Just prior to the American Civil War, in 1860, Field and bookkeeper Levi Z. Leiter became junior partners in the firm, then known as Cooley, Farwell & Company.

After Field and Leiter's immediate success enabled them to pay him back, Palmer withdrew two years later from the partnership in 1867 to focus on his own growing real-estate interests on one of the burgeoning city's important thoroughfares, State Street.

In 1868, Palmer convinced Field and Leiter to lease a new, six-story edifice[5] he had just built at the northeast corner of State and Washington Streets.

Horace B. Parker, a young salesman, rushed to the store's basement, broke up boxes, and built a fire in the furnace boiler so that the steam-powered elevators could be operated.

Six months later, in April 1872, Field & Leiter reopened in an unburned building at Madison and Market Streets (today's West Wacker Drive).

[7] Two years later, in October 1873, Field and Leiter returned to State Street at Washington, opening in a new five-story store at their old location they now leased from the Singer Sewing Machine Company, Palmer having sold the land site to finance his own rebuilding activities.

Ever tenacious, Field and Leiter had a new temporary store opened by the end of the month at a lakefront exposition hall they leased temporarily from the city, located at what is now the site of the present Art Institute of Chicago.

Meanwhile, the Singer company had speculatively built a new, even larger, six-story building on the ruins of their old 1873 store, which, after some contention, was personally bought by Field and Leiter.

In 1887, the landmark seven-story Henry Hobson Richardson-designed, (1838–1886), Romanesque-styled, Marshall Field's Wholesale Store opened on Franklin Street between Quincy and Adams (razed c.1930).

Chicago's location at the nexus of the country's railroads and Great Lakes shipping made it the center of the dry goods wholesaling business by the 1870s, with Field's former partner from before the war, John V. Farwell, Sr., (1825–1908), being his largest rival.

The nine-story "Annex" at the northwest corner of Wabash and Washington Streets has opened under the direction of Burnham associate Charles B. Atwood[8] in August 1893, towards the end of the Exposition.

In 1897, the old 1879 store was rebuilt and had two additional floors added, while the first of Marshall Field's iconic landmark Great Clocks was installed at the corner of State and Washington Streets on November 26.

Spurred on by Selfridge, Marshall Field razed the three buildings north of it, which had been occupied since 1888, as well as the Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan-designed 1879 Central Music Hall at the southeast corner of State and Randolph Streets in 1901.

In the midst of the construction, Selfridge abruptly resigned from the company in 1904, buying a rival store Schlesinger & Mayer, but sold it only three months later.

With completion of the 1907 building, Marshall Field's momentarily possessed the title of "world's largest department store" over John Wanamaker & Co. in Philadelphia and R.H. Macy & Co. in New York.

[10] In its place rose the 1914 building designed by the Graham, Burnham & Company architectural firm, completing the present-day store and now encompassing the entire square city block, bounded by Washington, State, Wabash, and Randolph Streets.

These buildings recaptured its status as the world's largest department store, its many restaurants and separate men's and women's lounges becoming an important social destination for upscale Chicago.

[5] In September 1928, its first branch in Evanston, Illinois followed, later relocating to a French Renaissance-style building at Sherman Avenue and Church Street in November 1929.

The retailer needed capital due to the expense of opening the massive new Merchandise Mart to house its flagging wholesale division.

Following World War II, the Merchandise Mart building was sold in 1945 to Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., (1888–1969), significantly improving the Field Company's finances and enabling the store to cope with the post-war suburban residential and commercial boom.

Marshall Field's presciently followed its customers to their new homes outwards to the suburbs, including opening a store in 1950 in partnership with pioneering suburban developer Philip M. Klutznick (a famous Jewish leader and later U.S. Secretary of Commerce) at his new Park Forest Plaza, which utilized revolutionary new concepts in land use and architecture.

Field's existing Frederick & Nelson unit in Seattle absorbed the Lipman's and Liberty House stores under its name, but after initially merging The Union of Columbus, Ohio with its earlier Halle's stores from Cleveland, Field's decided to sell the combined chain in November 1981; the new owners quickly liquidated it.

The former Gimbels Northridge and Southridge locations were retained by Field's for only three years; due to poor performance, they were sold in 1989 to H.C. Prange Co. of Sheboygan.

A major restoration and renovation of the State Street flagship store led by Director of Construction and Maintenance Bill Allen commenced in 1987.

In 2004 Target Corporation sold the Marshall Field's chain to May Co., exiting the traditional department store business entirely.

[17] Hundreds of protesters gathered under Marshall Field's famous clock that day,[18] and returned on the one-year anniversary, September 9, 2007.

[20][21][22] Many Chicagoans felt betrayed by Macy's takeover of Marshall Field’s when the company began to change its aesthetics and customer service standards, and demoted many Chicago-based brands.

In December 2006, Macy's reported 30% slower sales in former Marshall Field's stores; the focus shifted to promoting the State Street location in 2007.

Moreover, every year at Christmas, Marshall Field's downtown store windows were filled with animated displays as part of the downtown shopping district display; the "theme" window displays became famous for their ingenuity and beauty, and visiting the Marshall Field's windows at Christmas became a tradition for Chicagoans and visitors alike, as popular a local practice as visiting the Walnut Room with its equally famous Christmas tree or meeting "under the clock" on State Street.

[25] Field, the store he created and his successor John G. Shedd, helped establish Chicago's prominence throughout the world in business, art, culture, and education.