The Dixie Square Mall is best known for its role in the 1980s Blues Brothers film. It is the scene of an epic car chase that sends Elwood and Jake Blues crashing through the interior of the mall in an attempt to evade police. However, the mall has a history that makes it more reminiscent of the Monroeville Mall in Dawn of the Dead.
Opened in 1966, it was your pretty standard suburban shopping mall, with over 60 shops and three anchor stores. But the town of Harvey, where the mall existed, was a failing suburb that became poverty-stricken, leading to an increase in crime. Countless robberies took place at the Dixie Square Mall, and gangs kept families away. The first death at the mall came in 1968, when an elderly woman was killed in the parking lot in a hit and run accident. A woman was fatally shot in a botched robbery on her way to the mall in November 1972. Another robbery, with another fatal shooting happens on the mall property in April 1973. A young girl was abducted from the mall, tortured, and strangled to death by three teen girls in June 1973. Flagpole sitter Richard Blandy fell to his death near the end of his three-day stunt in the mall’s parking lot. This last death was the beginning of the end of the Dixie Square Mall, and stores began pulling out. By November 1978, the entire mall was closed down. The property was used as a temporary school while a new school was being built, but that lasted only two years.
Dixie Square’s “big break” came in 1979, when John Landis chose the mall to shoot Blues Brothers in. The production spent eight weeks filming at the mall, using it for both interior and exterior locations. As one might expect when shooting a car chase inside a shopping mall, there was a fair amount of damage. The movie crew never repaired the damage (after all, the city had been planning to demolish the building and start new) which led to a quickly-dismissed lawsuit.
Despite its newfound “fame,” Dixie Square was once again shuttered and sat untouched for years, until vandals decided to make it their playground. Every panel of glass was shattered; every piece of salvageable metal was stolen. It became a haven for gangs and an easy place to score drugs. Homeless people frequently broke in and set up camp. As such, the mall was left open to the elements, hastening its decay. A man named Raymond Eaves lured at least two girls to the mall where he raped them; the second girl, Denise Shelby, he also strangled to death. He is currently serving a life sentence.
The Dixie Square Mall sat abandoned for decades - more than twice as long as it was open - due to a variety of political red tape, EPA investigations, asbestos lawsuits, developer stalling, and accusations of city corruption. In May 2012, the final demolition was complete. Dixie Square is no more.
For a complete timeline of the Dixie Square Mall, check out the City Life Disco forum. For more photos, check out the Dixie Square Flickr Page and ifmuth’s stream.
Want more of our favorite, creepy abandoned places? Take a visit to Helltown, Ohio; the Farm Colony of Staten Island; or the Miracle Strip Amusement Park in Florida.