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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Robert Levine
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https://trexlerworks.muhlenberg.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=LVTNT-28.xml
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5.4 June 1, 2017 Robert Levine, June 1, 2017 LVTNT-28 52:00 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Robert Levine Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 LevineRobert_20170601 1.0:|23(4)|42(14)|67(7)|86(9)|109(11)|136(8)|161(13)|192(2)|219(6)|238(15)|263(4)|286(15)|313(11)|340(4)|365(8)|390(5)|409(4)|436(3)|455(15)|474(16)|495(16)|516(2)|539(9)|560(10)|587(7)|616(11)|643(5)|662(5)|679(12)|700(16)|725(15)|750(12)|771(11)|796(9)|821(6)|846(12)|873(12)|898(13)|929(14)|958(7)|991(13)|1020(7)|1043(14)|1068(12)|1087(13)|1112(10)|1137(2)|1158(8)|1185(9)|1220(9)|1241(13)|1270(6) 0 https://youtu.be/H-BXrwfr-xg YouTube video 0 Introduction—Robert Levine's Education SC: Today is June 1, 2017, interview with Robert Levine, and am I pronouncing that correctly? So I'd like to go first to have you put yourself into place, and say your full name, where you were born, when you were born, and also some things about where you’ve lived in your life, you know, if you’ve lived at different places.
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 ; RL: Full name is Robert Kerry Levine. Born and raised in Allentown. Attended the Jewish day school in Allentown. I believe one of the first graduating classes from there. From there, I guess I went to Raub Junior High School, went to Allen High School for a year. Then my parents sent me off to Perkiomen Prep which I did three years there. And then down to Clemson University in Clemson, South Carolina, to get my degree-- four year degree. 0 69 Levine's Father & ; the Textile Waste Business SC: And also, can you talk a little bit more about any memories you have as a child growing up and what got you into the business? 
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 ; RL: Memories were that my father always worked, and I think from the time I could walk, I probably went to the - as we called it the shop or the warehouse - to help, to get in somebody's way when we were younger. And eventually, every summer, every vacation I did work for my father.
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 ; SC: And was he in exactly the same businesses as what you then were in?
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 ; RL: Well, they actually had an unusual business, or unique business, that their father who was born in and married in Russia came over here and had six children. The oldest being Verna, then four brothers, and then the youngest being Rose, who was actually still alive today ; she's 97. Their father went around town with a cart - I guess in that time that’s what they had - to collect used metal. 0 389 Family History SC: [C]an you talk a little bit more about your parents’ background, a little bit more context of your mother's family and father’s family.
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 ; RL: And I think a unique part about my father’s and mother's family is my father, like I said, had three other sibling boys who were all in the business. Each one of them had a different part of the business: one was in the office, two were in the textile waste, one was in the fabric part of it. Two of the brothers, the oldest two married a set of sisters. My father and his brother, who was just as old, a little older than him, married a different set of sisters. So again, it’s sort of unique that growing up we were very very close. My father's background, and I think the brother’s background, they just worked hard and learned from doing whatever they did because they had no college education. High school education was the most they had.
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 ; SC: That was good though.
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 ; RL: I think that you know from work, hard work, working hard. Just being there and doing it. 0 755 Schmattas—Yiddish for "Rag Business" SC: And it’s interesting that your family went from metal, metal scraps to fabric scraps. Would that all be considered schmatta?
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 ; RL: Schmattas? 
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 ; SC: Yeah. I have a terrible Trenton accent, I’m sorry.
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 ; RL: I don’t know if the metals would be called schmattas, but the rags are schmattas.
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 ; SC: Yes, okay, I didn’t know. So it would've been scraps but it's still some of the same skills, maybe? Or…
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 ; RL: It’s picking up stuff that nobody can use or wants.
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 ; SC: You can see value. 0 800 Competition Within the Textile Waste Businesses SC: So do you, do you think that the Jewish community was cohesive when you were young and when your parents were young?
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 ; RL: I think they were, yes. I mean in the textile waste part there were three families involved in the business. Each one of them worked very hard to get their accounts, and it was almost like cut-throat. That if one would pay a nickel a pound, the other one would come in and say seven cents a pound. And really the only one that was benefiting from it was the customer that they were buying it from. And that really went on for as long as I can remember. Once the children got involved, my generation, I know of a family is probably little younger than I am, he would call me and say ‘listen why don’t one week you guys pick the scrap up, the next week we pick the scraps, and let’s buy it cheap.’ Our fathers didn’t, both sides of the fathers didn’t want to have anything to do with it. 0 883 Relationship to Non-Jewish Communities SC: And how about the relationship between the Jewish community and the non-Jewish community. A lot of people we actually interviewed a couple generations, and you would hear, you’re young and…
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 ; RL: It doesn't matter who you are, or what you believe in. I wouldn’t say that about my father or my father-in-law, you know, that’s something different. I think my father-in-law has changed, that he realizes that this is what it is. 0 931 Personal Connections to the Jewish Community GE: [D]o you want to share with us any memories you have of the local Jewish community growing up? Or, what were the prominent institutions? Was your family active in any thing?
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 ; RL: Well, like I said, I went to a Jewish Day School, and I was in one of the first graduating classes. My parents belonged to Congregation Sons of Israel which is the Orthodox synagogue in the town. I was bar mitzvahed at 6th Street which was the old Congregation Sons of Israel. By the time I got married we still belonged to Congregation Sons of Israel. The sad part is they told me my dues were based on who my father was. I said ‘my father doesn't pay my dues.’ And, again, I don’t know if this should be talked about, but. And I said ‘no, I pay my own dues. It's my value.’ And growing up with, and then having some young kids, we weren't sending them to a Jewish day school. So we needed somewhere for them to go to Hebrew school. And at that point, we joined Temple Beth El. 0 1041 History of the Family Businesses GE: [T]ell us a little bit about the businesses. How your . . . .sounds like your grandfather, but especially your father and his brothers really, what was, how did it start? How did it grow? It sounds like it eventually became these four businesses they operated. Which parts of the business, what happened for the next generation?
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 ; RL: My grandfather had the pushcart and for some reason, he got some fabrics. And at that point, I don't know how much fabric it was but I guess my father and his brothers thought that this would be a good thing, rather than the fruit stand and the fresh fish. So they all worked together on Second Street. Mostly with the textile waste part, and then they grew into full rolls of fabric. Either they were extra from the manufacturers that they weren’t using to make their garments, or from the contractors there was often extra. I think at one point, the manufacturers who had contractors making their fabric would send in thousands of yards, maybe they only needed 500 yards. And it would get lost in the shuffle. And at that point, my father’s business, they bought the fabric. So they started with the textile waste part and the full rolls of fabric, excess fabric, over cuts, or whatever you want to call it. 0 1253 1986: Consolidating the Businesses RL: And then at one point, and it may have been 1986, we put all the businesses in one building. My father and his brother Ben ran the textile waste part of it. His brother Irving ran the fabric part of it. All the fabric whether it was for the retail stores or for the manufacturers. And his oldest brother, Morris, was more the financial guy, but also in the ‘craft and notions’ part of the business. Each one of the brothers had one son. Morris’ son, who was an excellent carpenter, came into the business, and none of us worked under our fathers. We all worked under uncles. That’s what, that’s what they wanted.
 ; 
 ; Arthur was involved in the wiper part of the business in the textile waste part. My cousin Jeffrey, who was Irving’s son, I have to rephrase, he was the only one who worked under his father. He didn't really want to work, he didn’t really like the work. He did not last long. He moved out to California or Arizona somewhere. Ira worked under Irving, which is the second oldest brother in the textile part of it, and I worked under Morris, who was in the financial part and the ‘crafts and notions’ part. And everything was great, and then you bring everybody... and everybody did their own little thing. 0 1452 1996: Closing the Family Business GE: [H]ow were the four businesses doing? Were they all still…
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 ; RL: Successful.
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 ; GE: Okay.
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 ; RL: And then we also had all of the retail stores, which my mother's brother ran all the retail stores. At one point his office was in one store, and then he moved into the warehouse with us. So that's how the business was running. And then at one point, we decided that we didn’t want it, it wasn’t right for us, the times weren’t right, and we literally closed everything down. We sold out of the retail stores, and just closed them. And we closed the wholesale operation. 
 ; 
 ; GE: And that was about when?
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 ; RL: I want to say 1996.
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 ; GE: Oh, so by 1996, the retail was closed and the wholesale was closed?
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 ; RL: Everything was closed. 0 1631 Life After the Business—Husband & ; Wife Businesses GE: [W]ant to share with us a little bit what you have done since?
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 ; RL: Since then, we have the building, which we rent out. It’s about a 130,000 square-foot warehouse. I happen to own 60% of it because I had 20%, I got my father's 20%, and I got my one cousin’s, who lives in Florida.I bought his 20%. Ira in a sense had 20%, and his parents may have still been living, they had 20%. They both passed. They gave 10% of their share to their daughter, who had passed to her kids, and they gave 10% to Ira. So in a sense, Ira’s sister’s children, the three of them own 10%, Ira owns 30% of the building, and I own 60%.
 ; 
 ; And, I guess I got married in ‘75, so we started making clothing, my wife and I. We had our own contracting facility that we actually made our own. First we had other people making it, then we started making it ourselves, and then we made garments for other people. Most of it was garment dyed. We had someone making sweaters for us, and everything would get dyed together. And we were selling to J Jill, Black-and-White, and a lot of boutique-type stores. 0 2016 Memories of the Business GE: Do you have any fond memories about the business that you want to share with us, any kind of anecdotes working, either working with your dad and uncles, or the time it was the cousins. Any particular stories that you want to share?
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 ; RL: Well, it was unique that my father and his brothers could scream . . . if they had a huge argument, two seconds later, it was forgotten. When you get cousins involved and uncles involved, it doesn't happen like that. So I think that was, you know, you sort of get used to that. Memories I had was that every time I had a vacation, if it was from high school, if it was from college, I’d come and work in the business. And I tried to learn every part of the business, and I expected if I wanted, I would sweep floors. If I wanted my employees to sweep floors, they can’t say well you never did it. 0 2110 Profits and Products GE: [I]t may be interesting to hear of total sales and perhaps separately total profits. What percent was the retail, was the waste, was the fabric? Any, any…
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 ; RL: That’s a business question, I could tell.
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 ; GE: Yeah, but any feel for that? Which one was particularly small, large? In terms of sales and in terms of profits.
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 ; RL: I don’t know what percentages, but I would think the fabric to the manufacturers was probably the largest percentage. Under that was the sales to retail stores, and then our stores, our retail stores, and the textile waste. And probably the reason for that is because when you're selling a tractor trailer load of fabric, the dollar amount was a lot more than when we are selling a tractor trailer load of scrap. 0 2309 Impact of the Textile and Needle-Trade Industries on the Lehigh Valley GE: Right, what impact do you think it's had on the Lehigh Valley on the general community and what impact do you think it had on the Jewish community? If anything.
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 ; RL: I don’t know, well I think...I don’t know if it’s really had an impact except maybe for prosperity or you know that's what I was doing. Now even when we closed our business, I was devastated so what am I going to give my kids, I have nothing to give my kids. And again that’s probably a Jewish thing. Maybe not, but what do I give my kids, I have nothing to give them. So I was very upset about that part. And I remember talking to the cantor and he said, no-- it was actually the rabbi, and he said, ‘don’t worry about it ; they’ll find their own.’ 0 2359 Rosey's Creations RL: I was a contractor making flags also for a company that now had moved to Florida, excuse me to South Carolina. And they would give me the rolls of fabric, which were flags, I would take them to a contractor, and they would cut the flag out and sew it. We also did tablecloths for department stores if it was for a certain cosmetic company. We did NASCAR flags, we did the US flag, all kinds of different things. 
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 ; GE: At that point was that part of the Levine business or was that was part of yours and your wife’s..
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 ; RL: No, that was a part of my own.
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 ; GE: Right, okay, your own business. What was that business called? 
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 ; RL: Well I kept it under Rosey’s Creations, which was my, our fabric part of the business. 0 2410 My Boy's Baking RL: Just, you didn’t ask about My Boy’s Baking. My wife and I have three children, grown, and actually three grandchildren, which is better than having the children, but don’t record that. Your thoughts also?
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 ; GE: No, I don’t have them yet.
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 ; RL: Oh, it’s the best,
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 ; GE: I look forward to it.
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 ; RL: But, when my daughter was young, she used to say, ‘where are my boys?’ So we really didn’t want to call it biscotti, we didn’t want to give it . . . because what do we do if we start making cookies? So that's how we got the name My Boy’s Baking from. Actually, my daughter . . . because people would go to her and say aren’t you upset that it’s called “My Boy’s..” and she would say no because that’s what I called them. 0 2464 Reflecting on Jewish and Italian Involvement in the Textile and Needle-Trade Industries GE: Why do you think the Jewish community was dominant in that industry?
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 ; RL: Probably because once someone was doing it and another Jewish person said, ‘oh, maybe I should do it.’ No, I really don’t know because there are a lot of Italians in it too. 
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 ; GE: Right.
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 ; RL: But Italians and the Jewish people are sort of similar.
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 ; GE: Right, right.
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 ; RL: And they all got, we all got along.
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 ; GE: Right, right, any thoughts as to why those two groups?
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 ; RL: Get along?
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 ; GE: Or were in that industry? What about that industry made it attractive?
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 ; RL: I really don’t know. I mean just maybe for the enjoyment of it. It could be enjoyment. 0 2588 Levine's Children and Grandchildren RL: My oldest son, Joshua, is married and has two sons. He works for Stephen Starr Restaurants. They have about 47 restaurants, each one of them . . . mainly out of Philadelphia. Each one pretty much has a different theme. They've opened in Florida, they’ve opened in Washington DC, and they’ve opened in New York. Actually Stephen Starr just won the James Beard Award, which is like a nationwide or worldwide top honor. One of his restaurants in New York, Le Coucou, a French restaurant, just also won the James Beard for the best restaurant. Le Coucou was voted the best restaurant in New York. My son Joshua runs all forty-seven restaurants ; from opening them, helping to open, to buying the supplies for the restaurants. And actually he started out, our family was very ice hockey oriented, so he went to school in Colorado, University of Colorado, and he was a ref for the semi-pros out on the West Coast. 0 2884 South Clemson Versus Philadelphia Textile SC: Is there a reason why you went down South to Clemson, only because there were…
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 ; RL: Philadelphia Textile was the number one school. I did not get in on my own. I was probably not a very good student, and my father said, ‘we must know somebody.’ And I said, ‘Dad, I don’t want to do that.’ Clemson was the second best for textiles, so that’s why I went down to Clemson, it was farther away from Allentown.
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 ; SC: And were there any, when you were there, was that still an emerging textile area?
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 ; RL: Clemson?
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 ; SC: Out in the…
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 ; RL: Clemson area? Yes.
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 ; SC: That’s what I was wondering, method to madness.
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 ; RL: I mean talk about 1972, yeah it was still big. 0 2994 Levine's Values SC: So what do you value most in life?
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 ; RL: My family. And you know, kids, my wife. Well let’s do my grandchildren, my kids, and my wife...don’t quote me. Family is very important to us. Even today, my daughter must call my wife 10, 15, 20 times a day. And it’s just to talk. My wife lost her sister from cancer probably 20 years ago, so it's, and this is good for her to have my daughter very close. Every morning, I text her and say good morning. So family is very important and that’s why both my boys moved back from Florida and California because you know it’s family, it's all about family. 0 3082 Levine's Inspiration SC: And what has made you feel the most creative in your life? 
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 ; RL: My wife. I mean you know it’s, how creative am I? I don't really know, you know, it's my wife who is really doing the creative part. And I’ve just followed that in the financial part and worked it. Is that a good answer?
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 ; SC: Yeah, it's a good meeting… 
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 ; RL: Really?
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 ; SC: It’s a good match. 0 MovingImage Robert Levine (three generations in Allentown) talks about how S. Levine & ; Sons business was started by his grandfather, a peddler in scrap metal originally and later in textile scrap. Robert’s father and his father’s three brothers entered the business in the mid 1940s and grew it substantially. During its heyday, the Levine business included textile waste, fabric wholesaling, fabric retailing, and purveyor of crafts and notions to fabric and retail stores. By the 1980s, the older generation had either passed away or retired and the Levine business was now run by the next generation, Robert and his cousin Ira. By 1996, between industry decline due to globalization and free-trade and conflicting ideas of how to run the business, the cousins sold off part of the business and closed the other parts of the business. Interview with Robert Levine, June 1, 2017 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Today is June 1, 2017, interview with Robert Levine, and am I pronouncing that correctly? So I'd like to go first to have you put yourself into place, and say your full name, where you were born, when you were born, and also some things about where you've lived in your life, you know, if you've lived at different places. ROBERT LEVINE: Full name is Robert Kerry Levine. Born and raised in Allentown. Attended the Jewish day school in Allentown. I believe one of the first graduating classes from there. From there, I guess I went to Raub Junior High School, went to Allen High School for a year. Then my parents sent me off to Perkiomen Prep which I did three years there. And then down to Clemson University in Clemson, South Carolina, to get my degree-- four year degree. SC: And also, can you talk a little bit more about any memories you have as a child growing up and what got you into the business? RL: Memories were that my father always worked, and I think from the time I could walk, I probably went to the - as we called it the shop or the warehouse - to help, to get in somebody's way when we were younger. And eventually, every summer, every vacation I did work for my father. SC: And was he in exactly the same businesses as what you then were in? RL: Well, they actually had an unusual business, or unique business, that their father who was born in and married in Russia came over here and had six children. The oldest being Verna, then four brothers, and then the youngest being Rose, who was actually still alive today ; she's 97. Their father went around town with a cart - I guess in that time that's what they had - to collect used metal. The brothers, I believe, were in the fruit business, and they also grew into [selling] fresh fish. Something like they went to the Army, came back, and I think they still. . . I don't know if it was before the Army or after the Army, they still had that business. And then their father somehow started collecting pieces of fabric. So from there they got into the fabric business. They had a warehouse, the first one was actually on Second Street, near Second and Tilghman. And the story I've been told is that they put their father in the corner, let him play with some fabrics and sort them and from that they got involved in the textile waste part of the business. From the textile waste part of the business, they had from some of the manufacturers . . . . Textile waste, for those that don't know, it's when you make out a pattern, the part you scrap that's what they collected. From there they got rolls of fabric that were extra or the manufacturer's contractor sold it. They grew that into selling rolls of fabric to different retail stores, I believe, and to manufacturers who needed the fabric. From there they grew into the textile waste part and the full rolls of fabric. From there they grew into retail stores. With the retail stores, at one point we probably had over 20 retail stores. Some being, one being in the Hess department store downtown. Some being in Fox Food Basket, which was a grocery chain at that time, and freestanding ones. And then you had warehouses throughout the metro, throughout the Allentown area. That one was for the textile waste, one was for the fabrics, from which they sold to the manufacturers at that point. They also got involved with converting your own fabric, meaning when velour was big, they would go to a firm called Fair-Tex, which is a local firm. They would make the fabric for them, and then my father and his brothers, me and my cousins would sell it. In another warehouse, they had fabrics that were sold to retail stores, and also crafts and notions that were sold to retail stores. So in essence it was really four different parts of the business. One being the textile waste, one selling the full rolls of fabric to manufacturers-- for some of them the fabric was newly made, some was overrun, some was excess fabric. Another part [of the business] was the crafts and notions in fabric and retail stores, then the retail stores and the fabric. SC: May I just ask where the different fabric stores were. I remember Levine's in between Ewing and Princeton when I was a kid. Was that your family? RL: Ewing, Princeton, New Jersey? We actually had one in Woodbury, New Jersey and one in Williamstown, New Jersey, so I don't know if that's where you're talking about? SC: No, but I know that I've been to Levine's. RL: Their first one was actually on Ridge Avenue. Actually, no, the first one was on Tilghman Street, in a little, now I think it's a house or something, they converted it to. Then they went to Ridge Avenue. From there they went to Seventh Street. We had them in Colmar, Pennsylvania and probably could remember some of the others. SC: Landsdale, maybe? RL: Well Landsdale and Colmar are the same thing. SC: Yes, yes. So as far as your background, can you talk a little bit more about your parents' background, a little bit more context of your mother's family and father's family. RL: And I think a unique part about my father's and mother's family is my father, like I said, had three other sibling boys who were all in the business. Each one of them had a different part of the business: one was in the office, two were in the textile waste, one was in the fabric part of it. Two of the brothers, the oldest two married a set of sisters. My father and his brother, who was just as old, a little older than him, married a different set of sisters. So again, it's sort of unique that growing up we were very very close. My father's background, and I think the brother's background, they just worked hard and learned from doing whatever they did because they had no college education. High school education was the most they had. SC: That was good though. RL: I think that you know from work, hard work, working hard. Just being there and doing it. SC: Where . . . was everyone from this area, did they all finally settle in this area? Once they . . . before they were married? RL: The four brothers were, yes. SC: And the women? RL: I know about my mother and her sister. They're from here. I'm pretty sure the other two sisters were also from Fountain Hill, Bethlehem, somewhere in this area. Because my father's oldest brother, Morris, I believe he worked at a factory in Northampton. I don't remember the name of it. I don't know if you guys interviewed-- SC: ...different people, we did. RL: Not Kivert, who's-- GAIL EISENBERG: That's who we did. RL: I think that's where he may have ended up. That's...I think so, I'm not 100% sure, though. SC: So do you know anything about the rest of your family, where they came from, did they all come originally from Russia? Or-- RL: My...and my grandfather Sam, whom the company is named after: S. Levine and Sons, with the Sons being his sons. He was from Russia ; his wife was from Russia or my grandma was from Russia. They were married there and then they came here to the states. My mother's side of the family, I really don't know. And the only reason that I know my father's side is because after I spoke to Gail, I figured, I better find out where my father's family is from. So I made a phone call to my father's only living sibling, Rose, who is 97. And we FaceTimed, and she looks exactly like I saw her and remember her. SC: Do you know anything more about, like the maiden names of your family going back-- of the women? RL: Baringoldz is my mother's maiden name. And actually, B-A-R-I-N-G-O-L-D-Z. Actually, she, her brother, there were three sisters and a boy in that family. One of them was actually a Fock, who married a Fock. And then my aunt and my mother married my father and his brother. And Leon Baringoldz, he actually, had a fabric store of his own on Seventh Street. Then he closed that and came to run all of our fabric stores. He was from Allentown. I don't know my grandma's maiden name. SC: Cause sometimes people coming are looking for family members, or distant family members, so it's nice if they can connect with the other people. RL: Yeah, that's what I know. SC: And, so also was the entire family Jewish? RL: Yes. SC: And then other ones, we haven't done this for a little while-- RL: That's ok. GE: Quick question, when were you born? RL: 1950. GE: And then, what brought your grandfather to Allentown? How did he come to Allentown? RL: I have no idea. You know, I could ask my, if I could call you back, I could ask my aunt who's-- GE: Right, right, I'm just curious, it's not public. RL: I know, I don't know, were there a bunch of families that came, fabric families that came to Allentown? SC: Yeah, going through often, through Brooklyn. GE: Someone either brought them or they started out in Brooklyn. RL: So just a note of, personally, my father was in what they called new rags. It was never used, it was new fabrics or new scraps. Whereas my father-in-law was in used clothing in Scranton. My wife and I met at the textile, a rag convention, a wiper convention in Paradise Island. So that's how, that's what brought us together. SC: And the connections, too. RL: Well they sort of knew each other but they really didn't, and they may have said hello or whatever. But then after my wife and I got engaged, all the other families wanted to bring their kids in too, and said 'hey, maybe I can get my kid involved in the textile business.' SC: And it's interesting that your family went from metal, metal scraps to fabric scraps. Would that all be considered schmatta? RL: Schmattas? SC: Yeah. I have a terrible Trenton accent, I'm sorry. RL: I don't know if the metals would be called schmattas, but the rags are schmattas. SC: Yes, okay, I didn't know. So it would've been scraps but it's still some of the same skills, maybe? Or-- RL: It's picking up stuff that nobody can use or wants. SC: You can see value. RL: Well, everything had a value. Someone's scrap was someone else's value. SC: So do you, do you think that the Jewish community was cohesive when you were young and when your parents were young? RL: I think they were, yes. I mean in the textile waste part there were three families involved in the business. Each one of them worked very hard to get their accounts, and it was almost like cut-throat. That if one would pay a nickel a pound, the other one would come in and say seven cents a pound. And really the only one that was benefiting from it was the customer that they were buying it from. And that really went on for as long as I can remember. Once the children got involved, my generation, I know of a family is probably little younger than I am, he would call me and say 'listen why don't one week you guys pick the scrap up, the next week we pick the scraps, and let's buy it cheap.' Our fathers didn't, both sides of the fathers didn't want to have anything to do with it. And I guess it was, you know, their ego. You know, they started from nothing, and it was their account, and it was the way that that generation worked because they worked hard at it, and sweated it, and worked seven days a week to get their accounts. SC: And how about the relationship between the Jewish community and the non-Jewish community. A lot of people we actually interviewed a couple generations, and you would hear, you're young and-- RL: It doesn't matter who you are, or what you believe in. I wouldn't say that about my father or my father-in-law, you know, that's something different. I think my father-in-law has changed, that he realizes that this is what it is. SC: So I think that's it unless you have any more questions about getting into the business? GE: Right, right, well I'll ask you something, but in regards to this, do you want to share with us any memories you have of the local Jewish community growing up? Or, what were the prominent institutions? Was your family active in any thing? RL: Well, like I said, I went to a Jewish Day School, and I was in one of the first graduating classes. My parents belonged to Congregation Sons of Israel which is the Orthodox synagogue in the town. I was bar mitzvahed at 6th Street which was the old Congregation Sons of Israel. By the time I got married we still belonged to Congregation Sons of Israel. The sad part is they told me my dues were based on who my father was. I said 'my father doesn't pay my dues.' And, again, I don't know if this should be talked about, but. And I said 'no, I pay my own dues. It's my value.' And growing up with, and then having some young kids, we weren't sending them to a Jewish day school. So we needed somewhere for them to go to Hebrew school. And at that point, we joined Temple Beth El. GE: And were you or was your family particularly active members? RL: I don't think that they were very active, no, in neither the Sons of Israel or anything else. GE: So I'm going to take this, and I'm going to ask you, you already did. . . you already went into it, but I think I'm going to ask you again, maybe take a step back-- RL: Did I speak too early? Did I say too much? GE: No, not at all, this is your story. But, for you to maybe take a step back and and just maybe a little more slowly, right, tell us a little bit about the businesses. How your . . . .sounds like your