The Sad Tale of the Florencita Market Robbery

At 2460 Florencita Ave. sits an odd little house. Unlike the other houses on the street, it fronts right onto the sidewalk, with no front yard. A long and thin front porch seems to lead one right to the front door. It seems out of place, and indeed it is, for it was not originally a residence. It was a small neighborhood market, the Florencita Market.

It seems to be in the late 1930s that the Florencita Market first appears. We have some history from Charles Bausback, who left a legacy of local history stories. Charles told us that the small market was owned by the Mayer family. In the 1950s, Max Mayer, the son of the original owners, was the one behind the counter. Charles related that this market was one of the places in the valley where one could send a telegram. Two telegram services were available, Western Union and Postal Telegram. Max was a stickler about wearing the “official hat” for each of the two telegram services when called on to send the telegram, so he would elaborately change hats depending on the service the customer wanted.

Charles also related that Max and his wife had twin boys in the early ’50s, at the same time Lucille Ball gave birth to Little Ricky. Joseph and Michael Mayer were recruited to play Ricky on the “I Love Lucy” show from 1953 until 1956. The twins graduated from CV High in 1970.

In 1978, Barkev Narbadlian bought the little market. Barkev, or Bob as he was known by his customers, was born in Syria and emigrated from Iraq that same year. He lived in the Crescenta Valley with his family – his wife, a son and two daughters. Besides running the store, Bob was involved in several Armenian service organizations.

Bob was well-loved for his generosity by his customers. He was known as a friendly, generous man. He would make loans to his regular customers and deliver groceries to the elderly. One customer related, “The guy was just one helluva nice guy. He’d help you with anything. He’d give credit, cash checks, all kinds of stuff.”

But that same customer also related, “He trusted everybody. That was probably his downfall.” Apparently he was very casual about leaving his open cash register in view of his customers, trusting everyone.

One afternoon in January 1991, Bob was rolling coins and stacking bills before walking to the bank in Montrose to make a deposit. It’s at that moment that two men entered the store. No one knows exactly what happened.

Neighbors heard two gunshots and saw two men speeding down Florencita in a car. Bob was found sprawled on the floor, dead. The money was gone.
Bob was found in front of the counter and some displays were knocked over so police surmised there may have been a confrontation or a struggle.
Descriptions of the robbers made police think the robbery was linked to a series of small store robberies across the County. The suspects the police had in mind had just a few days before robbed a little neighborhood store in Maywood. That robbery went awry for what had been a three-man robbery team. In a tougher neighborhood like Maywood, the storeowner was armed and shot one of the robbers. But in a quiet and relatively safe neighborhood like Montrose, Bob probably thought a gun unnecessary. Perhaps the Maywood heist gone bad convinced the robbers to shoot first. But in this robbery, they got away unscathed and, as far as I know, they were never caught.

A tearful delivery driver who knew Bob said, “This is his little country store. He worked every day. He was a nice man, nice to everyone. Why would they shoot him?” It was indeed a senseless crime.

I don’t know if the store closed at that point but it is a residence today. The folks who live in the house today probably have no knowledge of both the good and sad history of their home.

Next week, some memories of the Florencita Market.