and opened its first shopping mall store in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1955. (It acquired another Omaha department store, Kilpatrick's, in 1961.) By 1978 Younkers had 28 stores in five states. Fires In November 1978, a fire broke out in the Younkers store in the Merle Hay Mall in Des Moines, killing 11 people. To date, it is the most devastating fire in Des Moines' history, and destroyed the original Younkers at the mall. It is also the third deadliest department store fire in US history. The fire was caused by faulty wiring. In the early hours of March 29, 2014, a fire ravaged the former Younker Brothers Department Store in downtown Des Moines while it was under renovation. The eastern, original 1899 building partially collapsed in the fire and was demolished; the western 1909 Wilkins Department Store building, that Younker's had expanded into in 1924, was still standing and undergoing renovation. Acquisitions of Brandeis and H.C. Prange Younkers was operated by the Equitable of Iowa insurance company from 1979 to 1992 after being a publicly traded company since 1948. Under Equitable's ownership, Younkers acquired all 11 locations of the Omaha-based Brandeis department store chain in 1987. After returning to public ownership on the NASDAQ on April 22, 1992, Younkers purchased the 22 stores of the H.C. Prange chain in Wisconsin and Michigan. Acquisition by Proffitt's After a hostile takeover bid by Carson Pirie Scott was rejected in 1995, Younkers' shareholders agreed to a friendly merger by Proffitt's, Inc., of Knoxville, Tennessee. The merger was completed in December 1996. Proffitt's would later acquire Carson Pirie Scott, and in 1998 Proffitt's acquired Saks Fifth Avenue to form Saks Incorporated. In 2003, Saks closed Younkers' headquarters in Des Moines and merged its operations with those of Carson Pirie Scott in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Sale to The Bon-Ton Saks sold Younkers and its other Northern Department Store Group stores (Carson Pirie Scott, Bergner's, Boston Store, and Herberger's) to Bon-Ton Stores in a $1.1 billion deal that was completed on March 6, 2006. On January 31, 2018, Bon-Ton announced that they were going to close 42 locations nationwide including 9 in the state of Wisconsin between February and April 2018. It was further announced on April 17, 2018 that Bon Ton Stores would be closing doors and began liquidating all 267 stores after two liquidators, Great American Group and Tiger Capital Group, won an auction for