The Vermont Country Store, Inc., is an American catalog, retail, and e-commerce business based in Vermont. The company was established in 1946 and is operated by the Orton family.
History
Although The Vermont Country Store was first opened in 1946 in Weston, Vermont, by Vrest and Mildred Ellen Orton,[1] its origins lie in the Orton family's long Vermont history. In 1897, Gardner Lyman Orton, the eighth generation of Ortons in the United States, opened a general store with his father-in-law Melvin Teachout in Calais, Vermont. Gardner's wife Leila gave birth to their eldest son Vrest that same year. The Teachout-Orton general store was the focal point of Vrest's early years and served as the original inspiration for The Vermont Country Store.
After serving in World War I, in France, Vrest entered the class of 1923 at Harvard. He served briefly in the U.S. Consular Service before moving to New York City in 1925. There he was on the staff of H.L. Mencken’s American Mercury, Alfred Knopf publishers, the Saturday Review of Literature, Life magazine, and in 1929 founded the international book collector’s magazine, The Colophon.