grandfather, but especially your father and his brothers really, what was, how did it start? How did it grow? It sounds like it eventually became these four businesses they operated. Which parts of the business, what happened for the next generation? RL: My grandfather had the pushcart and for some reason, he got some fabrics. And at that point, I don't know how much fabric it was but I guess my father and his brothers thought that this would be a good thing, rather than the fruit stand and the fresh fish. So they all worked together on Second Street. Mostly with the textile waste part, and then they grew into full rolls of fabric. Either they were extra from the manufacturers that they weren't using to make their garments, or from the contractors there was often extra. I think at one point, the manufacturers who had contractors making their fabric would send in thousands of yards, maybe they only needed 500 yards. And it would get lost in the shuffle. And at that point, my father's business, they bought the fabric. So they started with the textile waste part and the full rolls of fabric, excess fabric, over cuts, or whatever you want to call it. Then from Second Street, they moved to a couple other warehouses, one being in Catasauqua, which was just wipers. What wipers are, it's a bigger piece of fabric, bigger than your hand that someone can use for cleaning, the government used it, and for whatever else they could use it. The textile waste part was in Catasauqua, and there they sorted the different types of fabric out. They would try to teach the contractors and manufacturers when they were cutting something, their patterns, if they were cutting cotton, only put cotton in the burlap bag that our business would pick up. If there were cutting polyester, only polyester [in a bag]. If they were cutting only burgundy polyester, keep that in one bag. And it was more valuable at that point, whites were more valuable. The polyester scraps, a lot of that got sent to, I guess converters or someone who would break apart the fabric, and now they would already have a yarn dyed thread. So it was one less step that they would have to do. Some of it was made into the roofs of cars. A lot of it was made into paper and sometimes, I don't know if they still do it, sometimes you see recycled paper, or recycled fabrics, which was from the type of fabrics. Then from, that was in Allentown, they had a warehouse that would be just for the full rolls of fabric, and an upstairs was the 'craft and notions' and the downstairs for the full rolls of fabric but also the, what they called double fold fabric, which would go into the retail stores. And then at one point, and it may have been 1986, we put all the businesses in one building. My father and his brother Ben ran the textile waste part of it. His brother Irving ran the fabric part of it. All the fabric whether it was for the retail stores or for the manufacturers. And his oldest brother, Morris, was more the financial guy, but also in the 'craft and notions' part of the business. Each one of the brothers had one son. Morris' son, who was an excellent carpenter, came into the business, and none of us worked under our fathers. We all worked under uncles. That's what, that's what they wanted. Arthur was involved in the wiper part of the business in the textile waste part. My cousin Jeffrey, who was Irving's son, I have to rephrase, he was the only one who worked under his father. He didn't really want to work, he didn't really like the work. He did not last long. He moved out to California or Arizona somewhere. Ira worked under Irving, which is the second oldest brother in the textile part of it, and I worked under Morris, who was in the financial part and the 'crafts and notions' part. And everything was great, and then you bring everybody... and everybody did their own little thing. It was all dollars came into one pot. Then we moved out to, we built a building out towards Iron Run where everything was together: the textile waste part was one part, the fabrics to the manufacturers were in part of the building, the retail fabrics, crafts and notions were in the other part of the building, and we all had our offices there. GE: I'm sorry, that was 1990, or something? RL: I think around 1986. At that point, my uncle Morris, who was the oldest brother, had passed. He actually passed on Front Street where he was involved in the financial part, at the switchboard. And that's probably where he wanted to pass. His next brother, Irving, passed, so it was really only my father and his brother, who was a bit older than him, left in the business when we moved out to the Iron Run industrial park outside of that. By then, Arthur had already moved to Florida and so it was just Ira, who was Ben's son, and myself that were working in business, so it was really only four of us. Then at one point, my father took, went to Florida, and stayed there. Ben also, if I remember correctly, went to Florida -- much later than my father. And then it was Ira and I running the whole company. GE: And this was what time period? RL: I would say almost the late 1980s. GE: Okay, and how are the different, how were the four businesses doing? Were they all still-- RL: Successful. GE: Okay. RL: And then we also had all of the retail stores, which my mother's brother ran all the retail stores. At one point his office was in one store, and then he moved into the warehouse with us. So that's how the business was running. And then at one point, we decided that we didn't want it, it wasn't right for us, the times weren't right, and we literally closed everything down. We sold out of the retail stores, and just closed them. And we closed the wholesale operation. GE: And that was about when? RL: I want to say 1996. GE: Oh, so by 1996, the retail was closed and the wholesale was closed? RL: Everything was closed. GE: Okay, okay. RL: We still own the building so we rented that out. GE: Right, okay. RL: And at that point when we closed, it was only Ira and myself left. GE: Okay, um, so those last five years, I'm assuming part of it was that the businesses were slowing down? RL: Slowing down and-- GE: Different points of view about-- RL: The sons got married, and it was just problems, Jewish problems. GE: Right. RL: And you know, that and everybody wasn't getting along as we used to. Because growing up, my father and his brother Ben and my mother, who was called Tootie,and her sister Dorothy, we lived in a twin house. And we had a hole cut through it so we could walk back and forth. My parents had their baby, my sister first, so we got to move into, actually my aunt's house, and they moved into our house, and we just lived like that. And then at one point, they had to close up the wall because too many things were being thrown back and forth. GE: So the business ended in '96 but at that point it was still a thriving business. RL: It was slowing down. GE: Because I wanted to ask you, what do you see as being some of the factors that led to it slowing down? RL: I think the family members not getting along. I think the industry in itself. Because even with the retail stores, you could buy clothing cheaper than you can make it at that point. The textile waste part just lost what was made overseas so there was no textile waste. You know, how many manufacturers and contractors were left here. So I think it was just time that ; we just wanted to close it. GE: And so now do you want to share with us a little bit what you have done since? RL: Since then, we have the building, which we rent out. It's about a 130,000 square-foot warehouse. I happen to own 60% of it because I had 20%, I got my father's 20%, and I got my one cousin's, who lives in Florida.I bought his 20%. Ira in a sense had 20%, and his parents may have still been living, they had 20%. They both passed. They gave 10% of their share to their daughter, who had passed to her kids, and they gave 10% to Ira. So in a sense, Ira's sister's children, the three of them own 10%, Ira owns 30% of the building, and I own 60%. And, I guess I got married in '75, so we started making clothing, my wife and I. We had our own contracting facility that we actually made our own. First we had other people making it, then we started making it ourselves, and then we made garments for other people. Most of it was garment dyed. We had someone making sweaters for us, and everything would get dyed together. And we were selling to J Jill, Black-and-White, and a lot of boutique-type stores. And that business also was again, the retail stores of clothing was becoming less and less. So we closed that. And at the end of that business actually we were making pilates clothing, which was exercise clothing. And through the whole time, we had franchises of Benetton, and we had three stores, and we also had an ice cream franchise called Hillary's. And we closed all of those franchises, and I couldn't sit at home and just do nothing and that's why we started making the ladies clothing. Then once, at the end, like I said, we were making pilates clothing, and we advertised in a magazine, and we did a show out in California. My wife is a great baker besides designing clothes, and knitting and whatever. We were making biscotti, she was making some for our children because her mother used to send my kids biscotti and she said 'mom, I can make it taste better.' So we took some of our samples that my wife made of biscotti out to California to give it to the magazine and at that point they said, 'oh, could you do our corporate gifts?' And here we are, we didn't have a commercial kitchen, we didn't have a commercial oven, we had nothing commercial. And I said, 'sure, we'll do that for you.' It started out to be 100 tins, a hundred pounds, a pound in each tin. We bought a commercial mixer, put it in our house, and we had two commercial ovens that were electric put into our house. And in year one we started doing corporate gifts for this magazine. It turned out to be 1500 tins and 1500 pounds later. And someone who got that [biscotti] as a gift, that company, the next year, they wanted us to send it out to their customers. So we worked out of our house for two years doing corporate gifts. We worked Thanksgiving . . . from November to January. And we said, 'you know what, maybe we have something, let's open a retail store.' So we opened up a retail store. We got involved in the fancy food show in New York. So we have been doing that. It's been about 11 years now. We are selling at this point to some major grocery chains. We're in the second-largest coffee chain in the United States, mostly private label. And we were just on QVC for the third time. And a lot of small coffee shops, and again a lot of what we do is private label. As a matter of fact, someone who was in one of the coffee shops was a friend of someone who worked for us and they said, 'you know what I was in this coffee shop, looked like your biscotti, it tasted like your biscotti, but your name wasn't on it.' And, yes it was ours. So that's where we are right now, we have this bakery, one location and we're shipping all over for it. So it has been fun. It's retail and it's also wholesale. It's off of 512 in Bethlehem. GE: And so-- RL: Excuse me, we only do biscotti and cookies. We did rugelach, it just got too time-consuming. We do granola which we do some, we again, we do private label for some people. And we do brownies. My Boy's Baking. GE: So at this point you have this business, and you still have the warehouse. Is the warehouse pretty much rented out? RL: Once we moved out, it was rented to a return center for K-Mart. And the return center, what the return center is anything from a store that someone returns-- as you know you can go to any store and return whatever-- and it goes back to a return center. So you figure it was 130,000 square feet of merchandise that people . . . and they have six of these throughout the United States. K-Mart, when they closed, we were . . . it was empty for about six months, and we got another company in there who took the whole space, and it's a plastic company. They've been in there for ten years, and they signed another contract for five. GE: Good, good. Do you have any fond memories about the business that you want to share with us, any kind of anecdotes working, either working with your dad and uncles, or the time it was the cousins. Any particular stories that you want to share? RL: Well, it was unique that my father and his brothers could scream . . . if they had a huge argument, two seconds later, it was forgotten. When you get cousins involved and uncles involved, it doesn't happen like that. So I think that was, you know, you sort of get used to that. Memories I had was that every time I had a vacation, if it was from high school, if it was from college, I'd come and work in the business. And I tried to learn every part of the business, and I expected if I wanted, I would sweep floors. If I wanted my employees to sweep floors, they can't say well you never did it. I taught myself to drive a tractor-trailer. I love driving it, it's a good truck. So I was in, and I was in a retail store. So I was really in all aspects of the business. Not saying I knew everything about it, but G-d-forbid I could at least fudge my way through it. But I just loved to work there. It was just so much fun, and we had great employees which is very important. GE: About how many employees did you have? RL: At one point, 300 employees, throughout the retail stores and the warehouse. GE: Okay, wow, and about total sales, it may be interesting to hear of total sales and perhaps separately total profits. What percent was the retail, was the waste, was the fabric? Any, any-- RL: That's a business question, I could tell. GE: Yeah, but any feel for that? Which one was particularly small, large? In terms of sales and in terms of profits. RL: I don't know what percentages, but I would think the fabric to the manufacturers was probably the largest percentage. Under that was the sales to retail stores, and then our stores, our retail stores, and the textile waste. And probably the reason for that is because when you're selling a tractor trailer load of fabric, the dollar amount was a lot more than when we are selling a tractor trailer load of scrap. GE: Right, now just out of curiosity, so there you gave us a sense of the order in terms of sales, terms of the topline. What might it be in terms of profit, in terms of at least margin? RL: I would think it'd be almost the same thing. GE: Oh so, okay, okay, as to which ones would have had a higher margin compared to lower margin. RL: Because if you're picking up fabric from, and this is a business part of it, if you're buying someone's fabric that they have no more use for, you can buy it cheaper than if you have to go and make it yourself or buy from someone who's making it for you. So the profit was there. The retail stores sales were sort of like a set profit, and part of what brought down the wholesale to the crafts/notions and fabrics is the manufacturer's of a Coats and Clark, which was a thread company. They would start selling to customers directly and cutting out the wholesaler and at that point we could not compete. So that part of the business, a lot of the fabric people, if it were a Concord fabric or any other name fabrics that we were distributing, they would be out there selling in a sense our customers not because they knew they were our customers but because they themselves can get a higher dollar for that piece of fabric than they would if they sell it to us. Even though we may buy one- hundred pieces and someone is only buying ten pieces. GE: Right, right. They didn't protect their wholesalers. RL: Right. GE: So I think that's mostly...any other...what have you seen, so I don't know if you have anything to reflect on, you know, you've been here, it sounds like a minimum 40-50 years-- RL: 67 years. GE: Right, right, but I mean that you can even reflect on, right? And so very much change right in terms of what the textile industry had been locally compared to its little existence today. RL: The textile waste part because everybody was making stuff overseas so there was no more textile waste. GE: Right. RL: So yeah, it's diminished tremendously. GE: Right, what impact do you think it's had on the Lehigh Valley on the general community and what impact do you think it had on the Jewish community? If anything. RL: I don't know, well I think...I don't know if it's really had an impact except maybe for prosperity or you know that's what I was doing. Now even when we closed our business, I was devastated so what am I going to give my kids, I have nothing to give my kids. And again that's probably a Jewish thing. Maybe not, but what do I give my kids, I have nothing to give them. So I was very upset about that part. And I remember talking to the cantor and he said, no-- it was actually the rabbi, and he said, 'don't worry about it ; they'll find their own.' So I did forget, I was a contractor making flags also for a company that now had moved to Florida, excuse me to South Carolina. And they would give me the rolls of fabric, which were flags, I would take them to a contractor, and they would cut the flag out and sew it. We also did tablecloths for department stores if it was for a certain cosmetic company. We did NASCAR flags, we did the US flag, all kinds of different things. GE: At that point was that part of the Levine business or was that was part of yours and your wife's.. RL: No, that was a part of my own. GE: Right, okay, your own business. What was that business called? RL: Well I kept it under Rosey's Creations, which was my, our fabric part of the business. GE: Okay-- RL: Rosey's being R-O-S-E-Y Creations. Just, you didn't ask about My Boy's Baking. My wife and I have three children, grown, and actually three grandchildren, which is better than having the children, but don't record that. Your thoughts also? GE: No, I don't have them yet. RL: Oh, it's the best, GE: I look forward to it. RL: But, when my daughter was young, she used to say, 'where are my boys?' So we really didn't want to call it biscotti, we didn't want to give it . . . because what do we do if we start making cookies? So that's how we got the name My Boy's Baking from. Actually, my daughter . . . because people would go to her and say aren't you upset that it's called "My Boy's.." and she would say no because that's what I called them. GE: So while Sue is thinking about that, I also have a question. In the textile industry, it is dominated, or at least it was dominated by a lot of Jewish families, why do you think that's the case? Why do you think the Jewish community was dominant in that industry? RL: Probably because once someone was doing it and another Jewish person said, 'oh, maybe I should do it.' No, I really don't know because there are a lot of Italians in it too. GE: Right. RL: But Italians and the Jewish people are sort of similar. GE: Right, right. RL: And they all got, we all got along. GE: Right, right, any thoughts as to why those two groups? RL: Get along? GE: Or were in that industry? What about that industry made it attractive? RL: I really don't know. I mean just maybe for the enjoyment of it. It could be enjoyment. SC: Okay, I think I...my question is-- RL: In our retail stores or our host operation, we would sell remnants of fabrics, maybe a yard or two yards. I know in the retail stores, people would come in and say 'I want a quarter yard of this, I want a quarter yard of that,' which is very not cost-effective for us. But it was mainly to make the quilts and stuff. And we had all the supplies for it, you know, the thread, the fabric, and the stuffing or the foam that went in it. SC: So it was five or more and they were more profitable RL: Yeah because when you're cutting, it costs you just as much to cut 10 yards of fabric as it cost you to cut a quarter yard of fabric. And it's not just one quarter yard, they want 5 quarter yards. SC: Do you still feel comfortable talking about your daughters and where they worked-- RL: My children? SC: Yeah. RL: No, I'm very proud of them. SC: Good, go for it! I should have asked you that before. RL: My oldest son, Joshua, is married and has two sons. He works for Stephen Starr Restaurants. They have about 47 restaurants, each one of them . . . mainly out of Philadelphia. Each one pretty much has a different theme. They've opened in Florida, they've opened in Washington DC, and they've opened in New York. Actually Stephen Starr just won the James Beard Award, which is like a nationwide or worldwide top honor. One of his restaurants in New York, Le Coucou, a French restaurant, just also won the James Beard for the best restaurant. Le Coucou was voted the best restaurant in New York. My son Joshua runs all forty-seven restaurants ; from opening them, helping to open, to buying the supplies for the restaurants. And actually he started out, our family was very ice hockey oriented, so he went to school in Colorado, University of Colorado, and he was a ref for the semi-pros out on the West Coast. All my children went to Camp Canadensis, which is up in the Poconos. It's an overnight camp for two months or seven weeks. He, at one point, when he decided he didn't really like the life of an ice hockey ref, he went to work for the camp that they went to-- Camp Canadensis to help run the camp. He did that for a couple of years and the lady was supposed to possibly sell us the camp, and she reneged on it. So he interviewed at Stephen Starr Restaurants. And they said you don't have any restaurant experience, we really don't need you. Six months later, he saw the same ad in the paper, and went back to them and said, 'listen, obviously you haven't hired anybody.' And at that point, they hired him on the spot. He started out as assistant manager. He wanted to be a chef, but realized that you start out as assistant manager, manager, district manager, and now he runs all forty-seven restaurants. My son Andrew, who is two years younger than Josh, went to University of Colorado and when his brother left, he went to George Washington. George Washington in DC. And he became a teacher. He taught, first he taught at Radnor School District, actually he taught at a charter school in Philadelphia, fifth grade. Then he went to Radnor School, fifth grade teacher, then he got a job in a private school, Episcopal Academy, as a fifth grade teacher. He's married. They have a little girl who's 14 months old. My daughter-in-law, his wife, Debbie, got a promotion to her job and moved to Florida and after a year they realized that they wanted to be around family. And actually, Josh, for nine months moved out to California with his two children and wife and decided that when they all got sick one day and said, 'you know what, we have nobody here.' They came back to Philadelphia. Josh lives in Philadelphia, Andrew lives in Malvern. My daughter, Rachel, is an accountant. She is single and living in Philadelphia also. As a matter of fact, my son's Joshua's wife, Jill, works for an entertainment group who goes around and does bar mitzvahs and weddings and the dancers and the disc jockeys. And her brother, who happened to be Josh's counselor at camp, said, 'you know what, the Levines are having a bat mitzvah and your company's doing it, why don't you see if you can work it?' So she came to work my daughter's bat mitzvah, not being with my son or not, and a couple years later on the JDate said are you the Jill Rosen that... so we have videos of her, which she will not let us play of her performing at my daughter's bat mitzvah. And then we have the two grandchildren, Brody and Cooper. Brody just turned eight, and Cooper is six. He plays ice hockey and is travelling. As you can tell we have an ice hockey family. And then we have a granddaughter, Winnie Rose. GE: Wonderful. RL: Oh, Rachel did go to Pitt. SC: Oh, I remember the question. Is there a reason why you went down South to Clemson, only because there were-- RL: Philadelphia Textile was the number one school. I did not get in on my own. I was probably not a very good student, and my father said, 'we must know somebody.' And I said, 'Dad, I don't want to do that.' Clemson was the second best for textiles, so that's why I went down to Clemson, it was farther away from Allentown. SC: And were there any, when you were there, was that still an emerging textile area? RL: Clemson? SC: Out in the-- RL: Clemson area? Yes. SC: That's what I was wondering, method to madness. RL: I mean talk about 1972, yeah it was still big. SC: And then of course more and more textiles--[inaudible] RL: Down South around the country. SC: Wow, that's wonderful. I'm so glad that you talked about your children and grandchildren. GE: So now we just have a few final questions. SC: A few touchy feely questions. RL: Is that going to make me cry? GE: Depends on how you answer it. RL: You know why, because when I saw my Aunt Rose, it was the first time I saw her-- GE: Is she in Florida? RL: No, she's in New York, living with her son. I've seen her son on Facebook, and we've talked a little bit. And then when I figured I'd have to ask questions. So he called and I called him back, and he said, wait a minute, do you have an iPhone? We could FaceTime. And I'm telling you, she looks exactly the same. SC: That's so wonderful. RL: So it was, that was very emotional for me. SC: This is just a who you are type of question. So what do you value most in life? RL: My family. And you know, kids, my wife. Well let's do my grandchildren, my kids, and my wife...don't quote me. Family is very important to us. Even today, my daughter must call my wife 10, 15, 20 times a day. And it's just to talk. My wife lost her sister from cancer probably 20 years ago, so it's, and this is good for her to have my daughter very close. Every morning, I text her and say good morning. So family is very important and that's why both my boys moved back from Florida and California because you know it's family, it's all about family. And whereas we thought my daughter-in-law's, they weren't as, they weren't, I don't want to say weren't as close, one daughter-in-law was not. But we thought they'd resent it because we were so close to our kids. And, you know what, both my daughters-in-law call my wife now for questions or stuff. So it's, family is very very important. I remember when my oldest grandson Brody was sick in Philadelphia. If we had to go down there, I would close the bakery early to go down there and my wife would babysit one day a week, and I would leave to take her down, I would come back to work, and go back down. So family is very very important to us. SC: And what has made you feel the most creative in your life? RL: My wife. I mean you know it's, how creative am I? I don't really know, you know, it's my wife who is really doing the creative part. And I've just followed that in the financial part and worked it. Is that a good answer? SC: Yeah, it's a good meeting-- RL: Really? SC: It's a good match. RL: She's said she saved me, so. SC: Thank you so much. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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00:51:59
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Robert Levine, June 1, 2017
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Robert Levine (three generations in Allentown) talks about how S. Levine & Sons business was started by his grandfather, a peddler in scrap metal originally and later in textile scrap. Robert’s father and his father’s three brothers entered the business in the mid 1940s and grew it substantially. During its heyday, the Levine business included textile waste, fabric wholesaling, fabric retailing, and purveyor of crafts and notions to fabric and retail stores. By the 1980s, the older generation had either passed away or retired and the Levine business was now run by the next generation, Robert and his cousin Ira. By 1996, between industry decline due to globalization and free-trade and conflicting ideas of how to run the business, the cousins sold off part of the business and closed the other parts of the business.
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LVTNT-28
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2017-06-01
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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890f66a5524cd0a1a8b1085df51554b5
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
Oral History
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Marc Malkovsky
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https://trexlerworks.muhlenberg.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=LVTNT-20.xml
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5.4 June 1, 2017 Marc Malkovsky, June 1, 2017 LVTNT-20 1:09:23 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Marc Malkovsky Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 MalkovskyMarc_20170601 1.0:|21(14)|46(14)|67(17)|94(12)|123(8)|148(9)|175(3)|196(13)|221(14)|248(5)|273(10)|300(11)|329(7)|350(15)|381(2)|406(8)|435(4)|464(10)|489(10)|514(6)|547(14)|574(15)|601(15)|626(13)|657(9)|682(15)|709(3)|738(8)|767(16)|796(2)|825(8)|852(6)|879(7)|904(3)|931(12)|958(2)|983(3)|1010(6)|1035(6)|1060(7)|1085(14)|1112(3)|1135(9)|1162(6)|1185(18)|1210(11)|1237(9)|1262(19)|1293(5)|1322(8)|1351(9)|1380(17)|1405(9)|1434(7)|1463(4)|1492(4)|1519(7)|1544(7)|1573(10)|1602(14)|1633(11)|1654(12)|1681(13)|1712(3)|1735(7)|1762(15)|1783(14)|1808(9)|1833(5)|1934(15) 0 https://youtu.be/3hzoMqWzkkQ YouTube video 31 Introduction—Marc Malkovsky SC: So first of all what is your full name? Where were you born? Where do you live and also what is your educational history?
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 ; MM: Okay, Marc Alan Malkovsky. I was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Still live in Macungie right now, right outside Allentown. Born and raised, only left for college. I went to IUP for one year for business, and then I wanted to go into the culinary field, so I went up to Johnson and Wales in Providence. I was up there for four years doing restaurant and hospitality management. Left there to get a job in the Outback Corporation, worked there for about a year and a half, started through the process of becoming a proprietor and running a kitchen. And then one day I just decided, you know, that's not what I want to do. Maybe not just that type of restaurant work, still maybe in the industry but possibly something else, maybe business. And while I was looking for job, you know, my dad was like, I'm still living at home, said, you know, I’m going to work four hours a day for me on the phones, the other four hours a day you try to find a job, go out there, look to see what is available. And it was a hundred percent commission, and I just said well, if I do four hours times two a day, eight to nine hours a day, hopefully that means double the money that I'm making. It wasn’t anything crazy at the time, but you know for somebody who is unemployed, you know, anything is good. And living at home, expenses were low and you know it worked out. And I just stayed there, and that’s kind of where my career took me. 0 208 The Family Business in the 21st Century MM: [S]o when I went in to work with my father - and that was about 11 years ago now ; so it was about when I was 24 - it was just me, him, and the warehouse gentleman, George, that worked with him since he started the business basically after he moved out of the garage that he was using. So since then, I mean you know, it's changed tremendously. Our Internet presence has changed tremendously. You know, we kind of had to evolve with the times as you know through the late 90s and 2000, you know, the Internet and online shopping and marketing, you know, became a big time change. And our industry as a whole is really old school so a lot of people don't have that. They don't do the online so that was a huge change for us, and it was evolving every year, you know, little by little. 0 409 Family History in Philadelphia SC: So let’s go back into your family, what you know as far back from your father's side of the family, your mother's side of the family, and where they came from, how they got to Allentown, and anything you know about them.
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 ; MM: So, my mom's side: they were from South Philly, so she grew up, she had two sisters, and one of them actually isn’t, well is a cousin, but her parents actually died at a very young age, so my grandmother took her in. So basically from day one, I mean it just basically was her sister, and I assumed that was her sister for many many many many years, you know, didn’t even think about it. You know, similarities in looks and everything, so I didn't get to meet, I met my grandfather, her father, but he died when I was two, maybe, something of that age. So she grew up in a pretty nice household, obviously, you know, nice family with them in South Philly.
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 ; My dad grew up in North Philly. He and his brother and his mom and dad. They, I kind of knew a little bit more about that history for some reason maybe because my grandparents on that side owned a business and they sold, they had a wholesale lingerie shop underneath the blue rail in Kensington on Allegheny. And so I was there when I was little, you know, while they were selling the stuff or you know I remember the area. So I guess you could say even with that that has to do with the fabric business, you know, garment and stuff. 0 770 Father's Textile Business MM: [Y]ou know, you obviously mix in - home life was the business at a certain extent just because, you know, my dad worked in the fabric industry ; he went to Philadelphia Textiles. And my mom was, she did two different things, she was in the orthodontist field and she also, or the dental field, I guess I would say, and then she also was a nail technician that she did. So around, all these different companies my dad worked for, some big textile people in Allentown because you know, we talked about how Allentown was a big hub-mecca of whether it was for milling or selling or manufacturing just because of our location and what real estate cost compared to New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, DC, it was just so inexpensive, but yet so easy to get to. 
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 ; So he worked for all these different companies and eventually he just said ‘you know what, I can't work for people anymore, I just, I just can't do it, I need to go out on my own.’ And that happened in ‘95, yeah ‘95. So, big risk. My sister graduated in ‘97, so two 2 years before she’s about to go to college. And, like I said before, my dad always wanted to do everything he could for us. So my sister did get a job when she went to school. I think she had a partial soccer scholarship, but you know it wasn’t a question, he wanted to make sure he took care of us and try to help out in any way. 0 900 Mother's "Tips to Toes Nail Salon" MM: And not long after that, my mom decided she was doing nails and everything in our basement and they had different clothes that they were selling while they were down there. They decided well, let's open up a shop for her too. So my mom is running a business at the time, and my dad was also helping and that was on Tilghman Street, it was called Tips to Toes Nail Salon. And she was running that, my dad was helping, so I was there, you know, sometimes when she had to watch me, sometimes, you know, I was with my dad. 
