have fond memories of Brigham’s, Kay-Bee Toys, and Stride Rite. Kay-Bee had an unusual L-shape layout. You’d reach the back of the store and suddenly realize it stretched to the right another 40 feet or so. They always had a display out front with a million little wind-up toys all going at once. My favorite was the dog that would sit down and then do a backflip.

When I worked at UNO Pizzeria & Grill around 2008, I heard horror stories about Brigham’s sitting vacant for months upon months without the removal of any product. Needless to say, the foul odor allegedly reached unfathomable levels.

In the days before Spencer’s moved into its most well-known location (where Perfumania currently resides), we had DAPY in that same exact location.

I loved DAPY but oddly enough, they sold the same exact products as Spencer’s. Who knew there was such demand for lava lamps and fake puke? I vividly remember going to The Nature Company and tipping those giant rain sticks over to hear the watery sounds they made. And I loved crawling through the circle at the entrance of The Children’s Place.

The original Disney Store was the best. The storefront had an incredible art deco design, and I loved the filmstrip motif of the interior. I also remember the giant globe suspended from the ceiling above the escalators near the food court. Its simple, hollow, design resembled the globe at Universal Studios.

And then there was the Warner Bros. Studio Store. I’m not sure I can do this store justice. The entrance was flanked by two giant figures. On the left: a dapper looking Bugs Bunny. On the right: Daffy Duck dressed in a brown fur coat as a Fuller Brush salesman.

The interior was also adorned with statues (albeit much smaller) of other Looney Tunes characters, as well as some DC superheroes. Gremlins (the film characters) hung menacingly, interlocked over certain displays, like some nightmare version of a Barrel Of Monkeys. But my favorite thing in that store was undoubtedly Marvin’s Rocket, located at the back wall under a grid of TV monitors. On the side of the Rocket were two windows featuring holographic images of both Marvin the Martian, and his Martian dog, K-9. They were the type of holographs that turned to follow you as you walked from side to side. You could crawl inside the rocket. A TV in the cockpit would play a loop of select Looney Tunes shorts, and there was an array of buttons that emitted different sound bites and effects when pressed.

In August of 1992, Chuck E. Cheese opened its doors in Burlington. I believe this video of my 5th birthday, in September of 1992, is one of the first videos ever captured in the Burlington location.

I find it incredible that at one point in time, Burlington had not one, not two, but three different themed restaurants with animatronics – Chuck E. Cheese, The Rainforest Cafe, and Bugaboo Creek.

The Middlesex Mall is another location that holds a special place in my heart. I have so many memories of family errands to Caldor. It’s still so bizarre to me that the current complex shares the same footprint without the interior corridor. I remember when you entered from the front, the interior corridor hung left until you reached the entrance to Caldor, then banged a sharp right and held that direction. A cluster of children’s ride-on contraptions (carousel, horse, etc) congregated in the center of the hallway, near the entrance to Caldor. The Pepperidge Farm store was on the right.

I also remember MVP Sports where H Mart currently is, and another MVP Sports at Four Corners in Woburn. There was also Noodle Kidoodle where Bob’s Furniture currently is. There also used to be a store called The Learning Center, or The Learning Place where Cycle Loft is now.

Speaking of this particular area, I can recall my father recounting a story from his childhood. Two of his peers were in this area (near Butterfield Pond), and they got swallowed up by quicksand. Quicksand? I’ve researched this for years, and I’ve come up with nothing. I’m more than willing to bet that this story is completely false.

Tower Records was another store that I have fond memories of. On one of our regular outings, I remember begging my mother to buy me a (rather expensive) King Kong figure. She eventually caved.

As the end of the ’90s grew near, I entered my teen years, and the Mall became more important than ever before. Here were the days of Friday and Saturday nights, getting dropped off at the food court entrance; but not exactly at the entrance, of course. You’d be committing social suicide by letting any of your peers know that you were being dropped off and/or picked up.

This was around the fall of 2000. The first episode of Jackass had just premiered on MTV, and antics were definitely abound. I remember skateboarding inside the Mall. On the second level, near Filene’s, the corridor used to be split in half by a glass barrier and railing. On one side there was a ramp; on the other side there was a set of about four steps.

We had many nights of skating there. Doing tricks down the stair set for as long as we could, and then fleeing from the rent-a-cops. One of my friends climbed into the water feature in front of the Rainforest Cafe and pretended to wrestle the animatronic alligator.

On the second floor, near the food court, was a set of pay phones installed about an arm’s length from each other. If you stood between two of them and stretched far enough to touch both, there was a slight palpable electrical current. It wasn’t much, but you could definitely feel it. Faulty wiring?

Of course, no night at the Burlington Mall was complete without the pilgrimage over to Newbury Comics and Wendy’s over at Vine Brook Plaza. It was a mandatory ritual each night, and I say that without any exaggeration.

I remember that there were these two big trees on the backside of the Kohl’s building. At the base of each of these trees were metal grates that sort of formed a teepee around the trunk. I’ll never forget the night I saw a group of older kids riding BMX bikes back there. One of those kids used that metal grate as a ramp and performed an incredible trick off of it. Also in that plaza, right next to Newbury Comics, was Blades Board & Skate; our go-to skate shop. To this day, I still have a plastic bag from there. I remember that they used to host skate demos, as well as video premieres for skate videos that were filmed in the Boston area.

On the subject of skateboarding, here’s another weird anecdote. One day, we happened to be skateboarding in a place that was locally and affectionately known as “The Execs.” Suddenly, we heard the whirring of helicopter blades. Herb Chambers was flying in, and he landed in the parking lot to attend his annual holiday party. A group of his ruffians approached us, but Herb stopped them. Instead, he invited the five or six of us into the party. We were literally teenagers. I will never forget that.

Come 2008. Word was getting around that a new Happy Madison production was to begin filming at the Burlington Mall. Postings started popping up online for casting calls for both bit parts and extras. The film, of course, ended up being Paul Blart: Mall Cop. I applied as an extra, but unfortunately, the filming schedule didn’t align with my work schedule. But I did get a chance to film them filming the movie (redundant, isn’t it?) I got the scene where Kevin James’ title character first becomes smitten with Jayma Mays’ character, who works the aptly-named kiosk, ‘UnbeWEAVEable’.

There’s another scene that offers some glimpses of the surrounding area. The scene takes place on the rooftop of the Mall, where Kevin James is trying to apprehend one of the bad guys, professional skateboarder Mike Vallely. In this specific scene, we get some early spring 2008 views of the Woburn Communication Towers (Zion Hill), 700 District Ave, Lahey Clinic, and Burlington’s WRKO towers.

Another scene shows the short-lived Ruehl storefront facade. If you need any more reasons to appreciate this film, I’d say it’s because it has officially documented the Rainforest Cafe for posterity. There’s a lengthy scene that takes place inside the restaurant, which features close-ups of the animatronics. There’s even an explosion on the exterior of the building, near the sign for the restaurant.

As I said at the start, I grew up in Woburn. Those towers on top of Zion Hill have always been a sort of homing beacon for me. I get a sense of comfort and ease whenever I catch a glimpse of them in the distance.

I found a photo online, from 1983, in which someone stood directly below one of those towers and pointed their lens straight up.

I’m forever grateful to have grown up in the location that I did, and to experience the things that I’ve experienced. I hope that my contributions may be of value to this wonderful community.