Witcover’s Fashion Store

Maurice Lumiansky (1880-1958) was born in New Bedford, Massachusetts to Russian immigrants Bernard (b. c.1859) and Annie Jaffey Lumiansky (b. c.1862). He grew up in retail and worked at his father’s shoe and clothing store, B. Lumiansky & Company, until 1913. In 1910, Maurice married Darlington native, Miriam Witcover Lumiansky (1889-1964), and after a few years in Massachusetts, the young couple settled in South Carolina where they could be closer to Miriam’s family. Not long after that, Maurice began operating Witcover’s Fashion Store on the south side of the Public Square. There, he stocked styles from New York City and hosted spring fashion shows with “the most exclusive models in suits, coats, morning, afternoon and evening dresses and party frocks.”¹

In April 1930, Witcover’s Fashion Store sustained damage during a deadly fire. It reopened in September of that year but ultimately closed less than four years later. Maurice went on to serve as the president of the Darlington Chamber of Commerce, the purchasing agent for the State Department of Public Welfare, and the supervisor of commodity distribution for the Public Service Authority. He died in 1958.

¹ “You are Cordially Invited to Attend the Spring Fashion Show,” Manning Times, February 13, 1918, 4.