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 ; So I had two parents that were kind of running their own business, which was a great experience to see and I think, you know, it was definitely valuable in not even realizing it subconsciously of probably having how I grew up as a child, and things that I've learned without even knowing I was learning them and experiences, which definitely helped me to where I am today, for sure. 0 1058 Sister's Education and Career SC: May I ask where your sister went to college and what she does and you have another brother?
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 ; MM: Nope, just a sister.
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 ; SC: Oh, just a sister, I don’t know why I imagined that.
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 ; MM: No, it’s alright. She went to Ohio University. She went to play soccer and she then decided two years afterwards, I think she’s stopped playing soccer her senior year, she went into Family Education, I guess I'm trying to think of whether the exact title was back then. And then she came home and she didn't know what she wanted to do. She went and worked in Hoboken and actually that was kinda, that was, she lived with, you know, her roommate from Ohio who was from Ohio and she moved out to Hoboken, so they actually stayed together, and they lived out there, which was nice. 0 1243 Reflecting on Change—Technology & ; Childhood MM: [L]ife is, life evolves, life’s different. You know, we were talking earlier about just, you know, even this computer, you know like everyone talks about how different things were back in like the 50s and the 60s and the 70s and to us, I was born in ‘82. You know, when we say ‘well you know I was in the 90s’ and to us it doesn't seem that long ago. You know, but 20 years, if you go look back you’re like, when you talk about the Internet, you click on your phone, you're up on that just like that 30 seconds. We used to have to sign on and you’d hear these weird noises and you know seeing you can’t connect, you can't do this, and that's basically, you know, where my business went and that's how our business flourished, which was great and that's, that was a huge change, like everything. I used to remember sitting in front of the typewriter, had to type papers, and every time you know I made a mistake, I have to white it out with the brush and kind of set it back up perfectly if I could, you know, just to type something up. And now I mean, it would be odd to see a letter come that's typed on the typewriter. It would be very weird. 0 1483 Father's Experience as an Employee in the Textile Industry—Burlington, Levine's, and Fisher Textiles MM: So he actually wasn't in wholesaling when he first started, he was in the manufacturing end of it, so he worked for large companies. He worked for Burlington out of New York. So he basically, his one of his, in the early years of his career, after he graduated from Philadelphia Textile, which is Philadelphia University now, he was in charge of the manufacturing, so he got to see that end of the business as well. You know, up to the garment making, the pattern making, you know all the costs that are involved in that, all the different levels. And as he progressed then he, you know, decided to change, you know, fields in the industry. And when he came into Allentown, he worked for Levine's, and they had a large warehouse, and he was in the upper management there, the selling of the fabrics. So they also had retail stores in Allentown, downtown Allentown they had one, they had one in Tilghman Square. And, so he was involved in that a little bit but not so much because he was involved more in bulk purchasing and selling. At that point I really didn't know much anything about the business. I knew where his office was, I knew where he worked, I used to go visit him mainly because the Levines, for their sons, they had go-cart so I was able to drive those around the parking lot, which is pretty cool as a little kid. So obviously I always liked visiting my dad at work. But he then he worked for Levine's, he worked for another company called Fisher Textiles, which was in Allentown. And I'm pretty sure there's one other one but Fisher was the last one and that was basically when he said you know ‘I can't work for anybody anymore and I just decided to get out.’ 0 1588 1995: Creating "Nick of Time Textiles" MM: And through, let’s see, that must've been, see ‘46, and he graduated at 20, so ‘66, ‘67, so probably about 30 years. And, you know, over 30 years in the fabric industry, you tend to meet a lot of people. He is definitely a jokester, you know, he's pretty lighthearted, you know, likes to have a good time, so he was able to meet a lot of contacts, meet a lot of people that liked him, I’m sure there were some people might not have, but that’s everybody. 
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 ; And fortunately he decided to leave, he talked to some people down in the Carolinas, and his one friend said ‘you know, I'm going to ship you some fabric, let’s get you started and you pay me when you pay me, no big deal.’ And luckily, only friends are to do that for you, you know, help you get started. And everybody needs that when you're starting your business. It’s hard to do it just solely on your own. You always need a connection. You always need someone to kind of help you, push you. 
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 ; So, you know, he did that. He formed a website, which was in ‘95/’96, right when, you know, the Internet started coming along. It really was just kind of an informative website, really didn’t have much to it, no relativity to search engines back then, you know, whatever search engines might have been at that time, and, you know, just making calls. Calling people all the time, talking to people, traveling. 0 1755 Purchasers & ; Products GE: And the people who were buying, tell us again, they were other, who were they? What businesses were they in?
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 ; MM: I’m pretty sure, I mean, back then it was, you know, there's a lot of larger manufacturers. I mean everything was in the US, you know back then. Everybody was making everything here, so there could have been small, you know, now we would called them boutique people, you know, small companies, people, you know, just got out of sewing school, you know, they’re starting their own apparel company, and you know they are trying to make it, so they’re buying fabric. There could be large stores, you know, like any of the malls, you know, whether it was Hess’s or Macy's or something like that, you know, they were buying from different people in the US, like my father was building to be a company like that that could supply them. So large and small, back then it was all basically apparel manufacturing is what the fabric industry was and what people were selling to, the people that were buying, and that still is a big part today but it's changed tremendously. 0 1919 Marc Malkovsky's Role in the Family Business—Partnership with Harris Malkovsky MM: So I got into the business, that was the mid-90s, you know, and I was always working with him, not for him, I was, like I mentioned earlier, I was cutting samples, I was, you know, moving the fabric, you know, helping him cut stuff, you know, after school. So kind of integrating myself into the business even though that definitely was not where I said I wanted to go nor did he say he wanted to direct me there. So I was involved at that point and then after college when I wasn't involved and then I, you know, went my own route and then decided, you know, that wasn't the way I wanted to go and he asked me to start working for him, as I mentioned, so it's, you know, I started doing phone sales. It was very small. I mean we had a decent sized warehouse at that point. We had a lot of fabric, and, you know, I just started working for him. And, you know, it was nice. 
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 ; Luckily I think getting into it at that point and not being my primary thinking of that's my job, it was kind of maybe an easy way of getting us to work together. Cause working with family for most people is impossible. Some people it’s very hard. Some people find it very easy. I’d put us probably right in the middle of easy and hard. It's not hard by any means. It's pretty easy. Luckily because he, from day one when I started working with him, he was kind of open. 0 2160 Becoming an E-Commerce Business MM: The Internet, as that evolved, you know, that kept helping us go. I was Internet, not Internet savvy, but I knew more about the Internet, you know, and that was a good push for us to be able to do that but that took, to get to that point I mean, that probably took another five, six . . . 5 years, I would say, until like we really pushed it because Internet is very expensive in order to create a legit website. Not these websites that say go on GoDaddy.com and get a website for $10. It doesn't really give you the presence out there if you're trying to sell to America, you know, and Canada and possibly Mexico and everything else. So that kind of propelled us to the next level. And we’ve kind of, you know, you never want to get stagnant just like kind of stay. You need to keep evolving, you need to keep changing. We’ve changed our website, you know, maybe four or five times and that's helped us grow and he still has a ton of input and I learn something from him probably every single day. And, you know, things that I might not think are good idea, he does, and, you know, we do them. And things that he doesn’t think are a good idea, he lets me know them. You know, and that's kinda the great relationship that we formed, and like how we helped the business grow to where it is.
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 ; GE: So at this point you were really truly an e-commerce business. 0 2308 Internet Versus Warehouse Sales GE: So of your total sales, about what percentage at this point are come from the website, you know, that are e-commerce versus coming to your warehouse?
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 ; MM: Um, of it's kind of tough to put an exact number on it only because the people coming to the warehouse could have found us through the site so I would, I mean if you had to put a number I would probably definitely say it's minuscule of people that are just local people that just saw the sign. You know you might say that's 5%, you know, and everything is 95% otherwise. If you did just total in-house sales, you know, that number might go up to 10 or to 15%, but those people probably found us through the website, one way or another.
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 ; GE: So at this point your customer base, who you’re selling your fabric to, really the Internet is essential.
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 ; MM: Oh, yeah. The Internet goes down, our website goes down, it's, you know, there was a time, it was a couple months ago, and our website was down for say two days. While in that two days I can lose, you know, maybe $10,000 in sales. 0 2432 Advantages of Nick of Time Textiles—Youth, Diversity, Networking, & ; Technology MM: There’s, in my opinion, there's a lot of wholesalers of fabric out there, that's for sure. In my opinion, like us--probably a handful. You know, the one thing is, you know, you have a group of friends wherever or people that you talk to, and this person might be in this industry in somebody else's ; I don't have anybody that is in my industry. Not one friend that's in fabric, never was, never thought about it. You know, back when I started, you know, we were talking off camera, I think I started at 24 and I was probably the youngest person in America selling fabric unless some child, you know, came right out of high school work for the father that I didn't know about. But when I would go out to LA in my early years to meet people and gain more contacts, when I would walk in the door and I told them who I was, they were like ‘you’re Marc?’ You know, they thought I was 45, you know, and they see this kid walking in at 24, and they were just all shocked and they were like ‘dude, you’re young for this industry.’ You know, it was a great thing because eventually, people, you know, you get older. They’re gonna get out of it, and I'm still going to be present, and I’m gonna, you know, keep growing. 
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 ; We do a lot of different things than other wholesalers do. Our website is more prominent than most wholesale companies out there. There are other fabric websites but there's a lot of retail, there’s not so much wholesale, which helps. You know, the random person will go online and find us. 0 3175 Benefits of the Internet in Relationship to Suppliers MM: So the suppliers: two things the website can help in ways because suppliers are also, they’re obviously looking to sell. They don’t want to sell to the people I want to sell to. They want to sell to people like me. So sometimes they’ll go online and they’ll find people. And they’ll contact me and say ‘hey,’ you know, they’ll call me up and say ‘what do you, I see you sell this, this, and this, you know, we offer this. Let me send you some samples, let's talk about, you know.’ And then we can start doing business that way.
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 ; Another way that I guess would be a supplier of ours is actually our customers are also suppliers. In ways to where they do manufacturing, and we sell them a bunch fabric or maybe somebody sold them a bunch of fabric, and they have all this excess fabric and their lines over, they don’t know what to do with it, and they go online say, ‘I got to find somebody to sell this to.’ So they go online and they find us, and I get emails all the time saying, ‘hey, I am just curious, I found you online, do you guys buy fabric?’ And obviously we buy fabric. We have to buy fabric to sell fabric. So we’ll buy their leftover fabric. 0 3295 Fabric Brokers So people call me and say, you know, ‘I wanted to…’ We probably have over million yards of fabric right now. We have on the West Coast probably you know 40 different companies we can use that probably have millions and millions yards of fabric that we can sell off anytime we want and ship directly from them as if it's coming from us, so we're repping their line in a way but nobody knows about them.
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 ; GE: So you’re, in that case, you’re not, you don’t own it, you’re a broker of it.
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 ; MM: Yup, I’m a broker of it. 0 3393 Financial Growth of the Business—Sales GE: So, um, so it sounds like, if I understand, over the past ten years that you’ve been actively in the business, from the beginning until now, it sounds like it has grown a lot.
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 ; MM: Yeah, for sure.
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 ; GE: And was that growing five times? Two times? 
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 ; MM: Probably, if sales wise, in sales it’s gone, you know, if sales go up and down, it stays pretty consistent. Since I started, you know, at our highest point it grew 10 times and probably, you know, on an average, it's probably about seven times. So I mean it's tremendously, tremendous to where it was for sure. 0 3624 Profits GE: So Marc, where sales have gone up about seven times over the last ten years, how about, what about the profit, bottomline? Cause I realize you also hold a lot of more expenses and things and whatever.
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 ; MM: Yeah I mean the expenses are a lot more compared to what they are but I mean...
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 ; GE: Right, but that’s commensurate with the sales.
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 ; MM: Yeah, I mean, most businesses are going to be like that. I mean I would love to have a business model that my business sales grew seven times and my expenses stayed the same. I mean that would be fantastic. You know, for our business that's not the case and, you know, I would say well when I was younger I would say I wouldn’t need as much money, you know, to live. And having a family now, fortunately, you know, my wife doesn’t have to work. You know, she's at home. She does work part time, you know, once she is back from having the baby, and that's kinda just for her presence of mind. 0 3797 Jewish Involvement in the Textile and Needle-Trade Industry—Past & ; Present GE: So I’m curious, years ago for most of the older people that we have interviewed, there was a dominance, there was a pretty large presence of Jewish people in the business. A lot of Italians, a lot of other people, but certainly, given how small the population is, there had to be a large percentage of Jewish people. Is that because, I don’t know, we have not interviewed a lot of people who currently have a business, is that still the case?
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 ; MM: Yeah, uh, 99%.
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 ; GE: Ok, wow.
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 ; MM: You know, where did that come from…
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 ; GE: I was going to ask you, what do you think might be any reasons for that?
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 ; MM: Uh, I don't know, I think, you know, I just I think it was something from back in the day, you know, over whether it was in Israel or Iran, you know cause there are a lot of Iranian Jews, you know, that have come over that were in the fabric industry. I think there was a big fabric hub, you know, back in the day like over there and when everyone came, everybody, you know, migrated over here it kind of followed them and that was what they knew, you know, so you tend to have into whether it was the Jewish over here or Irish over here or you know Italians over here. Everybody for certain, it might have started in other industries, starting to diverse itself, for some reason in this industry it's not and I don't know why. Everybody I deal with is Jewish basically. I don't think there's one, there might be maybe one or two people, you know, that I buy fabric from that are not Jewish by any means. 0 3962 Marc Malkovsky's Inspiration and Values SC: What has made you feel the most creative in your life?
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 ; MM: Um, the most creative, um, hm, I mean I, you know, probably my parents. You know just, you know, the openness of letting me do things, you know, and then in business with my father, you know, letting me take control as a young person. Being, you know, getting ideas and seeing them and then learning and being able to open up and kind of venture into my own things, you know, they never, they never pushed me and said ‘you need to go to this.’ You know, I got tons of friends and families say, ‘well you need to go to nursing school, or you need to do this.’ You know, I was never pushed in any direction, but I was backed a hundred percent no matter where I went, so that’s what I would say.
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 ; SC: And what do you value most in life?
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 ; MM: Um, it would, I mean, there's a, you know, family obviously is very important, you know, and I think a lot of people would say that off the bat. 0 MovingImage Marc Malkovsky talks about helping his dad cut samples in the basement for the business while Marc was still in high school. A few years after college, Marc joined his father in the business. Together, they embraced the Internet and incrementally built an e-commerce site for the business. Nick of Time is a current, thriving Allentown business. Interview with Marc Malkovsky, June 1, 2017 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: So today is June 1, 2017 and we're going to be starting with some just general background questions and then move into a little bit more of your family connections and then go from there and then go into the business and then and end of my two questions sort of go deeper into you. MARC MALKOVSKY: Okay. SC: So first of all what is your full name? Where were you born? Where do you live and also what is your educational history? MM: Okay, Marc Alan Malkovsky. I was born in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Still live in Macungie right now, right outside Allentown. Born and raised, only left for college. I went to IUP for one year for business, and then I wanted to go into the culinary field, so I went up to Johnson and Wales in Providence. I was up there for four years doing restaurant and hospitality management. Left there to get a job in the Outback Corporation, worked there for about a year and a half, started through the process of becoming a proprietor and running a kitchen. And then one day I just decided, you know, that's not what I want to do. Maybe not just that type of restaurant work, still maybe in the industry but possibly something else, maybe business. And while I was looking for job, you know, my dad was like, I'm still living at home, said, you know, I'm going to work four hours a day for me on the phones, the other four hours a day you try to find a job, go out there, look to see what is available. And it was a hundred percent commission, and I just said well, if I do four hours times two a day, eight to nine hours a day, hopefully that means double the money that I'm making. It wasn't anything crazy at the time, but you know for somebody who is unemployed, you know, anything is good. And living at home, expenses were low and you know it worked out. And I just stayed there, and that's kind of where my career took me. SC: So next let's just go where do you live, more specifically and where talk a little bit more about are you still with the business and have you changed with the business of your job, with the business? We'll talk more about that later. MM: Sure, yeah, the location I live is still over by, it's called Brookside Country Club. It's over off of Sauerkraut. Moved there about three years ago. I used to live over in an area called Greenhills in a condo that I owned before I got married. So we lived there for about a year or so. And in that time before marriage, six months before, we were looking for a house. Just said, you know, let's not wait to the very end, let's kind of start looking now, and if we happen to find something, you know, that's great. And I think we looked for about a year and a half until we found what we really wanted because we were pretty picky in what we were looking for. And then we bought the house, and we moved over there, so that's where we reside. And you said, you know, about the company, so when I went in to work with my father - and that was about 11 years ago now ; so it was about when I was 24 - it was just me, him, and the warehouse gentleman, George, that worked with him since he started the business basically after he moved out of the garage that he was using. So since then, I mean you know, it's changed tremendously. Our Internet presence has changed tremendously. You know, we kind of had to evolve with the times as you know through the late 90s and 2000, you know, the Internet and online shopping and marketing, you know, became a big time change. And our industry as a whole is really old school so a lot of people don't have that. They don't do the online so that was a huge change for us, and it was evolving every year, you know, little by little. We eventually had to move out of where we were because of building inspections in Allentown about nine years, eight years ago there was a huge overhaul because building were not up to code, people were using them as apartments, they weren't supposed to, there were electrical heating fires, people's plug in heaters were going all over the place. So landlords that owned all of these building started telling on each other, and they started coming in, the marshal started coming in, and they wanted to shut our building down day one and we convinced them because it was a family business, they were basically going to put us, we were not going to make any money, put us out and they left it open for seven days, the landlord came in and was like I'm not fixing any of the stuff, you know, I'm not paying for this, it's too much money. So we had to move an entire warehouse just my dad, I and the gentleman, George, in seven days while we still ran the business. So we would work from 8 AM to 3 PM, and then we take a break and work from 4 PM until 10 PM for a week to try to move everything out as fast as we could. Ended up being a blessing because where we moved we have a lot more presence on the street. We're on Union Boulevard in Allentown-- big, the tall building. We had the third floor. It's a retail space but we're not retail and there's no elevator that gets you all the way up there, really, so it's not, it doesn't cost us that much per se because there's no other retail stores that would really go in there so we take space for the landlord that really would be unsellable, and we just grew from there. Now we have that floor, we have another floor. The company now instead of my dad, I, and a gentleman in the warehouse, we went and we had one employee, and then we got another person in the warehouse, so we had two extra employees. Then another lady in the office. Now we've grown to, on-and-off it really depends on right now with three ladies in the office, we did have four at one time, but learning new ways of how to do everyone's job more efficient, we only three right now. And we have five gentleman in the warehouse. So yes, so basically with my dad and I, I think we're, you know, anywhere from 9 to 10 employees at this point. SC: It's so interesting hearing this from your dad's perspective and from your perspective-- MM: ...it intertwines different, different points of view for sure, I would assume that. SC: It does, yes. So let's go back into your family, what you know as far back from your father's side of the family, your mother's side of the family, and where they came from, how they got to Allentown, and anything you know about them. MM: So, my mom's side: they were from South Philly, so she grew up, she had two sisters, and one of them actually isn't, well is a cousin, but her parents actually died at a very young age, so my grandmother took her in. So basically from day one, I mean it just basically was her sister, and I assumed that was her sister for many many many many years, you know, didn't even think about it. You know, similarities in looks and everything, so I didn't get to meet, I met my grandfather, her father, but he died when I was two, maybe, something of that age. So she grew up in a pretty nice household, obviously, you know, nice family with them in South Philly. My dad grew up in North Philly. He and his brother and his mom and dad. They, I kind of knew a little bit more about that history for some reason maybe because my grandparents on that side owned a business and they sold, they had a wholesale lingerie shop underneath the blue rail in Kensington on Allegheny. And so I was there when I was little, you know, while they were selling the stuff or you know I remember the area. So I guess you could say even with that that has to do with the fabric business, you know, garment and stuff. My dad was always around that type of business in that area. You know, the families, I think on his side for sure, I was always told my grandparents, my dad said his parents never did anything wrong, you know. And I think, it's probably a little different, you know, working with him, where obviously we're partners so I have a sometimes critical things, and it's tough for him on that side because you know, in his eyes his parents never did anything wrong. But in a business you know he accepts that because we're all going to make mistakes and as long as you can work together, it's better that way. So, you know, his dad was always there for him, did everything he could, and I think, you know, that passed onto my father to, you know, how he treated his kids and raised us. You know, my grandmother, I think she got a sense of humor from her. She was a riot, and she still was until the day that she passed. And, you know, I think it's just a lot of the values of the family. Luckily they were both very different, like how, you know, my mom's side was definitely more religious, my dad's side, you know, still had the Judaism in them and were religious to a certain extent. But that whole living situation, you know, my dad wanted to move in with my mom before marriage, her parents weren't happy about that by any means, so they would come over, my dad would leave, so he wasn't there, so they really didn't see anything or, you know, out of sight, out of mind type of deal. So two different families definitely, just, you know, also where they grew up, my mom you know in the South was more type of suburb-ish compared to being under the Blue Rail, you know, with in an alley, in a row home. Kind of, I guess, in a row home in a way, you know, just like in the city blocks, you know, and that's kind of like where they came from. And then did you say move into my family, I guess or? SC: Well, do you know where those families came from? Did your family, your parents, your grandparents, ever talk about how they got to America? MM: Not too much, no, to be honest. That never, wasn't really big conversation, that, you know, that came up. My grandparents, you know, passed in history. I mean, you know, I know, you know, both sides were Polish. I know there was a lot of different history, and I know my dad has talked a little bit about different family members, you know, throughout Europe and where they might've been and where they might've traveled, but not anything in great detail, I guess you would say. SC: So, it gets lost sometimes, over the generations. MM: Yeah, yeah, I guess it depends on how interested maybe some people are, you know, there's always ways of finding out now, I know everybody's doing the DNA testing and stuff to see where they came from and what their makeup is. And I know that my wife wanted to do that on her side and then my side too to try to kind of see, you know, where we might have kind of originated from. But most likely, you know, based on the background, my last, my mom's last name was Press. My dad's Malkovsky. It was definitely, you know, from Poland, most likely. SC: And do you know any other names back further, did anyone ever talk about that? MM: No, it really didn't. I don't know if it was just something that just didn't come down from my grandparents, but again, you know, I was young, my, other grandfather died when I was three, so I really had no, I have memories but I don't know if those memories are just from pictures of me seeing, cause it's tough when you're three, if you are going to remember anything like that. So everything else was just kind of based around my grandmothers, and it's not so much that they didn't want to talk about it or maybe concentrate on anything in the past, but they did a really good job of concentrating on us, you know, in making us the important thing, you know, and doing whatever they could for us I would say. SC: So any memories that really stand out about your own parents with either, with the business or just home life or-- MM: Um, yeah, I mean, you know, you obviously mix in - home life was the business at a certain extent just because, you know, my dad worked in the fabric industry ; he went to Philadelphia Textiles. And my mom was, she did two different things, she was in the orthodontist field and she also, or the dental field, I guess I would say, and then she also was a nail technician that she did. So around, all these different companies my dad worked for, some big textile people in Allentown because you know, we talked about how Allentown was a big hub-mecca of whether it was for milling or selling or manufacturing just because of our location and what real estate cost compared to New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, DC, it was just so inexpensive, but yet so easy to get to. So he worked for all these different companies and eventually he just said 'you know what, I can't work for people anymore, I just, I just can't do it, I need to go out on my own.' And that happened in '95, yeah '95. So, big risk. My sister graduated in '97, so two 2 years before she's about to go to college. And, like I said before, my dad always wanted to do everything he could for us. So my sister did get a job when she went to school. I think she had a partial soccer scholarship, but you know it wasn't a question, he wanted to make sure he took care of us and try to help out in any way. So to know that he has a college expense coming on, another kid immediately graduating three years later after my sister, going out starting his own business, you know, we had, he basically had a connection that he grew friendly with in the Carolinas, which is a big mecca for fabric as well. And he shipped them up a bunch of fabric, had it in the garage and basically said, you know, pay me when you can pay me. So, you know, looking at a two-car garage filled with fabric and basically he was just selling to hopefully, you know, small designers that he knew, that he gained relationships with when he worked at other companies. And that's how he got the ball rolling. And not long after that, my mom decided she was doing nails and everything in our basement and they had different clothes that they were selling while they were down there. They decided well, let's open up a shop for her too. So my mom is running a business at the time, and my dad was also helping and that was on Tilghman Street, it was called Tips to Toes Nail Salon. And she was running that, my dad was helping, so I was there, you know, sometimes when she had to watch me, sometimes, you know, I was with my dad. So I had two parents that were kind of running their own business, which was a great experience to see and I think, you know, it was definitely valuable in not even realizing it subconsciously of probably having how I grew up as a child, and things that I've learned without even knowing I was learning them and experiences, which definitely helped me to where I am today, for sure. You know, in just when you have two family members running businesses, it's, you know, a lot different than just having, you know, a job somewhere because the financials. So all of a sudden, things aren't going as well in this business, maybe they are not going as well as this business. You know, money starts to get a little tight. You know I think there's no there's definitely some tough times in, you know, tough times for, you know, give more stress ; stress has arguments and things happen. And you never should say money is important because it is not the end-all factor. Unfortunately, it does make the world go round, and it does make things easier in life, and less stressful. So there were some rough times definitely, you know, in the house, but they prevailed, you know, they kept moving forward. You know, my dad was very determined, you know, in what his vision was, in his goal was, and where he wanted to get to. Eventually they just decide to sell the nail salon because it just became too much. Then my mom just went back to the dental field to work. And, you know, my dad continued to grow the business as much as he could. I mean, after school, I would cut samples in the basement, you know, I would help him, you know, doing that instead of some kids were cleaning up the room and doing chores, these were like my chores, you know, like I was helping out. And in that essence, I was learning part of the fabrics, you know, I was learning how to cut them, I was learning what types they were. So even at 