August 4, 2005

Priscilla Moore, the owner of Mr. Fub’s Party, serving cake to Danielle Horton during the toy store’s 25th birthday party on Saturday afternoon on the Mills Lawn School grounds. About 300 young customers attended the three-hour party.

Mr. Fub’s celebrates with own party

By Lauren Heaton

Amid balloons, streamers, giant puppets and the gleeful cacophony of a children’s kazoo choir, Mr. Fub’s Party and around 300 of its young customers celebrated the toy store’s 25th birthday on Saturday afternoon on the Mills Lawn School grounds. Milling calmly around at the center of it all, was Fub’s owner, Priscilla Moore, wearing a white lace fairy godmother gown and looking satisfied with the milestone that was passing.

“I was in a daze, but I heard the day was a big success,” Moore said from her home as she recovered from the work of organizing the celebration. “I wanted to give the kids a party, too.”

Moore never imagined that she would own a toy store when she moved in 1971 from New York to Yellow Springs, where she initially lived in an artist community in the brick house at Walnut and Elm Street. As a clothing designer, Moore got involved in local theater productions and also managed DG’s Restaurant, where she met Jennifer Viereck and, eventually, the original Mr. Fub’s.

Moore had been thinking about opening her own business when Viereck got pregnant. While looking for a baby gift, she noticed a frustrating paucity of nice toys of good quality or interest, she said. So Moore and Viereck called several wholesale toy companies listed in phone books in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles, spoke with Wilbur Deaton about renting the space next to his hardware store, and by 1980, they were in business.

Naming their toy store was much more serendipitous. The day Viereck’s son, Ben, was born, the word “fubsy,” meaning stout, plump and merry, as Moore recalled, was printed on a word calendar, and Mr. Fubs quickly became Ben’s new moniker. When he came to DG’s during Viereck’s shifts, he sat at “his” table, where local resident Don Gasho eventually erected a reserved sign that said, “Mr. Fub’s Party.”

Moore had high standards for the toys she purchased for her store. She wanted well-made, well-designed toys that would stimulate children’s creativity and curiosity, and do more than just amuse, she said. She wanted durable toys that were made to last a generation or two and were manufactured in socially responsible places.

“I like toys where you have to do something to get something, kid-powered toys,” she said.

Viereck and Ben left Yellow Springs shortly after the store opened, and Moore bought her friend’s half of the business, always trying to stay ahead of trends by keeping the store stocked with the newest products from smaller manufacturers.

Over her first decade in the business, Moore made contacts with other toy retailers, manufacturers and distributors and in 1992 became a charter member of the American Specialty Toy Retailing Association, which started with 80 members and has grown to nearly 1,200, she said. Annual trips to the New York Toy Fair and one to two association meetings each year has kept Moore at the frontier of toy development, she said.

Some of the relationships Moore has developed with her manufacturers have lasted the 25 years she’s been in business, and together they donated for the party between $5,000 and $10,000 in toys in honor of Mr. Fub’s 25th birthday. This allowed Moore to give away tons of free gifts, including board games, puzzles, dolls, balloons, kazoos and dozens of Groovy Girl dolls. And she had help from enthusiastic villagers who wanted to make the event happen, she said.

Adrienne Chesire coordinated the three-hour party and helped serve five sheet cakes from Young’s Jersey Dairy, while Lynn Hardman organized the sack races, tug of war and the hoola challenge. Kate Anderson helped with the raffle and gift distribution, and Becky Brunsman led the kazoo choir. Louise Smith and John Fleming delivered puppets and decorations from the Antioch Theater. Store employees Julie Roupp and Gladys Verner lent their support, and the infamous pirate Captain Jack, (aka Walter Rhodes) led the children on a treasure hunt in search of pirate gold.

Moore said that Mr. Fub’s has always been profitable, but that she has had to work to make it successful. She has been a PBS sponsor for almost 20 years and feels good about putting her advertising dollars to work in a way that supports the children in the Miami Valley, she said.

Fub’s Bucks are also very popular with the young customers, who on their birthday receive a card in the mail, addressed to them, with a Fub’s Bucks gift certificate they can use in the store. Moore said she likes that the Fub’s Bucks empower kids to shop for themselves.

At the party on Saturday, local resident Rachel Meyer stopped her work at the hat decorating table and gave a puzzled look when asked what she liked about Mr. Fub’s. It’s a place with nothing but toys for kids her age, she said, noting that she shops at Fub’s for just about every gift she buys.

“I go there to use my Fub’s Bucks and for all my birthday gifts,” she said. “It’s just kind of a happy place.”

For many, such as the Tyree family who came to the celebration from Springfield, they keep returning to Mr. Fub’s because of its uniqueness and because the store sells items you can’t find elsewhere.

“Usually when we buy presents for friends, we’re looking for toys that are fun and have a learning component, not just the everyday toys,” Cindy Tyree said. “My kids love coming to Fub’s because it’s such a unique and wonderful place, and not just for kids!”

Tyree and her husband, Roger, started shopping at Mr. Fub’s before they had their three children. “I send all of our friends to Fub’s to shop for my husband’s birthday because the toys here suit his childish demeanor,” Cindy Tyree said.

After 25 years, Moore’s customers now include the children of her first patrons who also peruse the low shelves with the same wide-eyed rapture as their parents. She doesn’t know what the future holds, and said she could see herself running the store for another 20 years. But whatever happens, she said she hopes that Fub’s stays a specialty toy store, for the village and its children.

“It turned out to be a good way to live,” she said. “I think of how Mr. Fub’s has influenced generations of children growing up in Yellow Springs, and I feel like I’m bringing a lot to the children of the community.”