Store Owner Leaving Mark on Elgin After 50 Years in Business
Elgin, IL – Dave Andersen had no intention of running his father’s gift shop in Elgin.
He went to college and earned a degree in sociology, then served in the Army during Vietnam.
But after returning from the war in 1972, he found himself moving back home with his own new family in tow.
“My dad said, “Listen buster, if you’re going to eat my food and live in my house with your wife and baby, you’re going to come out to the store to help,'” Andersen recalled.