14, 13 years old, you know, I was still starting to learn stuff at that point, not realizing how I was going to need it later in life. So, you know, it was interesting childhood, I guess you would say, to say the least. SC: May I ask where your sister went to college and what she does and you have another brother? MM: Nope, just a sister. SC: Oh, just a sister, I don't know why I imagined that. MM: No, it's alright. She went to Ohio University. She went to play soccer and she then decided two years afterwards, I think she's stopped playing soccer her senior year, she went into Family Education, I guess I'm trying to think of whether the exact title was back then. And then she came home and she didn't know what she wanted to do. She went and worked in Hoboken and actually that was kinda, that was, she lived with, you know, her roommate from Ohio who was from Ohio and she moved out to Hoboken, so they actually stayed together, and they lived out there, which was nice. And then that whole, that 9/11 happened, and my sister lived in Hoboken, and she worked in Manhattan, so she actually took the train in there, and she basically was, I forget how many blocks away but I think she was eight blocks away because she basically got off the train and 30 minutes later is when everything happened. So, you know, that was kind of rattling in our family a little bit because she had to get stuffed onto a ferry and gets sent over and luckily, you know, at that time everybody came together and somebody housed her for like a week, fed her, clothed her, which was nice, you know. And then eventually she decided to leave Hoboken and try to figure something else out. Her roommate got engaged, got married, moved out. And then she went to Kutztown University for her graduate degree in counseling. While she was living at home, she was doing that and so she went through that progress, she got a job right out of school at Allen, Allentown School District. So she's the, she's been there for probably 11 years now. You know, she started probably when she was 27 so she's been the guidance counselor at Allentown. So, she's married, two kids, niece and nephew. So she's local, which is good, local and safe. SC: Do you remember where she was working when she was living in Hoboken? MM: No, it was just, you know, as you can imagine how big Manhattan is. It was just a big firm. She wasn't doing anything that really was relative to her college degree as probably 99% of people that come out of college don't, you know, they don't know where they're going or they just need to get a job, so they get a job wherever they can to get started at least at that time. And so it was just a big firm whether it was moving papers, or you know whatever it might've been, that's kinda where she was. SC: Do you have any random memories from other... you did talk about early memories from your childhood, anything else that you'd like to share or about the future? MM: In regards to-- SC: Just life. MM: ...Just life? SC: Yeah. MM: I don't know, I mean, you know, life is, life evolves, life's different. You know, we were talking earlier about just, you know, even this computer, you know like everyone talks about how different things were back in like the 50s and the 60s and the 70s and to us, I was born in '82. You know, when we say 'well you know I was in the 90s' and to us it doesn't seem that long ago. You know, but 20 years, if you go look back you're like, when you talk about the Internet, you click on your phone, you're up on that just like that 30 seconds. We used to have to sign on and you'd hear these weird noises and you know seeing you can't connect, you can't do this, and that's basically, you know, where my business went and that's how our business flourished, which was great and that's, that was a huge change, like everything. I used to remember sitting in front of the typewriter, had to type papers, and every time you know I made a mistake, I have to white it out with the brush and kind of set it back up perfectly if I could, you know, just to type something up. And now I mean, it would be odd to see a letter come that's typed on the typewriter. It would be very weird. So I think just changing, we talked about the different generations, you know, I push my kid to, I have two kids now, but one of them can't move really, only two months old. My daughter's two and a half, we pushed her, we want her to play outside as much as possible. We did that growing up, and I don't think kids do that. I mean I see certain kids that never go outside, you know, they prefer to sit in front of a computer where they're probably learning, you know, and maybe in 10 years, maybe that was the right thing, you know, based on how the world goes but, you know, you need that outdoor activity and live as a child and kind of enjoy that stuff. I mean we played games around the yard. But the different thing is now, you know, just like I see with, you want your kids outside, but then you have to be watching your kids. When I was little, not saying that my parents didn't watch us, 'oh, you're going two doors down, yeah, go ahead.' No big deal. You run around, you bike somewhere, now you see people posting watch out for this car, approaching kids, you know, people that are trying to take kids, stuff like that, you know. So, not that maybe that wasn't happening back then, but I think everything is now under a microscope and everybody is so sensitive nowadays compared to what they used to be and in some situations, that's a good thing and I think some situations, it's horrible because you look too deep into situations and when things used to be, you know, so easy and so fine and not a big deal, now everything is a big deal. I think that's an unfortunate part, but there's no way to change that. That's kinda, that's why I will be curious to see where it is 20 years from now. Everybody says, oh just wait, you know, all the time you know, like just wait 'til you're married, just wait 'til you have a kid, just wait 'til your kid's ten, just wait 'til your kid, you know, does this or wants to go out here, you know, where you can say 'oh, I'll be fine,' you know, then all of a sudden it happens and you're like wait a second, no you're not going or you can't do this. So it's fun to see evolve as long as your mind is open to change, you know, I think it's nice. SC: Thank you. MM: You're welcome. GAIL EISENBERG: So now we're going to start talking a little more about the business and if you want to give us a sense of the origins, how, you did quickly, how your dad got started, what role was he? Cause as I understand correctly, he was wholesaler, right? MM: Yup. GE: And so what role that was, how that business model works, how do you get your supplies, how do you, who were the customers? So if you want to give us a little bit of background telling us about how it started, how it grew, you know, when you got into it, and that way we can start a progression. MM: Yeah, sure. So he actually wasn't in wholesaling when he first started, he was in the manufacturing end of it, so he worked for large companies. He worked for Burlington out of New York. So he basically, his one of his, in the early years of his career, after he graduated from Philadelphia Textile, which is Philadelphia University now, he was in charge of the manufacturing, so he got to see that end of the business as well. You know, up to the garment making, the pattern making, you know all the costs that are involved in that, all the different levels. And as he progressed then he, you know, decided to change, you know, fields in the industry. And when he came into Allentown, he worked for Levine's, and they had a large warehouse, and he was in the upper management there, the selling of the fabrics. So they also had retail stores in Allentown, downtown Allentown they had one, they had one in Tilghman Square. And, so he was involved in that a little bit but not so much because he was involved more in bulk purchasing and selling. At that point I really didn't know much anything about the business. I knew where his office was, I knew where he worked, I used to go visit him mainly because the Levines, for their sons, they had go-cart so I was able to drive those around the parking lot, which is pretty cool as a little kid. So obviously I always liked visiting my dad at work. But he then he worked for Levine's, he worked for another company called Fisher Textiles, which was in Allentown. And I'm pretty sure there's one other one but Fisher was the last one and that was basically when he said you know 'I can't work for anybody anymore and I just decided to get out.' And through, let's see, that must've been, see '46, and he graduated at 20, so '66, '67, so probably about 30 years. And, you know, over 30 years in the fabric industry, you tend to meet a lot of people. He is definitely a jokester, you know, he's pretty lighthearted, you know, likes to have a good time, so he was able to meet a lot of contacts, meet a lot of people that liked him, I'm sure there were some people might not have, but that's everybody. And fortunately he decided to leave, he talked to some people down in the Carolinas, and his one friend said 'you know, I'm going to ship you some fabric, let's get you started and you pay me when you pay me, no big deal.' And luckily, only friends are to do that for you, you know, help you get started. And everybody needs that when you're starting your business. It's hard to do it just solely on your own. You always need a connection. You always need someone to kind of help you, push you. So, you know, he did that. He formed a website, which was in '95/'96, right when, you know, the Internet started coming along. It really was just kind of an informative website, really didn't have much to it, no relativity to search engines back then, you know, whatever search engines might have been at that time, and, you know, just making calls. Calling people all the time, talking to people, traveling. He would go down the Carolinas probably twice a month, you know, and he would do, because family was very important, he would drive down and drive back up, you know, basically in a 24-hour period. So he was always traveling, always, and that's how the business was. You know, you would take your samples, you cut your samples off your rolls, you pack them up in a suitcase, you would travel to different people that you can sell fabric to, whether it was large manufacturers, small apparel manufacturers, anybody else who sold fabric as well that you could job fabric to. And that's, you know, what the business was. GE: So when you say that he went down to the Carolinas with, that was selling fabric-- MM: It was selling and buying, you know, it was meeting a lot of people, you know, that he could either to do business with, also, you know, to sell to or that he could get, you know information on what goods can he buy, you know, what other goods are out there. So he knew based on what customers might be looking for, where he could turn to go and get those goods in order to sell them to them. You know, you can always work off of your own inventory which is a great thing because that's money that you can just bring in, but to always have an awareness of what else is out there when somebody's asking you. That's the type of people that kinda ended up making it because they kept going, they kept searching for new stuff, so that's why he made a lot of trips down to the Carolinas. GE: And the people who were buying, tell us again, they were other, who were they? What businesses were they in? MM: I'm pretty sure, I mean, back then it was, you know, there's a lot of larger manufacturers. I mean everything was in the US, you know back then. Everybody was making everything here, so there could have been small, you know, now we would called them boutique people, you know, small companies, people, you know, just got out of sewing school, you know, they're starting their own apparel company, and you know they are trying to make it, so they're buying fabric. There could be large stores, you know, like any of the malls, you know, whether it was Hess's or Macy's or something like that, you know, they were buying from different people in the US, like my father was building to be a company like that that could supply them. So large and small, back then it was all basically apparel manufacturing is what the fabric industry was and what people were selling to, the people that were buying, and that still is a big part today but it's changed tremendously. GE: Now your dad is not selling made apparel, correct? MM: No, they are so, it's not, he didn't make the garments. Basically what it is, it's the raw material. GE: So he's selling the fabrics. MM: Yup. So the raw materials is really, I mean you could look at it two ways. It's finished material after it's made, it's rolls of fabric and basically you would sell them and they go to a pattern maker and a manufacturer and then they cut the garments and sew the garments up for the customers. And then they sell them as their own product line. GE: So when a Hess's or Macy's bought from him, were they just buying from him for the fabric department, not for their clothing. MM: No, it was all for clothing. So they, since they were probably doing their manufacturing in the US, they would say 'okay we need the designers for that worked for them at the time, we need 10,000 yards of black X type of fabric.' So they would buy that, send it off to the mill, they would have it manufactured, they would have to make the garments, then they would dispersed it to the stores. So they all had different buying departments and that's how that would work, and then that's what you would see if the final product on the shelves when they have their own brand in there compared to all these other brands nowadays in small boutiques and everything else that's going on. The big department stores don't really buy like that in the US anymore. GE: So this is the mid-90s, and tell us now when you got into the business, and then together, how you and your father have continued to grow the business? MM: So I got into the business, that was the mid-90s, you know, and I was always working with him, not for him, I was, like I mentioned earlier, I was cutting samples, I was, you know, moving the fabric, you know, helping him cut stuff, you know, after school. So kind of integrating myself into the business even though that definitely was not where I said I wanted to go nor did he say he wanted to direct me there. So I was involved at that point and then after college when I wasn't involved and then I, you know, went my own route and then decided, you know, that wasn't the way I wanted to go and he asked me to start working for him, as I mentioned, so it's, you know, I started doing phone sales. It was very small. I mean we had a decent sized warehouse at that point. We had a lot of fabric, and, you know, I just started working for him. And, you know, it was nice. Luckily I think getting into it at that point and not being my primary thinking of that's my job, it was kind of maybe an easy way of getting us to work together. Cause working with family for most people is impossible. Some people it's very hard. Some people find it very easy. I'd put us probably right in the middle of easy and hard. It's not hard by any means. It's pretty easy. Luckily because he, from day one when I started working with him, he was kind of open. A lot of old-timers that open their own business are closed ; this is the way we do it, this is how it is, don't tell me anything new or anything of that sort. So working with him, he got to see maybe younger mind working and try to evolve and see what other avenues of business we could do. So back then, in mid-2000's, one of the things was he would always go to New York, New York, New York, that's where the fabric is imported, that's where everything came in. Well everything in real estate New York got super expensive. Everything start pushing out to Los Angeles. It was cheaper to import to Los Angeles. It was closer to the Orient, and that's where most of the fabric was milled and came from. So it only made sense: land's less expensive, the shipping is less expensive, the fabric the same cost, let's move out there and see what we can, what they can do. So a lot of people did that and somehow, I'm not exactly sure, but whether it was through somebody he knew and said 'hey, why don't you call so-so,' you know, and I formed a pretty good relationship with a gentleman out there. Their company is called Ben Textiles. And, you know, I was like, you know, well, why don't we see their fabric? You know, say we have our fabric but they have a lot of stuff that we don't have and people are calling us and I had to keep saying 'no, I don't have this,' 'no, I don't have this,' so I was like let's find it, let's serve these customers and see what we can do. So, you know, I started working with them. They would send us samples and, you know, we kind of formed that relationship and that kind of put our business to the next level a little bit. It was giving us a broader spectrum of different items that we were able to sell. And basically the more you can sell, the more you have access to in any business kinda helps you with the type of customer basis that you'll have and you're able to get out there. So that kind of pushed us to the next level of having more sources, you know, you always want sources, that's for sure, to be able to get more fabric. And so, you know, we started doing that, we still did our own inventory and on level to help our business grow with the sources, it's always about getting great quality fabric at low prices. You know, and that's kinda what I helped him to do too. He was always doing that, but we had to find better sources, we had to find better fabric, we had to find more of it, diverse to bring it in and that. So that's kinda started to push us into the next level. The Internet, as that evolved, you know, that kept helping us go. I was Internet, not Internet savvy, but I knew more about the Internet, you know, and that was a good push for us to be able to do that but that took, to get to that point I mean, that probably took another five, six . . . 5 years, I would say, until like we really pushed it because Internet is very expensive in order to create a legit website. Not these websites that say go on GoDaddy.com and get a website for $10. It doesn't really give you the presence out there if you're trying to sell to America, you know, and Canada and possibly Mexico and everything else. So that kind of propelled us to the next level. And we've kind of, you know, you never want to get stagnant just like kind of stay. You need to keep evolving, you need to keep changing. We've changed our website, you know, maybe four or five times and that's helped us grow and he still has a ton of input and I learn something from him probably every single day. And, you know, things that I might not think are good idea, he does, and, you know, we do them. And things that he doesn't think are a good idea, he lets me know them. You know, and that's kinda the great relationship that we formed, and like how we helped the business grow to where it is. GE: So at this point you were really truly an e-commerce business. MM: Yeah, I guess you would say in a way. Most likely I would say, you know, we worked out percentages, you know, when we first started the website we added a shopping cart then and that shopping cart, the sales we do on the shopping cart from day one which is seven years ago, you know, whatever that total probably, you know, now annually is probably a 10,000% more, you know, than we first started 10 years or seven years ago doing just the shopping cart. So that's how people find us all the time. Word-of-mouth people find us as well in the business for sure. So even if they're not online sales, people are calling us based on it, so yes that is a big portion. We do have our warehouse where it's open to the public and anybody can come in. So we get a lot of local people, we get customers that are traveling from out of state that want to come see us because we do send samples to everybody. Whoever wants to see a sample, we send them a sample for free, you know, we take care of that. But there's nothing like coming into a warehouse and seeing everything they have to offer. GE: So of your total sales, about what percentage at this point are come from the website, you know, that are e-commerce versus coming to your warehouse? MM: Um, of it's kind of tough to put an exact number on it only because the people coming to the warehouse could have found us through the site so I would, I mean if you had to put a number I would probably definitely say it's minuscule of people that are just local people that just saw the sign. You know you might say that's 5%, you know, and everything is 95% otherwise. If you did just total in-house sales, you know, that number might go up to 10 or to 15%, but those people probably found us through the website, one way or another. GE: So at this point your customer base, who you're selling your fabric to, really the Internet is essential. MM: Oh, yeah. The Internet goes down, our website goes down, it's, you know, there was a time, it was a couple months ago, and our website was down for say two days. While in that two days I can lose, you know, maybe $10,000 in sales. You know, I might, those might be customers that know there might be an issue and they might just wait, they might email me and order anyway, and there might be sales in there that somebody went to the website and it's not working and they just move on, and they'll never come back. So not only could that sale have been $500 but that $500 could have been another $500 next week, down the road, another month, could have been more, that company could have grown and could have helped us tremendously. So if you're not up, you're not present. You don't know what you're missing. GE: So now tell me a little bit about the industry. In other words, what competitors are there in this industry? Are there many people? Are there many wholesalers like you? MM: There's, in my opinion, there's a lot of wholesalers of fabric out there, that's for sure. In my opinion, like us--probably a handful. You know, the one thing is, you know, you have a group of friends wherever or people that you talk to, and this person might be in this industry in somebody else's ; I don't have anybody that is in my industry. Not one friend that's in fabric, never was, never thought about it. You know, back when I started, you know, we were talking off camera, I think I started at 24 and I was probably the youngest person in America selling fabric unless some child, you know, came right out of high school work for the father that I didn't know about. But when I would go out to LA in my early years to meet people and gain more contacts, when I would walk in the door and I told them who I was, they were like 'you're Marc?' You know, they thought I was 45, you know, and they see this kid walking in at 24, and they were just all shocked and they were like 'dude, you're young for this industry.' You know, it was a great thing because eventually, people, you know, you get older. They're gonna get out of it, and I'm still going to be present, and I'm gonna, you know, keep growing. We do a lot of different things than other wholesalers do. Our website is more prominent than most wholesale companies out there. There are other fabric websites but there's a lot of retail, there's not so much wholesale, which helps. You know, the random person will go online and find us. You know, there might be another fabric place if they really dug or made some phone calls, but nowadays it's how quick can I get it, how, and that's kinda where my dad came up with the name of Nick of Time Textiles, so that kind of worked in our favor. We do, I sell customers one yard of fabric, I sell customers 5000 yards of fabric, you know, we don't care. I'll sell, you want fabric, I'll sell it to you. Other people are like minimum 500 yards, you know, they don't want to deal with the small orders. Realistically, I could sell say five different fabrics 5 yards each and that order could take just as long as one of my guys doing 500 yards. And 500 yards could be a couple thousand dollar order. The 25 yard order could be $100. So it's not that the value is not there, but maybe this 5 yard customer turns into a 5000 yard customer. You know, we just always kinda, when the big customers aren't there, you know, all the little customers kinda make up into a big customer. We do bridal decorative goods, and we do apparel goods, and you know we sell to churches, and we sell to schools and, you know, like home sellers so when this industry isn't really doing much, and maybe that industry's down, then this industry is picking up so we like to do a little bit of everything. And other people are concentrated on their specialty item, but if that specialty item goes down the tube, your company is, you got to reinvent yourself, and fortunately, you know, we don't have to do that. We've gained a presence to where, you know, we don't, I came in and I was making calls, cold calling, calling people that my dad dealt with. I don't call anybody. Everybody calls us, which is fantastic, you know, so that helps us too. The other people in my industry they're, you know, if they're a wholesaler, they could be a broker, they don't own a lick of fabric. They sell everybody else's fabric, so sometimes I'll get from other wholesalers, I'll get five samples in and they're exactly the same. Everybody's the same ; they are selling off of one person's inventory and they're all just brokering the fabric and making you know five cents, ten cents, fifteen cents a yard. Our margins are greater, but we also have rent, we pay for the fabric, we have trucking, we have employees, we have insurance, you know, all the overhead that they don't have, so that's why our margins are larger but we still keep our prices extremely low compared to the market, for sure. SC: So, may I ask you, they used to talk about the benefits when we were in the industrial economy, you know the benefit of coming in... do you think this is the new world where you can sell on the Internet and that it is no longer beneficial as all your diverse patience and friendliness to make a smaller profit? MM: Um, you mean like-- GE: I think she means it gets the economy and scale through the Internet, that's how he gets much larger sales. MM: Yeah, so, yeah those people, the Internet brings all sizes, you know, but yeah it does help, you know, with the larger scales. You know it's just the e-commerce is has created such an opportunity just to touch everybody, you know, you really in this business you can only sell to who you can get to and who you can sit in front of and, you know, what you had to show them, which was a that was the way, that was a great way to do it, I guess, you know, everybody did then. And that's how a lot of, that's how some people still do it. I have people that joke in my warehouse who say 'hey I want to come in.' You know, they come in, they bring up suitcases, like four suitcases of all these different fabrics and start showing them to me: 'do you like this, you like this?' Personally I don't even like that. I don't even like when somebody's in front of me showing me 100 or 200 different fabrics that's just not, you know. One is typically, I don't buy a lot of stuff that way. Their prices are higher, depending on what they're repping. It works mostly upholstery people that are doing that type of traveling. I prefer just to kind of 'hey I need this, people, send me samples.' You know, it's just a lot easier that way. The website, you know, has brought us people that buy thousands of yards that helps. But we had one of our biggest customers and they slowed down this year to reconfigure some things, you know, it was Urban Outfitters, which is a big, you know, retailer. And my dad, you know, the only way to get into those companies is really somehow you just run into somebody. You meet somebody somehow and you get in and they want to use you, and as long as you make their life easy, you know, even if they could probably find the fabric a little bit cheaper, they'll use you. So they used us for many years, and they were a great customer for sure. And that was just kind of by association, that wasn't through the Internet and that can still happen, you know, you still can get those big sales without it, I just don't think it's as common or as easy. But to get those big ones, like an Urban or if you're going to do anybody else who, you know, say Levi's or anything like that, it would probably be a verbal 'I know this person, somebody.' Most likely people aren't going online trying to find fabric sources, so I would say. SC: So I guess what I was getting at: you could get in and out of the business much easier than well half the people. You have real estate and all that, and maybe I'm putting word in your mouth, do you think you could get in and out of the business, which is so much better in history, to be able to get in and out quickly and not to have-- MM: In and out to deal with the customer? SC: With everything. MM: Um-- GE: I think she's saying, moving because the way the business now has so much with the e-commerce, you're able to be much more nimble. SC: That's a great word nimble. GE: On both sides.. MM: Yeah, um, yeah I mean you definitely can be quick because, you know, a lot of the information is already out there so you can get to people quick, you can get to, you know, describe things quicker, you can show them things faster, yeah I mean it's... GE: And am I correct that one of your major competitive advantages is that you have a terrific site. It sounds like your competitors typically they don't have that. MM: Yeah so our site, I would say the advantage is the site. GE: Right. MM: There are things about the site, you know, there's all these different companies and I don't know anything from marketing on a website or the backend or how to create a website or anything like that. So you put all your eggs in a basket, and you hope that company does well for you. The company we use is very good at the behind the scenes, you know, where meaning for Internet savvy, it's organically searching, you know, it's people making us relative on the Internet world, you know, getting us out there so people see us in different spots. And they are very good at that. Designing a website you know maybe isn't their forte by any means, so that's the part that they're lacking, so we have to help but at the same time, you know, as my dad said, I get people that call me for recommendation for that company, and I say 'listen, they do things great, but it's still your company, so if you want to put everything in their hands and just say go do it, well they're only going to do so much. It's your company, you need to still work on it, you still need to give input, you need to come up with ideas, you need to stay on top of it if you want it to grow.' So we have to give them still ideas, but on the back end getting us out there, I mean they've done a fantastic job. There's something just recently that we started doing, well they started doing it for us, but we always talk and throw out ideas, is typically when you go on the Internet now and you search something, you know, whether you went to store to go buy something, you know, all of a sudden you're on your Facebook page and you see the ads come up. Well most likely that ad all the sudden you're like 'how is that ad there? I was on it on a different computer and now it somehow linked to my screen and now it's there.' Well I find that I go to Yahoo just as my open browser and the banner up top says Nick of Time Textiles you know on a Yahoo page. However, integrated that in to link to what your history is, is a great thing because I even talk to some customers who say 'whoever does this back end is great for you guys.' My wife was searching for this and she was on your fabric and then all of a sudden I was on my computer and it shows Nick of Time Textiles banner running up the side and you know the good thing is you just like to see people and trucks driving around with your name, you might not be looking for fabric at that point but all of a sudden you might be looking for it, six months later you might say 'wait, yeah is that Nick of Time,' or something like that. Type it in and it's easy to find. GE: So that does all of the search engine optimization. MM: Yeah, all of the optimization they do. They do a lot of our social media, they send out our different email programs where we can send email blasts about different specials were running, you know, we're are doing 20% off this weekend or we're giving $50 off the free shipping and we send it out to everybody, so all our customers, you know, every single day we have new customers, new people that call in, we get their contact information or email addresses, we add them to a list and we just send a mass list out. You know, it's just kind of an email blast, just like everyone gets some, like if you buy something at Nike, 'oh, we're having a sale this--' So basically we're kind of mirroring the same thing that bigger companies to do to kind of just keep our name out there. You know, some customers say 'take me off this list, if I need fabric, I will call you.' Other ones say, 'you know what? I hate when people send emails but I love getting your emails because it keeps me informed.' We send out emails when we get new fabrics and so people are aware of what's coming in, so you know it's helpful. Without them we would still be on ground zero, you know I would say. GE: So this is in regards to your customers. How about in regards to your suppliers? MM: So the suppliers: two things the website can help in ways because suppliers are also, they're obviously looking to sell. They don't want to sell to the people I want to sell to. They want to sell to people like me. So sometimes they'll go online and they'll find people. And they'll contact me and say 'hey,' you know, they'll call me up and say 'what do you, I see you sell this, this, and this, you know, we offer this. Let me send you some samples, let's talk about, you know.' And then we can start doing business that way. Another way that I guess would be a supplier of ours is actually our customers are also suppliers. In ways to where they do manufacturing, and we sell them a bunch fabric or maybe somebody sold them a bunch of fabric, and they have all this excess fabric and their lines over, they don't know what to do with it, and they go online say, 'I got to find somebody to sell this to.' So they go online and they find us, and I get emails all the time saying, 'hey, I am just curious, I found you online, do you guys buy fabric?' And obviously we buy fabric. We have to buy fabric to sell fabric. So we'll buy their leftover fabric. And that's how we're able to get, you know, they might've paid 5, 6, 7 dollars for it. They are creating their product, they have, you know, their margins set and all of their costs, but when they're done with it, that fabric is not worth 5, 6, 7 dollars, so they might sell it to us a dollar, fifty cents a yard and then we're just turning and selling it whether it's two dollars, three dollars, four dollars, depending on what type of fabric it is. And some people come to us and say, 'how are you selling this at this price?' Because they know what it costs to make. Well we're secondhand but then, you know, we're able to give it to, get it to people that can make the same type of products and have a better margin because they're getting in on the secondary market. So with the suppliers, you know, that's how they can use our website. But then we just have a separate list of all our suppliers and their emails. So people call me and say, you know, 'I wanted to--' We probably have over million yards of fabric right now. We have on the West Coast probably you know 40 different companies we can use