Obituary: Leonard Share, owner of Arcade Men's Shop in downtown Minneapolis

For Minnesotans looking to make a loud fashion statement, Leonard Share's was a go-to institution in downtown Minneapolis for more than four decades.

His Arcade Men's Shop was a popular destination, especially among musicians, for things you couldn't find in a typical department store. He was an early purveyor of fast fashion and items such as elephant bell bottoms, leopard skin spandex outfits and fringe leather jackets.

"Snakeskin and leopard skin is what we call fashion," he told the Star Tribune in 1987.

Share died on Labor Day of congestive heart failure in Cardiff-by-the-Sea, near San Diego. The former St. Louis Park resident was 85.

His store attracted punk rockers and those in hair bands, suburban kids and their urban counterparts. Morris Day, George Clinton and members of Prince's band were among some of his better-known customers. His store was also often frequented by Minnesota Vikings as well as former wrestler and Gov. Jesse Ventura.

A Minnesota native, Share grew up in north Minneapolis and attended the University of Minnesota, short of graduating.

"It drove him crazy to be in school. He was a doer," said his son Allan Share, who helped run the business with his father at one point. He now lives in Waconia.

"It was really the first sportswear store in Minneapolis," said another son, Mike, who also helped run the business and now lives in Maple Grove. "His was the place you'd go to find things they didn't have at the large department stores."

A couple times a year, Share would go to the big markets in New York and Chicago to pick out the latest fashions for his store.

He often went out on a limb to try new things — sometimes buying just a dozen of one item to see whether they would catch on. If any of them ended up being "dogs," as he called them, he would slash their prices to move them out the door. There wasn't space for slow-moving items in the roughly 500-square-foot store. Some walls were stacked so high with merchandise that rolling ladders were on hand to get to it.

In 1985, the store was moved to make way for a parking lot. Share moved the Arcade to the basement of another store he ran, called Lenny's, at 811 LaSalle Av. He also ran a Pants Plus in St. Paul as well as J.J. Flash, which was originally in the Minneapolis skyway system. His sons recall that their father was ahead of the times with mail orders and the Internet.

Over the years, Share took under his wing a number of young employees, many in high school or college.

"My mom would always say, 'Leonard, it's beyond me how you've run a successful clothing business but you can't dress yourself'," said Mike Share. "And he would say, 'What do you mean? It's a symphony of earth tones.' "

Survivors include his wife, Jean; daughter, Helene; sons Allan, Mike, and Jay, five grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. Services have been held.