I live in State College, Pennsylvania - although if you asked me where I lived I would say "State College, PEE AY" as in PA because all of us here are simply exhausted from saying "Penn-Syl-Vain-Ee-Uh." I honestly don't know how Californians do it, saying "California" all of the time instead of "SEE AY" as in CA. Well, except for the Governor - he's in pretty good shape and doesn't get winded so easily.

There's a fanciful (yet completely true!) story about the birth of State College. State College, PA was founded by Joe Paterno, who at the tender age of 16 cleared whole acres of forest with a giant axe and a blue ox. The blue ox was named "Nittany Lion" and yes I think that's a horrible name for a blue ox. When JoePa (we call him "JoePa" because saying "Joe Pa-Ter-No" quickly becomes tiring) first founded the town there were no Lowe's or Home Depot stores. (Or Red Robins or Macaroni Grills, but that's a story for another post.) Eventually Lowe's discovered our sleepy community and built a store here.

The evolution of home improvement shopping in State College is a colorful (yet completely true!) tale that while completely true! may be hard to believe. The story goes something like this: Home Depot found out that Lowe's had built a store in State College and Home Depot, having a policy about these sorts of things, decided that they would come into town too. They arranged to get a key piece of real estate right off of a major road through town. But before they started building their store, Lowe's decided to relocate their existing store next to the future Home Depot, a move of about three miles from their current location.

Lowe's succeeded in building their store before Home Depot starting digging. Their old building still sits vacant months later (though rumor has it Kohl's is coming) as Home Depot finally begins construction. Why do these home improvement box stores like to go head to head? Well that's a whimsical (yet completely true!) yarn traced back to the founders of Lowe's and Home Depot, who are brothers. Years ago the brothers had a falling out and now, largely out of spite, whenever one of the companies puts a new store in a town the other moves in right next door. Unbelievable!

Okay, yes, that's unbelievable. It turns out that the Lowe's/Home Depot Brothers story isn't true after all. I found this urban myth (and a few even more colorful variants) debunked thoroughly at Snopes.

So why does it seem like the two stores are always built near each other? Because that's the best place to build. According to this Pensacola News Journal article, the requirements of building a large home improvement store usually result in the two chains being near each other. How usually? A spokesperson for Lowe's claimed that 78% of Lowe's stores are located within 10 miles of their competition (I'm assuming Home Depot here).

Another outlandish (yet completely true!) claim by the Lowe's spokesperson: Lowe's does not "deliberately locate its stores across the street from its business rival."

So all of the behind the scenes home improvement machinations in State College? Apparently they're not what they seem. Just like the story of JoePa and his ox.

(It was really more of a teal color.)