that probably have millions and millions yards of fabric that we can sell off anytime we want and ship directly from them as if it's coming from us, so we're repping their line in a way but nobody knows about them. GE: So you're, in that case, you're not, you don't own it, you're a broker of it. MM: Yup, I'm a broker of it. But my, the way I detail it out is...cause there are some people that would just try to go around you as much as possible. And, you know, I've built those relationships so they cost me money in order to get to them. So basically I just stayed, you know, I have a storage facility in Los Angeles and, you know, we store some of our fabric that we import and I can ship it directly to you from there. And nobody questions. Typically nobody digs or anything like that. So with the suppliers we send..somebody calls me and says 'I need 500 yards of this.' I don't have it. The people I know out there don't have it. Maybe I deal with people in North Jersey too, they don't have it. We send it out to 4000 people on this email broadcast saying 'hey we're looking for 500 yards of white cotton, you know, twill, does anybody have it?' We get replies. People send us samples, I send it to the customer, they approve it and we broker it that way then. So that was a way that we grew our business because it gave us the ability to just supply people with larger amounts without having to spend the money on inventory of something that we didn't know was going to sell or not, which was nice. GE: So, um, so it sounds like, if I understand, over the past ten years that you've been actively in the business, from the beginning until now, it sounds like it has grown a lot. MM: Yeah, for sure. GE: And was that growing five times? Two times? MM: Probably, if sales wise, in sales it's gone, you know, if sales go up and down, it stays pretty consistent. Since I started, you know, at our highest point it grew 10 times and probably, you know, on an average, it's probably about seven times. So I mean it's tremendously, tremendous to where it was for sure. You know the great thing for that is definitely in the business we weren't, you know, fortunately for us were not like 'we got to pay x, we got to pay y.' You know, we're at a more financially stable place. That's not an issue, you know, at this point luckily for us, so, you know, we can buy fabric. We know, you know, 'hey, we don't know where these sales are coming from but, you know, on an average we're doing X amount, you know, every single week.' So as long as that's coming in and, you know, we're probably buying more fabric sometimes that we should but at the same time without new fabrics we can't keep new sales going selling old fabric you know we will sell it off at a lower price to gain, you know, more income bringing it in, more cash flow. But yeah, with the employees, and I have to hire somebody else in the warehouse now to help out, so yeah I mean it's gotten to a point, you know, my father always says, 'well you know this is your business, this is your business.' And he was always like that and, you know, a couple years ago we were like we're going to do 50%, and just gave me 50%. You know, it's not that maybe I didn't earn it, which I probably did, but at the same time it's his business. He doesn't owe me, you know, anything from it. So he gave me 50% of the company, but always in his mind he said 'I'll give you 100% if it made sense' but financially it made sense for him to be a 50 partner and for me to be 50. And, you know, it's just, he was always it's your business, it's your business, I just work for you. And he just wants it to grow and for me to be able to provide for me and my family to what it can be. You know, this business can be 10 times what we are now if we could do this and do this. And I say, 'yeah you know I understand that, you know, and that's nice and some people have this strived to you know have the biggest business they can possibly have, which I want to have a profitable business.' I want to have a good business, but I also want to have my family, my life. And I talked to older people in our business and all you know says, 'oh, you know, you're this or whatever.' Sometimes they're like, 'I couldn't get a hold of you last night.' And I was like 'yeah, you know, it was last night, call me during the day.' You know, my friends are like 'you're the only business owner that doesn't answer his phone after 6 o'clock.' I'm like what do you want, you know, I'm at home, I need to enjoy myself. I take vacation, and my dad thinks I take too much vacation. I tell him, you're living in the old times, you don't even realize how much vacation days people get nowadays out in the workforce. I don't even get that much and I'm a business owner. And he says you are a business owner so that's why you don't get that much because it's your business. But when I go away, I go away as much as possible. I try not to stay in contact with the business cause you need that time away, but what that helps, and it helps him, and I have seen him do this, is when you step away, you're not thinking about it. You're thinking about it a little in the back of your head, and you're kind of innovating a little bit, thinking of new ways to do things because you got to step away and you started thinking about it. GE: So Marc, where sales have gone up about seven times over the last ten years, how about, what about the profit, bottomline? Cause I realize you also hold a lot of more expenses and things and whatever. MM: Yeah I mean the expenses are a lot more compared to what they are but I mean... GE: Right, but that's commensurate with the sales. MM: Yeah, I mean, most businesses are going to be like that. I mean I would love to have a business model that my business sales grew seven times and my expenses stayed the same. I mean that would be fantastic. You know, for our business that's not the case and, you know, I would say well when I was younger I would say I wouldn't need as much money, you know, to live. And having a family now, fortunately, you know, my wife doesn't have to work. You know, she's at home. She does work part time, you know, once she is back from having the baby, and that's kinda just for her presence of mind. So, you know, financially bottom line, you know, it could be, it could be three times, you know, maybe. Maybe up to four, I don't know hundred percent on the mark but just because of the added expenses of everything else that goes up, it does mean more profit, but we sink a lot of our profit back into the business because, you know, I do do investments in retirement stuff but my dollar, you know, in my business can make me, you know, say that dollar can make me 400%. Well go show me something in the market that's going to make me 400%. It doesn't exist. So, you know, if I took into account everything that we made, yes, you know, it would probably be a lot more than that but everything we have to put back into the business on a daily, you know, business day takes away from that. But at the end, you know, we had at one time we might have had you know 150,000 yards of fabric, and then we might have had 300,000 yards. And we had one of the ladies just doing inventory just real quick nothing exact just goes through all of our headers and I told my dad what I thought we had and he came back and he's like 'we have over 1 million yards' and I said 'yeah, I know.' You know, so that helps our business value and gives us, you know, everything's paid for. We buy stuff, we paid it off within 30 to 60 days, so basically everything that's in there, we own, which is a great thing because if say we hit a hard time and we're like 'okay we can't buy any more fabric.' Well I have 1 million yards of fabric to sell so if I can just bite the bullet for three months and I wouldn't have $80,000 in bills, well, after three months I would have a nice you know bank account to go start buying again and start the business up and it wouldn't take that long, which is good. GE: So I'm curious, years ago for most of the older people that we have interviewed, there was a dominance, there was a pretty large presence of Jewish people in the business. A lot of Italians, a lot of other people, but certainly, given how small the population is, there had to be a large percentage of Jewish people. Is that because, I don't know, we have not interviewed a lot of people who currently have a business, is that still the case? MM: Yeah, uh, 99%. GE: Ok, wow. MM: You know, where did that come from-- GE: I was going to ask you, what do you think might be any reasons for that? MM: Uh, I don't know, I think, you know, I just I think it was something from back in the day, you know, over whether it was in Israel or Iran, you know cause there are a lot of Iranian Jews, you know, that have come over that were in the fabric industry. I think there was a big fabric hub, you know, back in the day like over there and when everyone came, everybody, you know, migrated over here it kind of followed them and that was what they knew, you know, so you tend to have into whether it was the Jewish over here or Irish over here or you know Italians over here. Everybody for certain, it might have started in other industries, starting to diverse itself, for some reason in this industry it's not and I don't know why. Everybody I deal with is Jewish basically. I don't think there's one, there might be maybe one or two people, you know, that I buy fabric from that are not Jewish by any means. GE: Interesting. MM: Yeah I think it's just it just was part of the culture. And I think people stuck to it. It's what, you know, what they knew and that's what they did. So it is interesting when you hear that, but it's definitely an industry that there's, the only way you're getting in this industry most likely is through your family. Nobody I don't even know if there's a course for college, you know, that's called fabric wholesaler, you know, where you can learn to sell fabric. There is manufacturing, you know, sewing, you know, getting into that, running your business, being a designer. There's a lot of that, fashion institutions, stuff of that sort. But everybody I know that's in it and that's younger that it's just through family, and I like just, it keeps, it's like a revolving door. I think that's why. SC: So I have two just sort of thought questions that I'd like to ask you. What has made you feel the most creative in your life? MM: Um, the most creative, um, hm, I mean I, you know, probably my parents. You know just, you know, the openness of letting me do things, you know, and then in business with my father, you know, letting me take control as a young person. Being, you know, getting ideas and seeing them and then learning and being able to open up and kind of venture into my own things, you know, they never, they never pushed me and said 'you need to go to this.' You know, I got tons of friends and families say, 'well you need to go to nursing school, or you need to do this.' You know, I was never pushed in any direction, but I was backed a hundred percent no matter where I went, so that's what I would say. SC: And what do you value most in life? MM: Um, it would, I mean, there's a, you know, family obviously is very important, you know, and I think a lot of people would say that off the bat. You know, I definitely value that, you know, especially now that I'm having two kids. You know, it's I think I also whether it's not just, you know, the family, it's your surroundings and everybody. Doing the right thing, you know, being good to people that you don't even know. You know, I find it comforting, you know, something simple as, you know, I'm walking into Wegmans and, you know, somebody that, say somebody is in the handicap spot, they just unloaded their carts and they are looking around, it's like just say, 'hey, I'll take your cart for you, I'll put it up.' I value that type of stuff. Those type of people that their faces isn't just forward, you know, looking at their day, they're looking at their surroundings, you know, looking to help others, you know, if they can, you know, as much as possible, you know, I value, you know, so it's that. It's family, it's that, and, you know, I value experiences, you know, in life whether it's traveling to different areas or meeting new people, you know, listening you know to other people, to hear about how things were and then, you know, being able to relate that to my life and move forward. So, you know, I would say those things are pretty important, yeah. And then, you know, obviously like I said, family is, I was raised that family is number one, you know, sometimes too much, you know, sometimes it's too much push, but, you know, as I said, you know, before it's like you don't know until, you know, you're in your 20s. You don't know until you get married, you don't know until you have kids. And now, it's the same thing when my parents say well you don't know until you have grandkids, you know, because I'm like well you don't, we need to do this with them, and they're like when you have a grandkid you'll see. You don't care what parents say, you do what you want to do and that's that. You know so it's that's why it always comes back to family and, you know, value and learning, and, you know, being able to experience things together, I would say. VIDEO ENDS HERE GE: So Marc is going to give us a little guided tour of the Nick of Time Textiles website. MM: Yeah, so we just actually, this is a new format that we have that basically we just changed probably a month ago. It's probably like our fourth or fifth change. Basically what we implemented two changes ago was something called a heat map, so when somebody comes to the website, they are able to track each user every time somebody signs on and they can track where their mouse goes, where they scroll to, what they look at. And what that enables us to do is to see what's commonly clicked on, where do people go, so then we can bring that stuff up to the top so they can see it right away once they sign on. Move some stuff down below, change wordings. You know, put different, maybe they're looking for our contact information, we always had it up here, but we also had a lot of other stuff up here. It could have been too much, maybe they were missing it, maybe they were looking for it somewhere else. So basically, you know, we change where, you know, the coupon is, you know, we wanted to put it up top easily visible. When we run more than one coupon, this just slides over. We have a couple different ones, so people can always see what they're doing. You know, dealing with now, you know, with the Internet and social media, you know, we have, you know, whether it's Facebook, whether it's Twitter, Pinterest, and then you know the Google Plus for keywords and ad-words. So basically it kind of just gives you the availability to browse our website pretty easily. As you go down, it tells you, you know, the stuff that's maybe the most popular, stuff whether that we sell a lot of or we have a lot to offer to customers. So we always have the main categories, two fabric categories that are split up between the knitted and the woven, those are the main categories in the industry and everything kind of falls under one or another and then we just pick out the ones that we sell the most of that people come to our website for the most common things, I would say. So we also, up here, we have a search engine. It's tough to get a really good search engine, but mainly we use this whether for style numbers that we have our fabrics and go right to them or, you know, if I just type in, you know, you type in the style number and then you want to find it real quick, you know, you just hit go and it just pops up everything that comes under that style number. And then, you know, this is kind of the generic way to look at it, doesn't give you all the information until you click on one of those, but if you go under knitted, this is like all the different categories that we'll have that's all broken down, shows you some fabric that might be included in there that you can, you know, look at and sell. It gives you a preview. And then once you click, it could be subcategories as well, so you don't lose, if you are looking for solids you don't have to go through all of the stripes to get the solids. And then once you get to it, it will kind of give you the prices, breakdowns, style numbers. You can order free samples on the website. You can just add it right to your cart, and you can just continue shopping to add more. If you go into it specifically, it will give you descriptions, it will tell you if it's in stock, if there are any customer reviews on a product that will tell you there. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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Marc Malkovsky, June 1, 2017
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Marc Malkovsky talks about helping his dad cut samples in the basement for the business while Marc was still in high school. A few years after college, Marc joined his father in the business. Together, they embraced the Internet and incrementally built an e-commerce site for the business. Nick of Time is a current, thriving Allentown business.
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LVTNT-20
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2017-06-01
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Stan Miller
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https://trexlerworks.muhlenberg.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=LVTNT-07.xml
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5.4 May 22, 2014 Stan Miller, May 22, 2014 LVTNT-07 1:24:44 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Stan Miller Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 MillerStan_20140522.mp4 1.0:|37(8)|62(6)|87(8)|112(2)|131(15)|152(9)|177(15)|200(15)|225(7)|248(16)|271(15)|292(4)|311(4)|332(5)|359(6)|382(11)|403(12)|428(6)|455(2)|478(2)|495(6)|514(13)|533(8)|552(3)|571(15)|596(16)|615(5)|640(8)|663(8)|684(12)|707(18)|730(16)|757(7)|780(7)|799(7)|818(3)|843(2)|872(12)|893(5)|916(5)|933(15)|952(3)|977(2)|994(13)|1015(8)|1042(2)|1071(4)|1102(5)|1125(5)|1150(15)|1173(12)|1202(13)|1223(8)|1252(4)|1271(15)|1292(12)|1309(7)|1328(16)|1353(2)|1386(5)|1407(8)|1430(9)|1451(18)|1474(3)|1495(13)|1516(7)|1537(3)|1558(7)|1581(12)|1614(3)|1631(7)|1650(17)|1669(12)|1690(14)|1717(16)|1736(8)|1759(8)|1786(12)|1809(2)|1836(8)|1855(10)|1876(11)|1897(5)|1918(15)|1931(4) 0 https://youtu.be/fr_LeNNxwFs YouTube video 8 Introduction—Stan Miller SC: OK. Today is May 22nd. This is an interview with Stan Miller. And what I’d like to do first is just put you into place very briefly and then we'll go back to your family. So just if you could give me your full name when you were born, where you were born, where and where you grew up?
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 ; SM: Stanley Zane Miller, or May 24th, 1932. I was born in Brooklyn. What else do you want?
 ; 
 ; SC: And where did you grow up?
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 ; SM: I grew up in Brooklyn til I went through high school in Brooklyn.
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 ; SC: Do you remember that address . . . 
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 ; SM: Of the high school?
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 ; SC: Of where you were born and where you grew up.
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 ; SM: Yeah, 2047 East 37th Street. I don't know the zip. 
 ; 
 ; SC: Did they have one? Didn't have one when I was a kid.
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 ; SM: Oh, I don't think so. Yeah, I don't remember my phone number. Actually, I remember my father's phone number where he used to work. I was always calling my father. 0 95 Family History SC: And so let's talk a little bit about your family as far back as you remember, your parents, your grandparents, great grandparents.
 ; 
 ; SM: Never. I never knew my grandparents. I, I never had them. They were around, I suppose. My mother's parents, well, her mother died when she was a teenager. And I think her father ran off and left she and her two sisters. So I know nothing about her parents. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Can you tell us their names?
 ; 
 ; SM: My mother's maiden . . . my mother was Ruth Vernick was her maiden name. That is V-E-R-N-I-C-K. She had a sister Lena and another sister Ida.
 ; 
 ; SC: And and you mentioned her parents, what were their names?
 ; 
 ; SM: Don't know. OK. I don't know. 0 258 Louis Miller's Start in the Garment Industry SC: So can you talk a little bit about you mentioned the business and any of the businesses that they were involved with?
 ; 
 ; SM: Well, let's see. My father, when he came here, I think it was his first job. He started working for a gentleman named August Neilsen. Mr. Nielsen had an embroidery business and made some infant sleepwear. And, well, I'm sure you haven't used these, but remember when years ago when babies were born, they used belly bands?
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes, I read about that..
 ; 
 ; SM: And these belly bands really were just strips of cloth, strips of flannel so long and the edges weren't finished, the edges were pink. You know that this so that it doesn't ravel. I still have this pinking machine downstairs. And they made belly bands, so he started working for Mr. Nielsen.
 ; 
 ; GE: And and this is in Brooklyn?
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 ; SM: This was in New York City on Wooster Street, not far from where NYU is, OK. And he started working for Mr. Nielsen and became his right hand man. And then for sales, they hired another fellow named Irving Wollims. And as time went on, I think Mr. Nielsen . . .I think his wife became ill, and he made some arrangements with my father and Irving Wollims to take the business and they paid him, or either paid off his wife's bills, or took care of him . . . I don't remember what the deal was, but they paid him out. They kept the name. 
 ; 
 ; GE: The name was?
 ; 
 ; SM: August Nielsen Company. 0 642 1949: Miller Family Moves Business to Allentown, PA GE: Or do we want to start . . .with what came after high school. He only told us up to high school for yourself.
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 ; SC: Yeah. OK, so I should start there. Yes. Just go on with your life.
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 ; SM: I graduated high school and my parents, the business, is moving out here. I had to go to college, so I applied to Lehigh and Muhlenberg, and I went to Muhlenberg. The first year I lived in the dorm because they hadn't moved out here physically, the home. My father came out with my brother-in-law and set up the business out here in the summer of 1949 or maybe in the spring. And then we didn't move out here until the fall of 1949. So he was a weekend husband for that period of time. I don't . . and he did go into business with Mort Miller's father. Mort Miller's father, Harry, owned the building out here. 0 749 Stan Miller's Education at Muhlenberg College/Early Work Experiences SM: As for me, I know on your sheet you had something about what kind of work I did. I guess my first job must have been as every young boy, a waiter in the Catskills. I was a counselor at summer camp. I was a lifeguard when I was at Muhlenberg at the old Jewish Community Center, when it was on 6th Street. And then in my spare time or sometimes summers or what have you, I worked at the factory. And, of course, as a young guy who was young and strong, I did all the scutwork, you know, took out the garbage . . .And I think my most interesting job was I was working in the shipping room, and my first duty to the guy who ran the shipping was at two o'clock every day. I had to stop whatever I was doing, and listen to the radio, and get the results of the horse races that he was betting on, and then somehow getting the daily number. He was a gambler and that . . . I had to do that.
 ; 
 ; I was . . . I took out the garbage. I loaded the trucks. And I did find out that for years I was unloading trucks. And I discovered now that I've done it all wrong because now they offload trucks. And all these years I was screwing up. 0 922 Stan Miller Works in the United States Army Finance Department, 1952-1953 SM: Anyway, I was in the Army, they sent me to Korea. 
 ; 
 ; GE: That's about what year . . . 1952?
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 ; SM: 1953 — 22 months and 27 days later, I got out. I was in Korea and then I was in Hawaii.
 ; 
 ; SC: What was your position in the services?
 ; 
 ; SM: Finance, fortunately. I was told by a friend of a friend who was working in personnel at the time that if you want to get into Army finance, which is the cushiest job you can find, don't tell them that you were an accounting major. I said why not? He says, because then the army feels that they have to unteach you regular accounting and teach you the army way. There is the right way, the wrong way, and the army way. And they feel that if you had accounting knowledge before, it's really going to be a mess. 0 1015 Strong Partnership and New Technology in the Family Business SM: When I got out, I started working and started learning. I think one of the . . . as I mentioned before, how well we got along. It wasn't a problem where you might hear that if you want to put in a new machine, the older gentleman like the father, oh, no, no, we can't do that or not. Not with my father took just a little explaining. The first thing we put in, I think, was a conveyor belt because we had a machine that would put the garments in plastic bags that we used to put them in boxes and have to pick the boxes up. Conveyor belt . . so at first he said, no, no, we don't need a conveyor belt. We can use boxes. But once we put it in, I remember he used to stand there and smoke a cigar and watch the conveyor belt and the garments go up. It was wonderful. We got along extremely well, extremely.
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 ; SC: And this was you and your father . . . 
 ; 
 ; SM: and my brother-in-law, and we all got along extremely well. Ultimately, when my father died, it was my brother in law and I and my father's partner who was still alive, and his son. Ultimately, my father's partner died. So it was the one, the son in New York, and Walter and I in Pennsylvania. And and we we ran, we were, I think, in business for maybe seventy seven years. 0 1109 1957: Stan and Lois Meet SC: How did you meet your wife?
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 ; SM: Blind date — Cedar Crest. She was . . . strange. She had gone to some party in Philadelphia with some guy from Lehigh and one of my friends from Muhlenberg. Well, his sister was at this party. You probably know her-- Sheva Rapaport. Remember Sheva Rapoport? She was a periodontist. You know, the judge Arnold Rappoport, he is a federal judge. Well, anyway, anyway, Sheva was at this party, and she told her brother, my friend, there's this nice girl for you. He called her, didn't work out. Picked up the phone, he called me, and he says, there's this girl she's just right for you. So I went over to Cedar Crest, and I met her, and I asked her out. And she told me the first thing she said to her roommate after our little parlor date, she says, if I ever go out with him again, I'm going to have to change the way he dresses. So we met in October. We were married in June. 0 1255 Stan Miller's Children SC: Can you tell us about your children?
 ; 
 ; SM: My children. I have my oldest daughter, who was born in nineteen sixty, who is currently not married. She's living in Florida with a wonderful, wonderful guy and she's a travel agent. His occupation, which is sort of unusual. You've heard of concierge medicine. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Yes.
 ; 
 ; SM: But he's selling it, he's getting doctors to go into concierge medicine. He's establishing their practices as concierge doctors. It's really interesting.
 ; 
 ; My number two daughter was born in [19]62 and she is now director of marketing for the United States and Canada for a software company that specializes in software design for anybody fooling around with real estate. For example, Hanes underwear ; they've got facilities all over the place. That was one of them. Not Seventh Day Adventists. What's the other one? Ones with Kingdom Halls?
 ; 
 ; SC: Jehovah Witnesses.
 ; 
 ; SM: That’s it, they just signed Jehovah's Witnesses. They must have thousands of establishments, and you need this software so that you can know when to pay the taxes. If you own apartments, it's perfect. Your percentage of rentals of occupancy will. So it's all to do with with real estate as opposed to some who will have for medical or dental or something. 0 1494 Community Involvement SC: Were you and your wife active in the greater community and the Jewish community?
 ; 
 ; SM: My wife was active in ORT. 
 ; 
 ; GE: What's your wife's name?
 ; 
 ; 
 ; SM: Lois. She was active in ORT, especially when it first came to town. Is it still active? Is it still around?
 ; 
 ; GE: Not really.
 ; 
 ; SM: OK, well, it used to be. And she was president at one time. And this was all her contemporaries at that time, all the young women of the time. Other than that, she didn't get involved in the Jewish community at all. She ended up spending about six years with my youngest daughter when she was doing television. They were spending time in Hollywood, in Los Angeles --for seven, eight, nine months. I was home. Sometimes with no daughters, sometimes with one daughter who was going to Rider for a while. And so all I had was a cat and a dog. So she didn't do much with the Jewish community. Quite honestly. I guess I really, I think, wasn't active in the community center and I wasn't active at Temple Bethel. I did sing in their choir for about forty some odd years. So I guess that was my contribution. Other than that, that wasn't my thing. 0 1678 Home Addresses SC: Where did you live in Allentown after you came with your parents and all the way through?
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 ; SM: You know where Alton Park is? You go down 24th Street, you remember there was a covered bridge,
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 ; SC: Yes.
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 ; SM: All right, and go up further. And before you get to Lehigh Street, it's off to the right a little bit.The block we lived on was a block that was two blocks long. I had a real nice house. After you you come from New York where you live in a semi-detached house with grass about the size of that hassock and no property. We had this house with an adjacent lot and a big, big house, I mean, big compared to what we lived in. And it was planted trees, I planted all the shrubs, it was wonderful. I never had such a good time. I love mowing the lawn. We had a power mower then. Power mowers were sort of new at that time. And and my father loved to love to put a cigar in his mouth.And he cut the property, and he loved it. And we could look out the front door, from before there were a lot of buildings, and you could see, well, they were not mountains, you know hills in Emaus. But you could you could see green green hills. For him after living in New York and for me, it was a treat. Then they continued to live there, and after Lois and I got married, we lived one block away at Tremont Apartments. And from there we moved, we built a house on South Glenwood Street, within spitting distance of the Swain school. And my kids went to Swain school while we were there. And then when we had our third child, we needed more room. So we built here and we've been here for forty six years. I was the first one on the block. So we've been here, raised our kids here. 0 1817 Factory Machinery SM: I also have -it's a toy- not a toy - this is my father's original cutting machine, you've seen factories with the cutting machines that are electric.
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes.
 ; 
 ; GE: Yes.
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 ; SM: Ibis is his cutting machine, it's still as sharp as can be, and the way it worked is, they had a table with a slot cut in it and the slot was shielded by metal so you couldn't cut the wood and you ran this up and down up and down in the slot and you moved the fabric around. To cut out an arm hole you'd just keep going and you'd move this around. And his handwriting says 1918, on here. 0 1946 Louis Miller's Pinless Diapers SM: Matter of fact, my oldest sister, when she was an infant, I don't know how it happened but she was stuck with a pin, and she ended up with this serious infection, which she ultimately got over. And my father was so angry about using pins that he created,- it didn't go anywhere- he created - back then they called it the pinless diaper. And he had the diaper and it had ties as I recall it, where you would be able to tie it onto the child as snugly as possible. I still have a diaper downstairs somewhere. And he patented it, but it went nowhere.
 ; 
 ; GE: Right. If only he'd tweaked it a little bit to become the disposable diaper or...
 ; 
 ; SC: Yeah, or tabs or snaps.
 ; 
 ; SM: Well, or Velcro.
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 ; SC: Or Velcro, yeah, oh my gosh. 0 2010 Manufacturers versus Contractors SM: So are we talking about the um?
 ; 
 ; GE: So my recollection is, we were talking about the business, and if you wanted to maybe start by saying a little bit how you see your manufacturers, compared to maybe, the other businesses or contractors. 
 ; 
 ; SM: We manufactured as opposed to most of the people in the needle trades here in town. As big as they were, they were contractors. There's nothing wrong with that, their product strictly was labor. They supplied the labor and the thread, and paid the rent, and all they did was take in the fabric. Sometimes they cut it, sometimes it came in already cut. They sewed it up, according to specifications, finished it, packaged it, whatever and sent it back to whoever was handling it. And that's all they had to do, so their job basically was pay the labor and they took care of um, - they had unions, paid the rent, and so on. And that's it. As opposed to our operation which I guess you could call to some extent, vertical. We didn't make the fabric but we had to design the garments, fit them into certain price ranges and then purchase the fabric with contracts and what not. 0 2777 Discussion on Vertical Integration SC: I was just thinking, with the vertical integration you always think of vertical integration as highly capitalized industries, but it was possible in the garment industry, not to be like the old Lowell [mills] factories that were totally vertically integrated- you could get in and out fairly quickly, even though you had to have more capital and contractors.
 ; 
 ; SM: Yeah, well we were I guess the true vertical integration is starting from...
 ; 
 ; SC: Raw material.
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 ; SM: Raw materials to sales. We skipped the raw materials. We did not make the fabric, we didn't knit it, we purchased the fabric. From then on,
 ; 
 ; GE: You were vertically integrated.
 ; 
 ; SM: It was a vertical operation because we did the styling, and the creating the samples, the pricing the whole business, the stocking, the billing, getting printed, the whole thing and
 ; as you said, you needed capital for that, so you needed good relations with the bank, or with whatever bank you're going to deal with. 0 3099 Manufacturing in the '70s: Expansion, Lawsuits, and Downsizing SM: I have to tell you one story.
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 ; GE: Sure.
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 ; SM: When we bought our new building,
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 ; GE: And this was about when?
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 ; SM: This was in the 70's, and at the time, the building was certainly worth the price. It was a great deal for a bank for a mortgage. For whatever reason, I don't remember, there was no mortgage money around. I guess banks have certain amounts in their portfolios that they could put into mortgages and whatnot there was none, and we were just dying. We were trying every bank in town, they would say, normally we would take a baseball bat and keep you here to make the deal, but they had no money. And we had a French poodle at the time, and the French poodle had an accident in the bedroom. And I got up at night, not knowing, go to the bathroom, and I stepped in it. Which is sort of, you know, well, funny experience, I told my mother, the next day I told my mother this, and she said, you're going to get your mortgage, and I said why, and she says, it's an old tale, that if you step in shit, something good is going to happen to you. Don't you think, the next day--
 ; 
 ; GE: Your mother was right!
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 ; SM: We got a call that they- I think it was union bank at the time -was going to take the mortgage. 0 3674 Max Charcov's Used Machines SM: Fellow named Max Charcov. Max Charcov's daughter married Roland Sigal. Sigal had a building by Sacred Heart Hospital where he had dress shops. I don't remember the names of the dress shops but he was very successful. And he was very philanthropic. And Max, Max was a real old slovenly Jewish fella, and he would pedal machines.
 ; 
 ; He would buy anybody's machine, sewing machine, for 50 bucks and would um,- he would fix them up, like a used car's fixed up. How would he fix them up, he'd take a rag, he dusted it off, had no idea whether the machine worked. But it's like new, he said. And he would then sell the machine for $100 or whatever. If you needed a used machine, Max had it. He never had a building, he had various garages around town where he would store the machines. He had a driver, because he couldn't drive anymore. He would run, he had the machines, and he had nothing on paper. He knew every machine that he had ; he had hundreds of machines. And they were all used and when it was time, you needed a machine, you call Charcov if you want to get a used machine. And sometimes he would buy our machines, and I remember he would come in and we would sell him 2 or 3 machines, and he would owe us three or four hundred dollars, and he would take his checkbook and he would give it to me. He says write out a check. He has no remittance- no um, check stubs, no check register, so I write out a check to August Nielsen for three hundred dollars. I give it to Max to sign, and I take the check and that's good. I don't know who kept his books. I don't know if he ever paid income tax but he was a guy that- he was a fixture in the business. 0 3822 Naming the Business SC: [H]ow did you choose the name of Nielsen?
 ; 
 ; SM: We didn't.
 ; 
 ; SC: Oh it was.
 ; 
 ; SM: That was the gentleman that my father went to work for in the early 1890s or early 1900s. His name was August F Nielsen. And they ultimately made the company incorporated, and I don't remember the terms. But I know that my father took over the business either because his wife was sick, and he was going to die, and they would support the wife until she died, or some kind of arrangement like that. They would pay him off or pay him in some way. I don't remember [details] but it was an interesting setup. But that name was there and no point in changing it ; it was unique. 0 3903 The End of the Business GE: Can you share with us a little bit, let's say the last ten years as it was beginning to a little ·bit unwind and slowdown for you
 ; 
 ; SM: Well during that time we knew the handwriting was on the wall because we were having trouble competing with folks, the other big manufacturers who then they ended up switching and manufacturing their stuff not in their plants down south, but in the Caribbean. There was this plan 807-- it was some kind of bill or something where goods can be made in the Caribbean, that made Guatemala and Haiti and Dominican Republic come into the United States with no duty as long as a certain percentage of the cost of the garment was done in the United States. I don't know what the percentage was, but it was pretty small. So, goods were sent uncut down to the Caribbean, it was cut, it was sewn, everything was done to it and it was sent back to the United States, and maybe we put a plastic bag over the garment and put a hang tag on which amounted to the proper percentage of labor. Something ridiculous and their costs were -- I may have said this before--their costs were five dollars a day. They were paying five dollars a day and this was in the 90's and the late 80's where we were paying five dollars an hour. And that was good, plus vacations and blue cross and blue shield, and holidays and all this other garbage and taxes and unemployment. They were paying just five dollars a day and there's no way you can compete with that. Plus these-- our competitors-- had the better licenses, so we were making an inferior garment for lack of a better term, or a less desirable garment. 0 4713 Stan Miller's Values SC: Okay, so my other question is what do you value most in life?
 ; 
 ; SM: What do I value most in life? I suppose good health and the health of my family. I can't think of much else that's important and ultimately you die with a good name. Because they never caught me.
 ; 
 ; GE: Right and as you say you checked it out on the internet.
 ; 
 ; SM: Yeah there was nothing bad, although the NSA has been checking my computers. I never...
 ; 
 ; GE: They're checking everybody's
 ; 
 ; SC: That's the new democracy, we all get checked.
 ; 
 ; SM: Well, you've got these crazies in the world.
 ; 
 ; SC: Yeah I know,
 ; 
 ; SM: You wonder, right now everybody says oh don't check me you're invading my privacy. As soon as we have another 9/11- why didn't you know about these people!? So there's no happy medium there. 0 4774 Stan Miller: Performer SC: And what makes you feel the most creative, artistic, I mean in the broadest sense of creative or maybe a sense of completion in your life?
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 ; SM: In my life, other than being very proud of your three kids, me, I like to sing. So I was in the Temple choir for about forty years. We ended up, my family ended up somehow getting involved in theater, so besides my daughter, my wife became a manager and I was a theater um. I did shows at Cedar Crest, Muhlenberg, at Civic, and Pennsylvania Playhouse ; I did them all over in the [area].
 ; 
 ; SC: You acted?
 ; 
 ; SM: Yeah, so I did that. I found we all agreed, this group that we-- this last group that we were with-- that one of the greatest joys in life, the biggest kick that we would get is to be in a room full of people and make them laugh. And that's what we were doing, we were doing murder mysteries. Believe me they were funny, and we were good, because we handled- it's a different procedure than being on a proscenium stage because on a proscenium stage there's an invisible wall between the actors and the audience. There's no ad-libbing to speak of, you do your thing, when you do dinner theater or murder mysteries. You are this close to them, and some of the people shoot off their mouths. 0 MovingImage Stan Miller talks about how his father, a young immigrant, got started in manufacturing children’s pajamas in New York City, and later moved the production to Allentown. The sales office of the company remained in New York and was run by Stan’s father’s partner. When Stan and his family moved to Allentown, Stan was 17 years old and would soon start college. Stan attended Muhlenberg College, majoring in Accounting and Economics. After college and the service, Stan and his brother-in-law entered the family business. As did the son of Stan’s father’s partner. Stan is very proud that the business operated harmoniously among the partners during its more than seventy-five years in business. The firm closed in 1994, due to stiff competition from globalization. Interview with Stan Miller, May 22, 2014 GAIL EISENBERG: Today is May 22nd. STAN MILLER: May 22nd? SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Yes SM: Then I put the wrong date down.. SC: OK. Today is May 22nd. This is an interview with Stan Miller. And what I'd like to do first is just put you into place very briefly and then we'll go back to your family. So just if you could give me your full name when you were born, where you were born, where and where you grew up? SM: Stanley Zane Miller, or May 24th, 1932. I was born in Brooklyn. What else do you want? SC: And where did you grow up? SM: I grew up in Brooklyn til I went through high school in Brooklyn. SC: Do you remember that address . . . SM: Of the high school? SC: Of where you were born and where you grew up. SM: Yeah, 2047 East 37th Street. I don't know the zip. SC: Did they have one? Didn't have one when I was a kid. SM: Oh, I don't think so. Yeah, I don't remember my phone number. Actually, I remember my father's phone number where he used to work. I was always calling my father. SC: Yeah. Oh, course. So you lived there until you were an adult and you went to high school there. SM: Until I was 17, then finished high school. And at that time my family moved to Allentown. SC: Where did you go to high school? SM: James Madison High School in Brooklyn. SC: And so let's talk a little bit about your family as far back as you remember, your parents, your grandparents, great grandparents. SM: Never. I never knew my grandparents. I, I never had them. They were around, I suppose. My mother's parents, well, her mother died when she was a teenager. And I think her father ran off and left she and her two sisters. So I know nothing about her parents. GE: Can you tell us their names? SM: My mother's maiden . . . my mother was Ruth Vernick was her maiden name. That is V-E-R-N-I-C-K. She had a sister Lena and another sister Ida. SC: And and you mentioned her parents, what were their names? SM: Don't know. OK. I don't know. GE: So the mother died young? SM: Well, I think when my my mother was a teenager -- 14, 15, or 16. SC: What did they live? In the United States? SM: I think in New Jersey. My mother was born in the United States. Where her parents are from, whether they were born here or not, I don't know. I think there's some Russian in my mother's family. As far as my father, again, his parents were left in Poland. He's one of seven children. GE: And what was your father's name? SM: Louis -- L-O-U-I-S Miller. Of the seven, one brother left and went to Sweden, and he settled there and had raised a big family. My father and three other brothers and a sister came to the United States, and one sister stayed there and the Germans got her. SC: Was this in the 1920s that they came? SM: My father came here something like 1910 or 1911. SC: OK, so it was older. SM: He was maybe 15, 16, 17 years old. SC: Yeah. And your mother's family, do you know when they came? SM: I have no idea just because I think they may even have been born here, I don't know. SC: And if we know their names, we could actually look them up on the ancestry. We find anything, we'll let you know. Oh, yeah, I have everything ancestry. So can you talk a little bit about you mentioned the business and any of the businesses that they were involved with? SM: Well, let's see. My father, when he came here, I think it was his first job. He started working for a gentleman named August Neilsen. Mr. Nielsen had an embroidery business and made some infant sleepwear. And, well, I'm sure you haven't used these, but remember when years ago when babies were born, they used belly bands? SC: Yes, I read about that.. SM: And these belly bands really were just strips of cloth, strips of flannel so long and the edges weren't finished, the edges were pink. You know that this so that it doesn't ravel. I still have this pinking machine downstairs. And they made belly bands, so he started working for Mr. Nielsen. GE: And and this is in Brooklyn? SM: This was in New York City on Wooster Street, not far from where NYU is, OK. And he started working for Mr. Nielsen and became his right hand man. And then for sales, they hired another fellow named Irving Wollims. And as time went on, I think Mr. Nielsen . . .I think his wife became ill, and he made some arrangements with my father and Irving Wollims to take the business and they paid him, or either paid off his wife's bills, or took care of him . . . I don't remember what the deal was, but they paid him out. They kept the name. GE: The name was? SM: August Nielsen Company. Okay. GE: And August Nielsen, was he Jewish? SM: No, he was German. SC: That was my question. I wondered if he was German or if he was Scandinavian because of a family member going to Sweden. SM: No, no, nothing to do with the other. Oh, that was my father's brother. SC: OK . . . Right. I realize that. But I wondered if there was any connection there. SM: They took over and they they ran the business. They started making more children's sleepwear, baby's gowns and kimonos and sleeping bags, things like that for them. GE: Just so that I know . . . Louis and what was the other man's name? SM: Irving Wollims. W o l l i m s -- was he Jewish? SM: Yeah. GE: OK, and so Irving Wollims was more sales and your dad is more the production or the operations. The two of them then bought out ultimately the . . .. SM: In some arrangement, I don't remember what it was, and they became partners, and they stayed partners until they died. It was a really a very interesting and pleasant relationship. And it went on because Irving Wollim's son went into the sales and took over the sales, and my father's son, which is me, and one son-in-law, ended up in the production. I would have to say that I think it's it's more the exception than the rule that family members get along, and we got along. I mean, I know of so many. . . GE: Can you tell me, I'm sorry, your brother in law's name? SM: Walter Ostrow -- O-S-T-R-O-W. GE: So you and Walter really did the production. SM: Yeah, yeah, down the line. SC: So, do you have any other stories about when your family entered business any of the connections with business? Was this pretty much a straight line? SM: And so it just happened that my father got this job. He . . . I don't think he knew anything about the garment business. Well, you know, as far as I know. I don't know what his father was. I don't know that. I do know that when he was younger, he was an itinerant cantor in Poland, and he used to go around and sing and do whatever services until, I think one time he told a story that he used to sleep in somebody's barn. One time at one place, and it was dark, and he lit a match, and he dropped it. The place burned. He ran like hell. It was another village and they never found him. GE: Right. When your father came to this country, how old was he about? SM: I'm guessing around 17ish. And oddly enough, as time went on, my father and his partner were running the business, and he ended up marrying my mother who was working for him. SC: Do you know what she did? SM: No, I don't know. I don't know. Thinking back, I can't remember her ever sewing much. I mean, she with a needle and thread, but we never had a machine at home. And I don't know what she did there, but he met her there and he married her. SC: So now we can get back to you a little bit more about you, unless you have any more questions. GE: No, no, that's good. SC: So how did you know . . .Can you talk a little bit more about where you went from that moment when you started the business, more of your personal life, what you did? Were you involved at all in the greater community or the Jewish community? GE: Or do we want to start . . .with what came after high school. He only told us up to high school for yourself. SC: Yeah. OK, so I should start there. Yes. Just go on with your life. SM: I graduated high school and my parents, the business, is moving out here. I had to go to college, so I applied to Lehigh and Muhlenberg, and I went to Muhlenberg. The first year I lived in the dorm because they hadn't moved out here physically, the home. My father came out with my brother-in-law and set up the business out here in the summer of 1949 or maybe in the spring. And then we didn't move out here until the fall of 1949. So he was a weekend husband for that period of time. I don't . . and he did go into business with Mort Miller's father. Mort Miller's father, Harry, owned the building out here. SC: Where was the building? SM: In Fountain Hill on Seneca Street. And I think it's now a home for elderly people, I think. Anyway, Harry had the building, and I think he had lots of machines, and he was making similar garments so they went into business. Ultimately, Harry had to get out because he had some kind of skin disease, and he ended up in El Paso 11 months out of the year. So so it ended up that the business was running in Fountain Hill. As for me, I know on your sheet you had something about what kind of work I did. I guess my first job must have been as every young boy, a waiter in the Catskills. I was a counselor at summer camp. I was a lifeguard when I was at Muhlenberg at the old Jewish Community Center, when it was on 6th Street. And then in my spare time or sometimes summers or what have you, I worked at the factory. And, of course, as a young guy who was young and strong, I did all the scutwork, you know, took out the garbage . . .And I think my most interesting job was I was working in the shipping room, and my first duty to the guy who ran the shipping was at two o'clock every day. I had to stop whatever I was doing, and listen to the radio, and get the results of the horse races that he was betting on, and then somehow getting the daily number. He was a gambler and that . . . I had to do that. I was . . . I took out the garbage. I loaded the trucks. And I did find out that for years I was unloading trucks. And I discovered now that I've done it all wrong because now they offload trucks. And all these years I was screwing up. Oh, am I suppposed to look . . . SC: That's why I moved over to try to get you to look over here. SM: OK. SC: Just because if we would use this, it's better to have . . . SM: You should have one of those red lights. SC: So that's fascinating. SM: So I went to Muhlenberg and worked in summers either as a counselor or at the factory. And then I was drafted. SC: What did you major in at Muhlenberg? SM: In economics . . . economics and accounting. And it really wasn't much of a course somehow or other. I found that it really didn't, in retrospect, it didn't do much good except for the accounting. The Money and Banking and Corporation Finance. And I think I did very poorly in one of them because I discovered the Municipal Opera Company here in town. Did you ever see any of their shows? I guess I was a junior at Muhlenberg, and I discovered the opera company. I tried out and I ended up in some of their shows, and I loved it so much I didn't do anything except for the rehearsal. It was it was really a treat. Anyway, I was in the Army, they sent me to Korea. GE: That's about what year . . . 1952? SM: 1953 -- 22 months and 27 days later, I got out. I was in Korea and then I was in Hawaii. SC: What was your position in the services? SM: Finance, fortunately. I was told by a friend of a friend who was working in personnel at the time that if you want to get into Army finance, which is the cushiest job you can find, don't tell them that you were an accounting major. I said why not? He says, because then the army feels that they have to unteach you regular accounting and teach you the army way. There is the right way, the wrong way, and the army way. And they feel that if you had accounting knowledge before, it's really going to be a mess. So he says, tell them you were an economics major, which I told them, and I got into finance, which was lucky. I stayed out of trouble. So I was in Korea for about nine months. And then they sent the entire division to Hawaii to go back to Schofield Barracks. And I was there for about nine months. And I got out. When I got out, I started working and started learning. I think one of the . . . as I mentioned before, how well we got along. It wasn't a problem where you might hear that if you want to put in a new machine, the older gentleman like the father, oh, no, no, we can't do that or not. Not with my father took just a little explaining. The first thing we put in, I think, was a conveyor belt because we had a machine that would put the garments in plastic bags that we used to put them in boxes and have to pick the boxes up. Conveyor belt . . so at first he said, no, no, we don't need a conveyor belt. We can use boxes. But once we put it in, I remember he used to stand there and smoke a cigar and watch the conveyor belt and the garments go up. It was wonderful. We got along extremely well, extremely. SC: And this was you and your father . . . SM: and my brother-in-law, and we all got along extremely well. Ultimately, when my father died, it was my brother in law and I and my father's partner who was still alive, and his son. Ultimately, my father's partner died. So it was the one, the son in New York, and Walter and I in Pennsylvania. And and we we ran, we were, I think, in business for maybe seventy seven years. GE: Yeah. Wow. SM: Long time. GE: Yeah. Wow. Seventy seven years. SM: I think it was seventy seven years. SC: How did you meet your wife? SM: Blind date -- Cedar Crest. She was . . . strange. She had gone to some party in Philadelphia with some guy from Lehigh and one of my friends from Muhlenberg. Well, his sister was at this party. You probably know her-- Sheva Rapaport. Remember Sheva Rapoport? She was a periodontist. You know, the judge Arnold Rappoport, he is a federal judge. Well, anyway, anyway, Sheva was at this party, and she told her brother, my friend, there's this nice girl for you. He called her, didn't work out. Picked up the phone, he called me, and he says, there's this girl she's just right for you. So I went over to Cedar Crest, and I met her, and I asked her out. And she told me the first thing she said to her roommate after our little parlor date, she says, if I ever go out with him again, I'm going to have to change the way he dresses. So we met in October. We were married in June. SC: What year was that? SM: Nineteen . . . met in fifty seven. And we were married in June, fifty eight. So this June will be fifty six years. At this point, she doesn't speak, she doesn't understand, she doesn't walk, she doesn't do anything but she still smiles. I can get her to smile. She still knows who I am. I go up there and feed her every day and get her to laugh. She doesn't laugh-- you know the voice doesn't work, but still . . .but she still smiles, laughs. And I think she still recognizes my children. The miracle of cell phones. This has the Facetime on it, and I hold it up for her and she sees any one of the kids and they sing to her or they talk to her and . . . it works out. It works out. I sing to her and that's. SC: Can you tell us about your children? SM: My children. I have my oldest daughter, who was born in nineteen sixty, who is currently not married. She's living in Florida with a wonderful, wonderful guy and she's a travel agent. His occupation, which is sort of unusual. You've heard of concierge medicine. GE: Yes. SM: But he's selling it, he's getting doctors to go into concierge medicine. He's establishing their practices as concierge doctors. It's really interesting. My number two daughter was born in [19]62 and she is now director of marketing for the United States and Canada for a software company that specializes in software design for anybody fooling around with real estate. For example, Hanes underwear ; they've got facilities all over the place. That was one of them. Not Seventh Day Adventists. What's the other one? Ones with Kingdom Halls? SC: Jehovah Witnesses. SM: That's it, they just signed Jehovah's Witnesses. They must have thousands of establishments, and you need this software so that you can know when to pay the taxes. If you own apartments, it's perfect. Your percentage of rentals of occupancy will. So it's all to do with with real estate as opposed to some who will have for medical or dental or something. And so my third daughter is she's a lawyer, but she isn't practicing. She's currently doing voices for Doc McStuffins and on television and Henry Hugglemonster and Clifford and what else. Wow! Wow! Wubbzy and she did all that. She was on on NBC for six years with Nell Carter back in the 80s. So she had, she had a nice a nice career, and then she went to law school, and she didn't like practicing law. Just just didn't like it. She went back back to California and having her her fun. SC: Did any of them have any interest in the business? SM: No, no. My oldest daughter, she went down to Florida with her boyfriend, which didn't last, and then she ended up staying there because she started working and going to school, and her grandparents lived there. So she, she had no interest. My second daughter and she had none . . . none of them had any interest. Of course, they all ended up working there during summers. And I must have employed half of the young people in Allentown beside my kids. We always need people in the summer. Alan Silverman, his son. Max Davison's boy . . . any of the friends of my daughters, you know, worked in the shipping room or in our testing lab. And so we employed a lot of the young boys around here. And we also clothed most of the babies in Allentown, our contemporaries. Somebody had a baby, they need a layette. SC: Were you and your wife active in the greater community and the Jewish community? SM: My wife was active in ORT. GE: What's your wife's name? SM: Lois. She was active in ORT, especially when it first came to town. Is it still active? Is it still around? GE: Not really. SM: OK, well, it used to be. And she was president at one time. And this was all her contemporaries at that time, all the young women of the time. Other than that, she didn't get involved in the Jewish community at all. She ended up spending about six years with my youngest daughter when she was doing television. They were spending time in Hollywood, in Los Angeles --for seven, eight, nine months. I was home. Sometimes with no daughters, sometimes with one daughter who was going to Rider for a while. And so all I had was a cat and a dog. So she didn't do much with the Jewish community. Quite honestly. I guess I really, I think, wasn't active in the community center and I wasn't active at Temple Bethel. I did sing in their choir for about forty some odd years. So I guess that was my contribution. Other than that, that wasn't my thing. SC: Were you active in the business community, in the garment industry's trades? SM: Well, we did belong to the . . there was an organization that was founded for needle trades with the Atlantic, something or other . . . I don't remember what it was. We used to go to the meetings and have the discussions and so on. But no, I wasn't that guy. I didn't do that. SC: Was that Arnold Delin's? SM: Yes, there you go, there you go. I found that I had certain problems. I think when I first came to town, when I was married, they started with a be in the Jewish Federation or something and here is some people to call for contributions. I could not, I could not do it. It wasn't me. And I kept putting it off. But gradually I'm not going to do this. And I just didn't get involved in the building fund for the synagogue or the community center. It just wasn't my cup of tea. SC: You have to be true to yourself. SM: So my recreation was singing in the choir, and I did a lot of theater in town. And that was my thing. SC: Where did you live in Allentown after you came with your parents and all the way through? SM: You know where Alton Park is? You go down 24th Street, you remember there was a covered bridge, SC: Yes. SM: All right, and go up further. And before you get to Lehigh Street, it's off to the right a little bit.The block we lived on was a block that was two blocks long. I had a real nice house. After you you come from New York where you live in a semi-detached house with grass about the size of that hassock and no property. We had this house with an adjacent lot and a big, big house, I mean, big compared to what we lived in. And it was planted trees, I planted all the shrubs, it was wonderful. I never had such a good time. I love mowing the lawn. We had a power mower then. Power mowers were sort of new at that time. And and my father loved to love to put a cigar in his mouth.And he cut the property, and he loved it. And we could look out the front door, from before there were a lot of buildings, and you could see, well, they were not mountains, you know hills in Emaus. But you could you could see green green hills. For him after living in New York and for me, it was a treat. Then they continued to live there, and after Lois and I got married, we lived one block away at Tremont Apartments. And from there we moved, we built a house on South Glenwood Street, within spitting distance of the Swain school. And my kids went to Swain school while we were there. And then when we had our third child, we needed more room. So we built here and we've been here for forty six years. I was the first one on the block. So we've been here, raised our kids here. SC: Okay, It's going to stop now. SM: I also have -it's a toy- not a toy - this is my father's original cutting machine, you've seen factories with the cutting machines that are electric. SC: Yes. GE: Yes. SM: Ibis is his cutting machine, it's still as sharp as can be, and the way it worked is, they had a table with a slot cut in it and the slot was shielded by metal so you couldn't cut the wood and you ran this up and down up and down in the slot and you moved the fabric around. To cut out an arm hole you'd just keep going and you'd move this around. And his handwriting says 1918, on here. SC: I think cutting with a really good pair of scissors was much easier for me when I used to sew. I would have killed myself on something like that. SM: I have one other piece of equipment downstairs, I'm not going to get it ; it's too heavy. It's a pinking machine. GE: And what is a Pinking machine? SM: You know what pinking is, when you edge the cloth with little jagged edges so it doesn't fray as easily. GE: Oh, okay. SM: Back then they used belly bands for newborns to hold in the umbilical cord, and my father manufactured belly bauds big strips of cloth and they ran it through the pinking machine so that it had an edge and would sell belly bands. You put it around the child with a safety pin, and stick the child and the child gets an infection- you know, that was part of the problem back then. SC: Although they are going back evidently- one of my friend's daughters just had a baby and they are going back to bands and contraptions to hold the belly in and push the uterus in so it goes back. GE: For the woman... SC: Right, not for the baby. GE: Interesting, I never heard of that. SM: Matter of fact, my oldest sister, when she was an infant, I don't know how it happened but she was stuck with a pin, and she ended up with this serious infection, which she ultimately got over. And my father was so angry about using pins that he created,- it didn't go anywhere- he created - back then they called it the pinless diaper. And he had the diaper and it had ties as I recall it, where you would be able to tie it onto the child as snugly as possible. I still have a diaper downstairs somewhere. And he patented it, but it went nowhere GE: Right. If only he'd tweaked it a little bit to become the disposable diaper or... SC: Yeah, or tabs or snaps. SM: Well, or Velcro. SC: Or Velcro, yeah, oh my gosh. SC: Today is June 17 2014. Interview with Stan Miller. SM: So are we talking about the um? GE: So my recollection is, we were talking about the business, and if you wanted to maybe start by saying a little bit how you see your manufacturers, compared to maybe, the other businesses or contractors. · SM: We manufactured as opposed to most of the people in the needle trades here in town. As big as they were, they were contractors. There's nothing wrong with that, their product strictly was labor. They supplied the labor and the thread, and paid the rent, and all they did was take in the fabric. Sometimes they cut it, sometimes it came in already cut. They sewed it up, according to specifications, finished it, packaged it, whatever and sent it back to whoever was handling it. And that's all they had to do, so their job basically was pay the labor and they took care of um, - they had unions, paid the rent, and so on. And that's it. As opposed to our operation which I guess you could call to some extent, vertical. We didn't make the fabric but we had to design the garments, fit them into certain price ranges and then purchase the fabric with contracts and what not. And have the fabric, cut it, sometimes you'd cut it to order. Sometimes you'd cut if for spec. or you'd cut five hundred dozen to order and you'd cut another two hundred dozen for spec. and we then had to pay for the fabric, pay for the labor and the overhead, pay for the buttons and the bows, and the zippers and whatever else goes on it, and then sell it. And that sometimes is harder or easier depending- you may sell it easier if you have the order and you cut it to order. Otherwise you have stock, and you have to carry the stock then once you sell it you wait for your money, not like a contractor who invariably gets their money within a very short time. Labor is the first thing you pay, so that meant we had to have working capital. A lot of working capital. More than the regular contractor, because he could turn his money over in a couple of weeks, whereas we- quite a few months. And then of course you would sell it to a K-mart or a Sears. Or a Hess, and now you have to wait for your money. GE: Right, and you typically were paid from then, after it was sold, or after the season. SM: Oh yeah, after they received it, after they received it, they paid whatever the terms were. At thirty, or discount, whatever terms were agreed upon. And prior to getting the money we had to have enough cash to pay for the fabric, pay for the labor, pay for the trimmings, pay for overhead, and wait. GE: Right. GE: What do you see as being the advantages of your operation? You already told us a little bit about the advantages of theirs, but especially of yours, - in other words, what do you see as being the strengths or advantages of your operation, being vertically integrated? SM: Well, I suppose there are more opportunities, maybe to make more money because you're marking up everything but on the other hand you've got interest, and... GE: More risks. SM: Risk, and worry, ah, that was the business that we had. GE: And, if I'm understanding correctly somewhat, that's just the way your father had started it, and therefore you continued. SM: Yeah. GE: Okay, as opposed to a strategic decision saying this would be the best way. SM: We could have, toward the end we stopped manufacturing, the last year or so, and we were contractors. Because we weren't selling our goods anymore. And then of course, to sell the goods, you had competition. You had competition from some of the bigger manufacturers down south who had bigger names, bigger plants, they were able to get desirable licenses, Superman licenses, as opposed to some cartoon character that wasn't very popular. We had major league baseball, we did very well with that. We had striped fabric and we would put on a screen- a decal- made that to order.- but others had more desirable -whatever was popular at the time- I think it was Mickey Mouse, and we couldn't compete with these people. And these people were making it in the Caribbean, where it was so much cheaper so that's why we went out of business, we just couldn't compete. Have desirable licenses, the garment that we would sell for fifty dollars a dozen, they'd be selling it for forty because it cost them less. GE: Right. SM: And it was nicer than ours because they had the nicer cartoon character on it. There was no competing with them. GE: After a while they just- right. SM: We lost out in the early nineties, because we just couldn't compete with the Caribbean. GE: And so you were in business until around-? SM: 1994. GE: Okay, so prior to that, through the eighties you were still- SM: We were perking along, we did very well, and were very happy. I raised three children, my brother in law raised two, my partners raised three. I mean -we did very well and were very comfortable. Compared to some of the other people in town we weren't as successful. Some of the people in town they made a lot of money whether they were contractors, or manufacturers, there were a few manufacturers and it was a good business back then, and we all did reasonably well. We worked hard, I was there six days a week, and we ran a night shift, and that was me. -Just, never got home- that was... I was young, so I could do it. GE: Right, great, can you tell me a little bit about, the sales and marketing end that was done, in other words, one thing I'm curious- is, was it your own sales force or did you have sales reps, and then also about the brand, did you - you told us about licensing, but was there anything where you- where you had- your brand became known to the public? SM: We had our own sales force. It was headed by my partner who was the son of my father's partner. And he had helped in the office- we had an office in New York. On 34th Street, we were right in the district. And we had some salesmen on the road. Some reps for us, they may have been carrying other things, I don't know, but, um we had a guy in Pittsburgh, another guy down South and so on. We had our brand, it was Style by Nielsen, it was the brand. I can't remember some of the other competing brands but that was our name, but what was required quite often was to put the big retailers tag in there. So garments that were made for JC Penney didn't have anything about Nielsen. We had JC Penny's label in there ; we put in labels from Montgomery Ward, um, who else did we put labels for? I don't recall. GE: Sears, probably SM: Well yeah, and we put the hang tags on, and um, what was I thinking of? Well, that thought just went by me - so we did for them, - and we also ended up pre pricing them, that was the beginning of the UPC whatever you call those. GE: Yes, UPC codes. SM: Well we had to get pinning machines. We used to pin it on the garment and pre-priced everything, or else pre price them with stickers. If the garment was in a plastic bag, sometimes put the sticker on the front of them. See, you did almost everything. GE: Right. SM: So our brand, it was just a brand, it was known, matter of fact, many years ago I ran into someone that I knew in the army, when I was in Hawaii and hadn't seen this person for many many years since then. And we're talking about our lives and she told me that when her kids were little she remembers going into the store and buying garments made by Nielsen. Little did she know that-- GE: So therefore it was even known by the public, in other words people at smaller stores - SM: Yeah, oh yeah, we sold to Hess and we sold to the big chains, Walmart, and over the years, it was some of the smaller department store chains, there was- I can't even remember the names any more, in fact, they probably don't exist! And to specialty shops, and we did, I don't remember the numbers anymore, did we do one or two million dollars a year back then in volume, I don't remember. But we did very well over the years and were very happy. GE: Right, besides obviously the main way that you sold and communicated was that you had this sales force, besides that, was there any kind of advertising that was involved? SM: No. We didn't really advertise, it was to sell the stuff was really the contact between our salesmen with the samples, the sample lines. GE: Okay and the buyers in the stores. SM: And their contacts, the buyers, or if they went on the road and stopped in different places or the buyers came into the showroom. Usually the big companies would come to New York, but some of the others, for example K-mart I think was in Royal Oak, Michigan, their headquarters, we used to send people out there. And Montgomery Ward they either came to New York, might have been in Chicago. SC: Might have been SM: So it was -you- went where- advertising was absolutely nothing - GE: Was absolutely- SM: We didn't do a thing with it, it wasn't necessary, the people that we were working with were buying the garment. They knew us, or they got to know us, and advertising just wasn't in the cards. It's a good thing, it would have been more aggravating. GE: Was there any other- can you think of any other questions in regards to the... SC: The business. GE: And then I will have you share with us, a little bit about the demise, a little bit about the last few years. SC: I was just thinking, with the vertical integration you always think of vertical integration as highly capitalized industries, but it was possible in the garment industry, not to be like the old Lowell [mills] factories that were totally vertically integrated- you could get in and out fairly quickly, even though you had to have more capital and contractors. SM: Yeah, well we were I guess the true vertical integration is starting from... SC: Raw material. SM: Raw materials to sales. We skipped the raw materials. We did not make the fabric, we didn't knit it, we purchased the fabric. From then on, GE: You were vertically integrated. SM: It was a vertical operation because we did the styling, and the creating the samples, the pricing the whole business, the stocking, the billing, getting printed, the whole thing and as you said, you needed capital for that, so you needed good relations with the bank, or with whatever bank you're going to deal with. SC: I've heard that Philadelphia was, had many places that were vertically integrated but out here, where there are a lot of, in the Allentown, Lehigh Valley area-- SM: I'll tell you, one that I know of was Sondra Manufacturing, the Kaplans. Do you know them? GE: Tell me- say their names. SM: Stanley Kaplan, Morris Kaplan was the father. GE: Are any of them still here? SM: Yeah. GE: Is that the name? SC: We should talk to them SM: Stanley well, the Kaplan's had- GE: That name is familiar, Stan Kaplan, but I don't think we've... SM: Stan and Elaine Kaplan, they were doing real estate after a while. GE: And they still live here? SM: Yeah, but I think they are going to be staying in Florida but I think they are in town this summer. They live down toward Emmaus somewhere. GE: And they were all- what was the name, Sondra? SM: Sondra, S-0-N-D-R-A. It was a family. They were very similar to ours really, their father had a partner in New York, they had two daughters and a son, both sons in law were in the business, the son was in the business, they I think were more vertical. I think they knitted the fabric. SC: Okay. SM: And then they manufactured it, I do believe. I'm not sure, I'm trying to think, was there anybody else in town. GE: The other manufacturers, am I correct that the main place where they deviated from you was that many of them outsourced the sewing? You know, that was what the contractors did. But otherwise the other pieces that you're talking about they did as well, is that correct? SM: I don't follow you GE: I guess in other words, I guess all I'm saying is most of the clothes manufacturers. SM: Here in town? GE: Or in New York, they in a sense, did just as you did, where from fabric to the sales, the only thing that many of them did is many of them outsourced the sewing. SM: Yeah, so the companies-there were companies that owned nothing, they.would sell - some enterprising people-they would manage to sell a big batch of stuff, and they would buy the fabric, and they'd ship it to a contractor and the contractor would sew it up, and would ship it out to the customer for them. GE: Ok, so in other words, all they did was take care of the sale in a sense? SM: The sales, and getting hold of the fabric. And they didn't actually make the fabric, they bought the fabric, but there were other places that bought or made the fabric and- GE: Right, so you're saying it varied a lot. SM: Oh yeah, and there were- in order to capitalize, if you couldn't get your credit from the bank, they had what they call factors, you know about them? GE: You know what? Why don't you tell us, I've heard the term, and I know a little bit about them. SM: We never used the factor but he would sell your goods, and send the bill to him. He would pay it, less a percentage, and he would handle the accounts receivable. And he'd collect it, it's his problem. Of course, he would have to approve of the people you sell it to. GE: Right. So he took care of that part. SM: Right there you have another partner but that could work, because he's the one who's getting you the capital. GE: Right. SM: To buy the fabric, and do everything else. GE: And take care of the headache with the accounts receivable. SM: Oh yeah, that's a big headache, I have to tell you one story. GE: Sure. SM: When we bought our new building, GE: And this was about when? SM: This was in the 70's, and at the time, the building was certainly worth the price. It was a great deal for a bank for a mortgage. For whatever reason, I don't remember, there was no mortgage money around. I guess banks have certain amounts in their portfolios that they could put into mortgages and whatnot there was none, and we were just dying. We were trying every bank in town, they would say, normally we would take a baseball bat and keep you here to make the deal, but they had no money. And we had a French poodle at the time, and the French poodle had an accident in the bedroom. And I got up at night, not knowing, go to the bathroom, and I stepped in it. Which is sort of, you know, well, funny experience, I told my mother, the next day I told my mother this, and she said, you're going to get your mortgage, and I said why, and she says, it's an old tale, that if you step in shit, something good is going to happen to you. Don't you think, the next day-- GE: Your mother was right! SM: We got a call that they- I think it was union bank at the time -was going to take the mortgage. SC: That's funny. SM: It was just amazing. GE: Was that the time that you told us that you bought the building, I think from Finkelstein? SM: Yes. GE: Okay. SM: Yeah, that was in the earlier seventies. And then shortly after that, in '76, '77 we had this Tris fiasco and you'll read it in there. One of the unique things about it, is the consumer products safety commission was comparatively new, and well, they had an axe to grind. Well they went ahead and issued this ban, but the ban was illegal. The ban was illegal because they were supposed to give the people involved their day in court. To say, hey wait a minute, you can't ban this because.... or the tests were wrong... they just-- it was a unilateral thing. Ultimately, it went to the Supreme Court, and the ban was declared illegal, but the damage was done. Once they declared the ban, all the stores -- sell all the stuff back! And if they had paid for the merchandise, we had to repay them. If they hadn't paid for the merchandise, the account receivable was no good. So- but the ban was illegal. GE: How was that fought? Is there an association, or lobby? SM: We had no lobby, what we did, we had a very very strong advocate, I don't think you'll know the name, Louis Nizer was a very prominent lawyer in New York, who happened to be a relation to my partner, and Louis Nizer sent one of these amicus something, friend to the court. GE: Amicus brief or something, SM: And there were some other prominent attorneys that were hired and that was. GE: Was that fought by your firm, or by a consortium? SM: Well sort of a consortium. GE: Of all the ones affected... SM: Mostly the bigger ones but, we were all involved, we went to Washington D.C. and, I was really pleasantly surprised how accessible, I don't mean by graft, but how accessible a lot of the representatives and congressmen were in dealing with this thing, because they knew it was a fiasco, and they all wanted to, and tried to do something. And ultimately a bill was passed in Congress so that those affected could get a loan to help get back on your feet. And-in that little article I gave you- once you made a claim of X number of dollars they had to come and audit your books, to make sure that the claim was kosher. And we had the FBI -the FBI came in! With their guns, they had to go through all the records to see whether we qualified. And then the tough part was- of course, we had no money, but if they would grant you a loan, you had to pay income tax on it. Hah, and we had no money to pay income tax for it, it was a horrible situation, we couldn't take the money, because we'd have to pay back too much money, which we didn't have. We'd have to borrow money to pay back-to pay the income tax. It was -there would be nothing left. It was really freaky, the loan that we did end up getting was from the SBA, where you really had to dance and sing and do everything else for them before you would get the loan they say this. SC: I'm sorry, what year was this about? SM: That was about, in the later seventies. GE: And about how many years did it take your company to recoup from all of this? SM: I would say about 3 or 4 or 5 years. But we never really got out of the mess because we were always, we never had enough working capital- it was always difficult, so that if we wanted to expand again, we couldn't we just had enough working capital to operate, we wanted to buy new machines, something fancy with computers and what not back then, oh that was a big thing, we couldn't do it. So we were at a certain level that we just couldn't get out of. SC: And may I- I just wanted to comment that in the early 70's when you first started, when it was hard to get money, of course that was moving into the time of stack inflation when prices were high and - GE: And growth was low. SC: Yeah, and then interest rates were high and then in the late 70's and you would be moving into the recession of the early 81' recession. SM: Yeah we ended up going through all the cycles. GE: Right. SC: It makes so much sense, history works. GE: Right, although the cycles I would think because it pajamas, you probably don't feel the cycles as much as, you just have to do a little bit cheaper maybe, items: SM: Yes, there were ways to make things fit into a price range. GE: Right, but I think in general. SM: You make the garment a little smaller. There were really no standards. SC: Yes, I always thought that. SM: You thought there were standards? SC: Those garments were getting a little smaller. At times and they were-- SM: You thought you were gaining weight, or you were getting tall right? SC: No, I never thought I was getting tall SM: There were really no standards, some of the buyers, some of the bigger companies would say that this is -make the garment according to this, that the inseam has to be this long, and the out seam has to be this long and you had to make it to their specs, well that's fine but otherwise you could make the bathrobe an inch shorter and when you start adding up all these inches, all of a sudden the piece doesn't cost ten dollars a dozen it only cost nine dollars a dozen. Or make it a little bit- the pants leg, not quite as full, make it a little bit narrower, make the pants a little bit shorter, the sleeves a little bit shorter. The chest measurement is a little bit less- and nobody knows the difference. They'll put it on and oh, this is a size 4 it doesn't fit my child, well oh, I've got a big child. They don't blame it on the garment, they don't. Whoa, my child is growing so big, so tall, that was done all the time. There was nothing that was really standard unless a customer insisted. But to a place like Hess's or any other department store chains they bought what you gave them, not so with Montgomery Ward, I remember they had very stringent standards. GE: Right, interesting. SC: Yeah. SM: Fellow named Max Charcov. Max Charcov's daughter married Roland Sigal. Sigal had a building by Sacred Heart Hospital where he had dress shops. I don't remember the names of the dress shops but he was very successful. And he was very philanthropic. And Max, Max was a real old slovenly Jewish fella, and he would pedal machines. He would buy anybody's machine, sewing machine, for 50 bucks and would um,- he would fix them up, like a used car's fixed up. How would he fix them up, he'd take a rag, he dusted it off, had no idea whether the machine worked. But it's like new, he said. And he would then sell the machine for $100 or whatever. If you needed a used machine, Max had it. He never had a building, he had various garages around town where he would store the machines. He had a driver, because he couldn't drive anymore. He would run, he had the machines, and he had nothing on paper. He knew every machine that he had ; he had hundreds of machines. And they were all used and when it was time, you needed a machine, you call Charcov if you want to get a used machine. And sometimes he would buy our machines, and I remember he would come in and we would sell him 2 or 3 machines, and he would owe us three or four hundred dollars, and he would take his checkbook and he would give it to me. He says write out a check. He has no remittance- no um, check stubs, no check register, so I write out a check to August Nielsen for three hundred dollars. I give it to Max to sign, and I take the check and that's good. I don't know who kept his books. I don't know if he ever paid income tax but he was a guy that- he was a fixture in the business. SC: Ha-ha oh, I have a-this is tape number 2- on June 17 2014 and we're interviewing Stan Miller, but I have a question- there was another question I had, how did you choose the name of Nielsen? SM: We didn't. SC: Oh it was. SM: That was the gentleman that my father went to work for in the early 1890s or early 1900s. His name was August F Nielsen. And they ultimately made the company incorporated, and I don't remember the terms. But I know that my father took over the business either because his wife was sick, and he was going to die, and they would support the wife until she died, or some kind of arrangement like that. They would pay him off or pay him in some way. I don't remember [details] but it was an interesting setup. But that name was there and no point in changing it ; it was unique. SC: And I remember Louie Nizer's name and I don't know why. SM: You do? SC: Yes I do. I don't know why, whether I read it in the history book. SM: My Life in Court--he wrote some books. SC: Yeah, he wrote some books, that's what It was. SM: He wrote some books. He was very big, really a big-shot in law in New York. GE: Can you share with us a little bit, let's say the last ten years as it was beginning to a little ·bit unwind and slowdown for you SM: Well during that time we knew the handwriting was on the wall because we were having trouble competing with folks, the other big manufacturers who then they ended up switching and manufacturing their stuff not in their plants down south, but in the Caribbean. There was this plan 807-- it was some kind of bill or something where goods can be made in the Caribbean, that made Guatemala and Haiti and Dominican Republic come into the United States with no duty as long as a certain percentage of the cost of the garment was done in the United States. I don't know what the percentage was, but it was pretty small. So, goods were sent uncut down to the Caribbean, it was cut, it was sewn, everything was done to it and it was sent back to the United States, and maybe we put a plastic bag over the garment and put a hang tag on which amounted to the proper percentage of labor. Something ridiculous and their costs were -- I may have said this before--their costs were five dollars a day. They were paying five dollars a day and this was in the 90's and the late 80's where we were paying five dollars an hour. And that was good, plus vacations and blue cross and blue shield, and holidays and all this other garbage and taxes and unemployment. They were paying just five dollars a day and there's no way you can compete with that. Plus these-- our competitors-- had the better licenses, so we were making an inferior garment for lack of a better term, or a less desirable garment. GE: Right, less desired. SM: At a higher price! Doesn't work. So gradually, our sales decreased, and we were shopping around trying to sell, and then we were still manufacturing a little bit, and we were trying to do some contracting work. We did some contracting work, um, and it gradually wound down to the point where as years went on, and we kept paying our people, I remember Walter and I, we kept taking our salary was maybe about 15,000 a year or something. And it was ridiculous, we just kept cutting our salaries. Well you had to pay your secretaries and we would give up my secretary because-um, it gradually wound down and we knew it was happening. We just held on as long as we could and tried to at the end pay off everybody, as many people as we could. We still had the building that we ultimately sold to well, it was some person who made candles, and we went through the building one time after that, and I saw a lot of my people there and they were making candles in the building. GE: Well, that's good at least SM: Yeah. GE: Where was your building? SM: South Allentown on South Albert Street. We had the, there was a fire company there, Fairview Fire Company I think, it's about a block or so away and it was a lovely building. It was great for us, it was about 40,000 square feet or 50,000 something like that. GE: At its peak, how many employees did you have there? SM: At its peak we had maybe about 120 there. We had another factory in Allentown with another 40 or 50. So we had two. GE: Two hundred. Okay, and how about the other employees, like in the New York area I realize that's small. SM: Well we had my partner and a sales manager so to speak, they had no need for office help and they took care of the sales and managed the salesmen on the road, we had no real employees. GE: Other than that. SM: Of note, in New York, except the sales. force. You know, one guy can sell enough to keep 200 people working in someplace else. GE: Right. SM: Sales it's just a different ballgame. They can make a sale and they can provide us with enough work for three months. GE: When, as you said, you saw the handwriting on the wall. Is there any consideration to either also trying to use labor in the Caribbean or to make that move, or- SM: Oh yeah, we were approached quite often, I remember one was in Guatemala. They would provide the land, they'd build the building, they'd help finance the machines, the labor was cheap, there would be no taxes for I don't know, and I just, as for me, I just couldn't see myself leaving my wife and three kids and going there or taking them there, or being there for three months out of the year. It wasn't for me. In retrospect, I suppose there could have been a way to do that and then you could compete, and we might still be in business for all I know but doing that wasn't for me. GE: Right. SM: It scared me, I just couldn't do it. And my brother-in-law felt the same way. So, whereas a lot of the people from down in the south it was a little closer for them, they went for it. We couldn't do that. So we ended up, for a while, we did some contracting and just, that was an unhappy situation, when we were manufacturing, we were our own bosses, when you're contacting, somebody else is telling you what to do. And we were very unhappy about that. But it happened, it evolved, as many things do ; businesses don't stay in business forever. And we had a good run. It was 70 some odd years that we were. GE: Continuous in two generations? SM: Yeah, yeah. GE: Right, and so you closed the doors in around 1994, like you said. SM: Yeah and we started renting the building and um, but we couldn't keep the building. We had to unload it so we had it up for sale. I don't remember when it was sold, maybe a year or two later. And as for me, I filed for social security. I think I was 62, and I started working for the bank. And I knew a lot of the people there, and I knew some of the people who were hiring, and I started working for them. And I became, I guess, the oldest male bearded Jewish bank teller east of the Mississippi River. They had none like that. They had no men. SC: Ha-ha. SM: Think back! Who were the bank tellers? The girls who then became pregnant. They were all women, they never had a man, never had anybody my age, with a beard, so - and I worked part time, and it was good because it kept me a little busy, GE: Sure. SM: It gave me some pocket money, I was having fun with the people. I wasn't a normal bank teller. I would kid with them and ask them about their children. You joke with them about giving them change in 17 and 23 dollar bills, and I enjoyed it. GE: Good. SM: I really had fun. GE: Right. That's great. And how long did you do that? SM: And I spent 7 years there. GE: Right. SM: I had time to play golf and play tennis and so it was wonderful for me. I was there from seven years 94' to 2001. GE: And then you retired? SM: Then I retired, and I became a professional tennis player and golf player, and I was an actor. I did that and I had a good life ; it was the best job I had. Retirement, it was wonderful. GE: Right, you speak very highly of it. SM: Oh yeah, it was really, really, really, good. GE: Good. SC: Well I have a couple of other questions, and, first of all there was a question I had about where was your other factory, SM: Originally it was on Hamilton Street, 930 Hamilton Street. Do you remember Miller Furniture? SC: Ah you know what, the name is familiar. SM: It was on the south side, not Hess's side. It was a half a block away from Hess's. And Krupers Appliances was there. It was between 9th and l0th Streets, and we had an upstairs there, and we were operating that plant for a while, and then we lost the lease and then we found a place. You would know this building, it's on 7th and Tilghman Street. It was a bank on the comer, there was a bank there and then one place up was another building. I don't know what was there, um, it was an automobile showroom or whatever. Anyway we took the second floor and had to put in a fireproof stairway, and they had a ramp that we used when we moved in. I rented a golf cart because we had so much stuff to bring up and there was no elevator to get to the second floor but there was a ramp because it used to be a car dealer. And they would have the cars up on the second floor, and go down the ramp. In fact that was the place where many years ago I went to see my very first Edsel. It was a dealer that had the Edsels and I went with my cousins to look at it. I remember seeing the Edsel there so we had that place for a while and then as time went on we had to condense our operation. We had to close that, I don't remember when we closed it, it was sometime in the nineties where it just wasn't feasible anymore. So we were running two, and running night shifts sometimes. When the situation demanded it. That was our- SC: By the time you closed, how many workers, how many employees did you have at the end? SM: Oh well it started going down. GE: Right. SM: We must have had about 40 or 50 or 60 when we used to have over 100 because certain operations we didn't need. After a while we didn't need the cutting room, we were just getting the stuff in cut, and we just had to sew it. We gradually knocked it down. Even to the point when we were contracting we really didn't need our girl in the office to do the payroll anymore. We found it cheaper that we would send it out to I don't know... GE: ADP? SM: Yeah, one of those places. And they'd send the check. It would cost us less than paying the girl her salary and her Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and holidays. I mean we gave the girls, they had a salary and her Blue Cross and Blue Shield, and holidays. I mean we gave the girls, they had up to 14 holidays we were giving them ; they even got Yom Kippur off. Then they got their Easter, and their Good Friday and um, they had plenty of holidays, um what else could I tell you, not much else. SC: Okay, so my other question is what do you value most in life? SM: What do I value most in life? I suppose good health and the health of my family. I can't think of much else that's important and ultimately you die with a good name. Because they never caught me. GE: Right and as you say you checked it out on the internet. SM: Yeah there was nothing bad, although the NSA has been checking my computers. I never... GE: They're checking everybody's SC: That's the new democracy, we all get checked. SM: Well, you've got these crazies in the world. SC: Yeah I know, SM: You wonder, right now everybody says oh don't check me you're invading my privacy. As soon as we have another 9/11- why didn't you know about these people!? So there's no happy medium there. SC: And what makes you feel the most creative, artistic, I mean in the broadest sense of creative or maybe a sense of completion in your life? SM: In my life, other than being very proud of your three kids, me, I like to sing. So I was in the Temple choir for about forty years. We ended up, my family ended up somehow getting involved in theater, so besides my daughter, my wife became a manager and I was a theater um. I did shows at Cedar Crest, Muhlenberg, at Civic, and Pennsylvania Playhouse ; I did them all over in the [area]. SC: You acted? SM: Yeah, so I did that. I found we all agreed, this group that we-- this last group that we were with-- that one of the greatest joys in life, the biggest kick that we would get is to be in a room full of people and make them laugh. And that's what we were doing, we were doing murder mysteries. Believe me they were funny, and we were good, because we handled- it's a different procedure than being on a proscenium stage because on a proscenium stage there's an invisible wall between the actors and the audience. There's no ad-libbing to speak of, you do your thing, when you do dinner theater or murder mysteries. You are this close to them, and some of the people shoot off their mouths. You know they interrupt, and you have to know what to do, you can end up forgetting your lines, and you answer them back, sometimes you have to shut up, shut them up. One time we had somebody who wouldn't shut up, and one of the people in the show yelled over to a waiter do you have any tape? And he says, yeah, and she says give me the tape. And she went over and put duct tape on the guy's mouth. Of course he took it off, but he got the hint. Another time, when we were starting act 3, I was out there with one guy, and we had a little dialogue and he was supposed to answer but before he could somebody in the audience shouted something out. It was funny. It was really funny, everybody laughed. Well, you can't let him get away with it, so you hit him with something, and then he comes back with something, and before you know it well, everything's stopped, and I said to the guy with me, where did we stop? But, you can do these things in the dinner theater. He says I don't know, well let's start all over again. Excuse me. And my wife was involved, my daughter was involved, my other two daughters were involved. We all played the piano, they sang, they played the violin, this is what we did. That was our life. As a matter of fact, when we had this Tris fiasco where we really had no income at all, we couldn't take any income, we dropped out of Locust Valley and stopped doing things, going out for dinners. We ended up doing theater, that was our entertainment--theater. When we started Percy Brown's dinner theater in the 70's, we would have a show Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday night, and Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday we'd be rehearsing for the next show. GE: Wow. SM: And this was the whole family doing it. One daughter was dancing, another one was doing this, another one was playing the drums. Lois was assistant director, and doing the props and the makeup, and I was in the show. I think the first show I did myself and three other guys who were the male chorus and the reviewer called us led-footed hoofers with terminal melancholy. And he was right by the way, we were really bad. But I got to like it, I did pretty good, and that was my fun. Plus I did photography ; I've taken a lot of photographs, and that was my thing, that made me happy. SC: Thank you. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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01:24:44
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Stan Miller, May 22, 2014
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Stan Miller talks about how his father, a young immigrant, got started in manufacturing children’s pajamas in New York City, and later moved the production to Allentown. The sales office of the company remained in New York and was run by Stan’s father’s partner. When Stan and his family moved to Allentown, Stan was 17 years old and would soon start college. Stan attended Muhlenberg College, majoring in Accounting and Economics. After college and the service, Stan and his brother-in-law entered the family business. As did the son of Stan’s father’s partner. Stan is very proud that the business operated harmoniously among the partners during its more than seventy-five years in business. The firm closed in 1994, due to stiff competition from globalization.
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LVTNT-07
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2014-05-22
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
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Mort Miller
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5.4 June 25, 2014 Mort and Judy Miller, June 25, 2014 LVTNT-14 38:08 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Mort Miller Judy Miller Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 MillerMort_MillerJudy_20140625.mp4 1.0:|17(7)|34(9)|51(15)|68(15)|85(10)|104(15)|125(10)|144(5)|159(13)|176(11)|197(4)|220(5)|237(10)|252(12)|267(10)|280(10)|299(10)|312(11)|329(4)|346(14)|363(12)|384(5)|407(2)|426(18)|445(11)|458(6)|471(14)|494(7)|513(6)|526(9)|547(6)|570(10)|587(2)|604(17)|625(6)|650(2)|661(6)|670(7)|671(10) 0 https://youtu.be/x5z3Qfqn_Lk YouTube video 34 College Experiences MM: When I graduated from Allen High, I applied to four schools: Columbia, NYU, Penn, and Lehigh. I got into Columbia, NYU and Penn. I did not get into Lehigh because Lehigh in those days had a 2% quota. For every hundred students they took in, two were Jewish. I had an interview and they had my records 9th through 12th grade, and it listed the Hebrew Institute of Boro Park. The man who was interviewing me said, ‘Hebrew Institute of Boro Park, what kind of school is that?’ And I figured that’s it I’m not getting in. And I didn’t. I got into two Ivy League schools but did not get in there.
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 ; GE: And then if you could just recap for us, since we talked about it off tape, what you did as far as your educational career. 
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 ; MM: I started out as an accounting major. I was still an accounting major when I was drafted in the middle of my sophomore year. When I came back after the war, I stopped being an accounting major and became just a general economics major. I took liberal arts classes whenever I could. 0 201 1943-1945: Time in the Eighth Air Force MM: I was drafted in March of 1943 ; I had my basic training at Miami Beach. I was then sent to Finance School at Wake Forest College. I was then sent back to Saint Petersburg, Florida. Then I was sent overseas to a little town called Sudbury, which was north of London. I was there for almost two years then I came back to this country. The group that I was with, the war was over, but we were still fighting in Japan. My group was scheduled to be sent to the pacific. They gave us a thirty day leave and we came home. While I was on that thirty day leave, they dropped the atomic bomb and the war was over and three months later I was out of the army. I was in the Eighth Air Force in England. 0 263 The Family Business GE: So now, tell us about the business. So as you said, it was first started by your father and his brother, it sounds like. 
 ; 
 ; MM: It was started by my father. He then brought his brother from Poland to this country, and took him into the business immediately, and made him a partner. They remained together until 1943 or ‘44 and then they split up.
 ; 
 ; GE: By that time did the two of them pretty much retire?
 ; 
 ; MM: No. My uncle remained in business. My father did retire in 1945 but then he went back into business in 1947. 
 ; 
 ; GE: And now if you want to share with us about you and your brother-in-law.
 ; 
 ; MM: Yes. We were both working for my father, and my father then merged his business with a cousin in New York. And part of the agreement was when they merged the businesses, that there would be no children in the business. So my brother-in-law and I left, and we started our own business. 0 384 1948-1979: Millcrest Manufacturing GE: Tell us about what products. 
 ; 
 ; MM: We started out originally manufacturing panties and then we switched to ladies sleepwear. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Why did you make that switch?
 ; 
 ; MM: I think we just started manufacturing overseas and panties were not very labor intensive. But they began to manufacture them in the Caribbean and it was difficult to compete with that. On the other hand, sleepwear was being manufactured only in this country, and that we could compete with. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Were you a contractor or were you a manufacturer?
 ; 
 ; MM: We started out as contractors. We remained as contractors for a few years. 0 484 Sears, Cresty, Newberry, & ; JCPenny MM: We sold to many of the major chains. We sold to Sears, Kresge, Newberry, JCPenny, most of the major chains. And we also sold to many of the department stores around the country through buying offices. Our product was a low-end product. 
 ; 
 ; GE: What was the label? What was the brand?
 ; 
 ; MM: Well the label was Ardru Undergarments. A-R-D-R-U. That came from, my son was Andrew and my nephew was Sheppard. We took the last part of both of their names and made it Ardru. That was the name we sold uner.
 ; 
 ; GE: Was it exclusively under that name?
 ; 
 ; MM: The name of the company itself was Millcrest [Manufacturing].
 ; 
 ; GE: But the product, the brand was Ardru. Did you also do private labeling? Did you do store brands or everything was under Ardru?
 ; 
 ; MM: Everything was under Ardru. 0 740 Relationship to Unions GE: You said it was never unionized?
 ; 
 ; MM: For forty years they tried to unionize us, and they were never able to. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Why?
 ; 
 ; MM: We provided wages that were as good or better than union wages. We provided all the same benefits, and in some cases even better. We had complete healthcare. All of our employees were registered with Blue Cross/ Blue Shield. And they paid nothing toward that. We also had something that appealed to people. We did not have seniority. In the union shop, if you were a collar sewer, and they ran out of collars, you were sent home. In our shop, if you were a collar sewer, and we ran out of collars, we had you sewing sleeves. So we never sent anybody home and that appealed to many people. 0 855 Problems Between Partners GE: And how would you say the relationships were between you as the owner and the managers and the people working there?
 ; 
 ; MM: I think everything was really good. The only one I didn’t get along with was my brother-in-law. I ran the sewing. My brother-in-law took care primarily of the cutting of the fabric and the pattern making.
 ; 
 ; GE: So he took care of the first part?
 ; 
 ; MM: And then I did the sewing. 
 ; 
 ; GE: What were the difficulties?
 ; 
 ; MM: He was not an honest man. Had a sense of cheating. He was Syrian. He had this Arab mentality. He lied. He lied quite a bit. He misinformed. I didn’t particularly like him, and he didn’t particularly like me. 0 1102 1979-1989: Millcrest Contracting GE: Who was it that you became contractors for? Like were they ones in the area here?
 ; 
 ; MM: No, they were in New York. Our biggest was Katz up in Pennsylvania, and they were big manufacturers. They owned the factory in Coatesville that we bought from. We did a great deal of contracting for them.
 ; 
 ; GE: At this point did you still have both factories for them?
 ; 
 ; MM: No, we closed the Coatesville factory ; we had both of them up until right before I retired. That was one of the things I did every week or twice a week. I drove down to Coatsville and took care of things there. We closed that a few years before I retired. Also the other thing was that my two nephews, my brother-in-laws’ sons, came into the business and for a while one of the sons was managing the plant and living in Coatesville. The other one was working here with us. 0 1280 The Workforce MM: The largest part of the workforce were the Hungarian women. The Hungarians were native to Bethlehem. Then there was the Hungarian revolution where the Russians invaded Hungary, and a lot of Hungarians got out because they had family and friends in Bethlehem so they came to Bethlehem. A lot of them came to work for us. 
 ; 
 ; GE: Was it primarily women?
 ; 
 ; MM: Yes.
 ; 
 ; JM: There was a name.
 ; 
 ; SC: Windish.
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes.
 ; 
 ; GE: Was that the community?
 ; 
 ; SC: Yeah they came from Slovenia.
 ; 
 ; MM: The majority were Catholic. 0 1407 The End of Millcrest Contracting GE: Tell us about the ending of the business.
 ; 
 ; MM: The business had declined, I was 66 years old, and I’d decided that I had enough. I told my brother-in-law that I wanted out. One of the things we had done at that time was we had sold the building so I was no longer involved in that, just the business. I told him I wanted out, and he wanted to stay in the business because his sons were in it. So he bought me out at a fair price. 
 ; 
 ; GE: How long did his business continue?
 ; 
 ; MM: Well he stayed in business I think 3 or 4 years after that. The building was sold, and he at that point had to move out. He opened another factory, and he was there for about 3 years. And then he stopped as well. 0 1487 Mort's Employees Win the Lottery MM: An interesting thing, one day one of the women working there said I’m going out to buy lottery tickets, anyone want to contribute? Thirty-five women gave her a dollar a piece, and my nephew gave her a dollar. They won two million dollars. I think everyone who was in the pool got something like $65,000. Those days that was a fair amount of money. When they closed the business, the Morning Call ran an article about how they won the lottery and a year later they were closing. 0 1567 Impact of the Industry on Women GE: At this point, this was a very prominent industry in the area from around the 1930s to 1980 or so. How do you think the area has been affected by its life?
 ; 
 ; MM: Not that much in a sense that most of the work was through the women. There were very few men so the husbands were not really affected. I guess, the women who wanted to work were able to get jobs. One of the things about the industry was there was always a shortage of sewing machine operators. The other thing was that almost from the very beginning, coming back to the 1900s, the women who worked in sewing were primarily immigrants. By the time I got ready to retire and the industry started to close up here, the children were now second or third generation. They were going to school, going to college, they were able to do other things. And so that was dwindling as well. 0 1689 Judy Miller's "Hole in the Wall" Outlet Store SC: But, did you ever work with the business at all?
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes. When did I start that? I think Nancy was in high school. So in the 70s. And I had an outlet store, and it was called The Hole in the Wall. And it was a hole in the wall. 
 ; 
 ; SC: In the factory building?
 ; 
 ; JM: At the factory building, on the ground floor. It was a true outlet. I sold ribbons and lace and all leftover rolls from the lingerie business. I had ends of piece goods, rolls of piece goods. I froze in that building because it wasn’t heated. I had a space heater. I did have a telephone. I didn’t make a lot of money, and I was open only two days a week. I had a lot of customers. 0 1941 Volunteering in the Jewish Community SC: We didn’t talk about volunteering in the Jewish community. Did you do that?
 ; 
 ; JM: The blood bank was with the Jewish Community Center. I did flowers with Ida Kinberg at the synagogue for Oneg Shabbat. She was our across the street neighbor, and she did that, and I always helped her cut and do flowers. I did Hadassah. I can’t remember. . . . what you have done for me is... wow.
 ; 
 ; SC: It’s wonderful, isn’t it? To think of everything. 
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes. 0 1998 Judy's Values and Creative Inspirations SC: Okay, the two filmy questions that I always ask, “What do you value most?
 ; 
 ; JM: That I’ve been so lucky, and I’ve had a good life. I really do. I’m getting teary. I don’t usually cry easily.
 ; 
 ; SC: You’ll make us teary, too. The other is, what has made you feel the most artistic or creative?
 ; 
 ; JM: I guess flowers. I did have more of a garden before we moved here. We never talked about that at our house.
 ; 
 ; SC: Oh, tell us about your house. 0 2198 Donation to Cedar Crest College SC: So he has the mechanical skills, and you have the decorating?
 ; 
 ; JM: Well, he’s wiring. We had all kinds of wiring because we had HiFi. We had CDs. And Mort didn’t tell you, but we had 350 LPs that we gave to Cedar Crest College. 
 ; 
 ; SC: Oh, that’s nice.
 ; 
 ; JM: I wish we would’ve kept some vinyls.
 ; 
 ; SC: So you turned vinyls into CDs?
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes. First, they were cassettes. 0 MovingImage Mort Miller talks about growing up around his father’s contract sewing business. Later, Mort partnered with his brother-in-law to open their own contract sewing factory. Originally they made women’s underwear, later they switched to making women’s lingerie, which wasn’t as price competitive.
 ; 
 ; Interview with Mort and Judy Miller, June 25, 2014 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Today is June 25, 2014. Interview with Mort Miller, tape number 2. GAIL EISENBERG: Mort was just sharing with us a little bit about his college experience. Tell us again about your experience. MORT MILLER: When I graduated from Allen High, I applied to four schools: Columbia, NYU, Penn, and Lehigh. I got into Columbia, NYU and Penn. I did not get into Lehigh because Lehigh in those days had a 2% quota. For every hundred students they took in, two were Jewish. I had an interview and they had my records 9th through 12th grade, and it listed the Hebrew Institute of Boro Park. The man who was interviewing me said, 'Hebrew Institute of Boro Park, what kind of school is that?' And I figured that's it I'm not getting in. And I didn't. I got into two Ivy League schools but did not get in there. GE: And then if you could just recap for us, since we talked about it off tape, what you did as far as your educational career. MM: I started out as an accounting major. I was still an accounting major when I was drafted in the middle of my sophomore year. When I came back after the war, I stopped being an accounting major and became just a general economics major. I took liberal arts classes whenever I could. JUDY MILLER: How about the fraternity? GE: If you'd like to share with us that's fine. MM: I had belonged to two fraternities which is something no one did. The way that happened was the fraternity that I was in originally was suspended during the war, and when I came back they were closed. Then my best friend, who belonged to Kappa Nu, said 'come on join us.' So I went there and spent the rest of my time in Kappa Nu. So I was actually in two fraternities. GE: And tell us briefly about the war experience that you had just shared with us. MM: I was drafted in March of 1943 ; I had my basic training at Miami Beach. I was then sent to Finance School at Wake Forest College. I was then sent back to Saint Petersburg, Florida. Then I was sent overseas to a little town called Sudbury, which was north of London. I was there for almost two years then I came back to this country. The group that I was with, the war was over, but we were still fighting in Japan. My group was scheduled to be sent to the pacific. They gave us a thirty day leave and we came home. While I was on that thirty day leave, they dropped the atomic bomb and the war was over and three months later I was out of the army. I was in the Eighth Air Force in England. GE: So now, tell us about the business. So as you said, it was first started by your father and his brother, it sounds like. MM: It was started by my father. He then brought his brother from Poland to this country, and took him into the business immediately, and made him a partner. They remained together until 1943 or '44 and then they split up. GE: By that time did the two of them pretty much retire? MM: No. My uncle remained in business. My father did retire in 1945 but then he went back into business in 1947. GE: And now if you want to share with us about you and your brother-in-law. MM: Yes. We were both working for my father, and my father then merged his business with a cousin in New York. And part of the agreement was when they merged the businesses, that there would be no children in the business. So my brother-in-law and I left, and we started our own business. Subsequently, three of the partners' children wound up in business. Even though that was the initial condition. But we remained in the building we started in. A few of the people who came to work with us were people that had worked for my father. One of them in particular who worked for my father for many many years, she [Mary] became our floor lady. She was a great floor lady. GE: Tell us about what products. MM: We started out originally manufacturing panties and then we switched to ladies sleepwear. GE: Why did you make that switch? MM: I think we just started manufacturing overseas and panties were not very labor intensive. But they began to manufacture them in the Caribbean and it was difficult to compete with that. On the other hand, sleepwear was being manufactured only in this country, and that we could compete with. GE: Were you a contractor or were you a manufacturer? MM: We started out as contractors. We remained as contractors for a few years. We had a gentleman who sold for us in New York. He was an older man. He retired. So we took on a new salesperson. We had a New York office on Madison Avenue. And he took over the office and then asked to become a partner, which we accepted. He ran the sales out of New York. And so the manufacturing began. GE: So you were their exclusive supplier? MM: It was our business. We manufactured ladies sleepwear. We sold to many of the major chains. We sold to Sears, Kresge, Newberry, JCPenny, most of the major chains. And we also sold to many of the department stores around the country through buying offices. Our product was a low-end product. GE: What was the label? What was the brand? MM: Well the label was Ardru Undergarments. A-R-D-R-U. That came from, my son was Andrew and my nephew was Sheppard. We took the last part of both of their names and made it Ardru. That was the name we sold uner. GE: Was it exclusively under that name? MM: The name of the company itself was Millcrest [Manufacturing]. GE: But the product, the brand was Ardru. Did you also do private labeling? Did you do store brands or everything was under Ardru? MM: Everything was under Ardru. You know there was one store brand, it was Sears. I think Sears, JCPenny was its own name, Kresge was its own name. GE: So the ones that were its own name, you used the store name. Any difference in those products? Between Ardru and Penny or Ardru and Sears? MM: Sears we only made them one star. Just that same one year in and year out. Made of the same material, exactly the same garment. Huge, extra large. But yes they were different than we sold to other people. GE: So there, in these cases, the store specified. MM: In cases of major chains. For other stores, it was ours. To be honest, they were knockoffs of more expensive garments. GE: How was the relationship between your end, the operations end, and the sales end? Were there any conflicts? MM: No, we worked well together. GE: What was your brother-in-laws' name? MM: Charles Dweck. D-W-E-C-K JD: He's a Syrian Jew from Brooklyn. GE: So the two of you started in the business together in 1947? MM: '48. GE: Can you just give us a sense of how things went through the fifties, sixties? MM: Everything went well, it was smooth. At our peak, we put in Bethlehem about 125 people. We also put another factory in Coatesville. GE: Coatsville is where? MM: Coatesville is northwest of Philadelphia. 50 miles. Primarily west. GE: So more like Reading? MM: No, it's south of here and slightly west. SC: Close to Lancaster. MM: Yeah. We had almost about 175 people working there. GE: You said it was never unionized? MM: For forty years they tried to unionize us, and they were never able to. GE: Why? MM: We provided wages that were as good or better than union wages. We provided all the same benefits, and in some cases even better. We had complete healthcare. All of our employees were registered with Blue Cross/ Blue Shield. And they paid nothing toward that. We also had something that appealed to people. We did not have seniority. In the union shop, if you were a collar sewer, and they ran out of collars, you were sent home. In our shop, if you were a collar sewer, and we ran out of collars, we had you sewing sleeves. So we never sent anybody home and that appealed to many people. One of my operators, she and two sisters and a nephew and a niece worked for us. Her husband was the president of the Bethlehem Steel Union. And I used to say to her, Margaret, how does your husband feel about you working in a non-union shop. She said, Mort, we've talked about it, and he said, "Margaret, you like the people, you like the shop, they give you everything you would get at a union shop, stay there." So here I had this woman whose husband was the president of the Bethlehem Steel Union. GE: And how would you say the relationships were between you as the owner and the managers and the people working there? MM: I think everything was really good. The only one I didn't get along with was my brother-in-law. I ran the sewing. My brother-in-law took care primarily of the cutting of the fabric and the pattern making. GE: So he took care of the first part? MM: And then I did the sewing. GE: What were the difficulties? MM: He was not an honest man. Had a sense of cheating. He was Syrian. He had this Arab mentality. He lied. He lied quite a bit. He misinformed. I didn't particularly like him, and he didn't particularly like me. GE: How long did you two stay in business together? MM: We stayed in business for 40 years. I retired first. And the reason I retired was that offshore manufacturing had become big, and the business was going down. The man we had selling at the New York office, was 10 years older than I was. And he retired. And we closed the sales office and had no one to run the sales office. GE: When was that about? MM: That was the 1980s. GE: How old do you think he was when he retired? MM: My partner [New York]? He was exactly 65. GE: When were you born? MM: 1924. So he was born 1914. GE: So '79 he retired. MM: And we went for the next 10 years, until I retired, we were contractors. Except Sears. GE: Okay Sears was the one client you were able to keep. This is still pajamas? MM: Once we started contracting, we manufactured other things like blouses, t-shirts, almost anything. GE: And your women had the skills? MM: Yeah. GE: So the one customer you still managed was Sears but you became a contractor for others. Who was it that you became contractors for? Like were they ones in the area here? MM: No, they were in New York. Our biggest was Katz up in Pennsylvania, and they were big manufacturers. They owned the factory in Coatesville that we bought from. We did a great deal of contracting for them. GE: At this point did you still have both factories for them? MM: No, we closed the Coatesville factory ; we had both of them up until right before I retired. That was one of the things I did every week or twice a week. I drove down to Coatsville and took care of things there. We closed that a few years before I retired. Also the other thing was that my two nephews, my brother-in-laws' sons, came into the business and for a while one of the sons was managing the plant and living in Coatesville. The other one was working here with us. GE: When did they come into the business? Like in the '70s? MM: Probably the early '80s, I would imagine. GE: So when would you say were the best times? MM: Best times I think were the early '50s probably to the early '80s. GE: Okay so during that whole time it was still thriving? MM: Yes. GE: And then in the 80s was when you saw steady decline. MM: Yes. JD: Tell them about the workforce. MM: The largest part of the workforce were the Hungarian women. The Hungarians were native to Bethlehem. Then there was the Hungarian revolution where the Russians invaded Hungary, and a lot of Hungarians got out because they had family and friends in Bethlehem so they came to Bethlehem. A lot of them came to work for us. GE: Was it primarily women? MM: Yes. JD: There was a name. SC: Windish. JD: Yes. GE: Was that the community? SC: Yeah they came from Slovenia. MM: The majority were Catholic. SC: There were Windish Catholics and Windish Lutherans in Bethlehem ; there were two groups. MM: They gradually were replaced by Puerto Ricans and there were some Portuguese. GE: Was there anything done to accommodate the women, since many of them were moms? Anything that was often needed to accommodate them and the families or children's schedules? MM: If they had to take time off, I would certainly allow that. JD: One woman worked until the day before she had her baby. Helen Donovan. MM: We didn't really do anything special but if they needed something, we worked with them. GE: Tell us about the ending of the business. MM: The business had declined, I was 66 years old, and I'd decided that I had enough. I told my brother-in-law that I wanted out. One of the things we had done at that time was we had sold the building so I was no longer involved in that, just the business. I told him I wanted out, and he wanted to stay in the business because his sons were in it. So he bought me out at a fair price. GE: How long did his business continue? MM: Well he stayed in business I think 3 or 4 years after that. The building was sold, and he at that point had to move out. He opened another factory, and he was there for about 3 years. And then he stopped as well. GE: How about his children? MM: His one son left earlier and had jobs, I think he was living primarily in Connecticut. And the one son stayed with him until the day that he closed the business. An interesting thing, one day one of the women working there said I'm going out to buy lottery tickets, anyone want to contribute? Thirty-five women gave her a dollar a piece, and my nephew gave her a dollar. They won two million dollars. I think everyone who was in the pool got something like $65,000. Those days that was a fair amount of money. When they closed the business, the Morning Call ran an article about how they won the lottery and a year later they were closing. GE: When the business closed, how many people were still working there? MM: I'm guessing about 75. GE: Okay, and then just a couple of other more broad questions. At this point, this was a very prominent industry in the area from around the 1930s to 1980 or so. How do you think the area has been affected by its life? MM: Not that much in a sense that most of the work was through the women. There were very few men so the husbands were not really affected. I guess, the women who wanted to work were able to get jobs. One of the things about the industry was there was always a shortage of sewing machine operators. The other thing was that almost from the very beginning, coming back to the 1900s, the women who worked in sewing were primarily immigrants. By the time I got ready to retire and the industry started to close up here, the children were now second or third generation. They were going to school, going to college, they were able to do other things. And so that was dwindling as well. GE: So it was becoming even more acute, the shortage of operators. MM: Yes. I think the fact that there were no longer these kinds of jobs didn't affect the women of the area very much because they didn't want to do that. GE: Thank you. Interview with Judy Miller, June 25, 2014 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: So you were talking about your volunteer work. But, did you ever work with the business at all? JUDY MILLER: Yes. When did I start that? I think Nancy was in high school. So in the 70s. And I had an outlet store, and it was called The Hole in the Wall. And it was a hole in the wall. SC: In the factory building? JM: At the factory building, on the ground floor. It was a true outlet. I sold ribbons and lace and all leftover rolls from the lingerie business. I had ends of piece goods, rolls of piece goods. I froze in that building because it wasn't heated. I had a space heater. I did have a telephone. I didn't make a lot of money, and I was open only two days a week. I had a lot of customers. People would come in-- oh, he forgot to tell you, Mort was a contractor for Christian Dior-- I sold some of their leftover things. That was when I met the woman who had said she rode our elevator in the factory because her friend's father owned the silk mill, when it was a silk mill. Anyhow, I sold whatever our leftovers were. And somehow, my brother-in-law always managed to-- shrink the patterns. SC: Oh, we've heard that before. JM: As a matter of fact, our scrap went to the Sheftels ; they were our neighbors. GAIL EISENBERG: Right, that was his business. SC: It's wonderful how everything connects. If I could just interrupt for a second. I can't tell you how many families have said, "What do you value most? Family and a community." JM: Well, we were a close-knit community. Okay, back to my business, people would come in for laces because they were making confirmation dresses and wedding gowns. I would sell it by the yard and measure it out. It was so basic. Oh that's the other thing, my father-in-law was the king of repossessing doors, and the doors were the tables. SC: About what year did you start the outlet? JM: This says '86, but I think I must have started earlier. GE: You said your daughter was born in 1956, and you said you did it when she was in high school. So that would be '72, '73. JM: Yeah. SC: And that was the heyday of outlets, too. JM: Yes. GE: How long do you think you ran that business? JM: From when I started until Mort retired. It wasn't that much of a business, but it put me on the payroll. At the time, my sister-in-law, Charles' wife, his sister Shirley, was working in the office. We did have an office. That's about it for the factory. SC: You said you did volunteering. We didn't talk about volunteering in the Jewish community. Did you do that? JM: The blood bank was with the Jewish Community Center. I did flowers with Ida Kinberg at the synagogue for Oneg Shabbat. She was our across the street neighbor, and she did that, and I always helped her cut and do flowers. I did Hadassah. I can't remember. . . . what you have done for me is... wow. SC: It's wonderful, isn't it? To think of everything. JM: Yes. SC: Okay, the two filmy questions that I always ask, "What do you value most? JM: That I've been so lucky, and I've had a good life. I really do. I'm getting teary. I don't usually cry easily. SC: You'll make us teary, too. The other is, what has made you feel the most artistic or creative? JM: I guess flowers. I did have more of a garden before we moved here. We never talked about that at our house. SC: Oh, tell us about your house JM: Well, we were married in 1952, Christmas. We lived in the Highland Street Apartments at 22nd and Highland and Livingston. Andy was born there. Then we bought a lot, and he said we are going to build a house. And I said wonderful, we are going to build a split level because when I was a home service representative, I loved the split levels. I always lived in apartments, and Mort always lived in two-story houses. So this was our, we made a mistake, that we should have bought a ranch house so we wouldn't be here [living in an apartment] because I decided that we would move before we needed to. We could still be in the house, we are both fine. GE: So where was your house? JM: Right around the corner from here. 3030 Tremont Street. On the corner of Marshal and Tremont St. GE: You moved there in '55? JM: No, '54. We built the house because I knew everything. I was a home economics major and it ended up that I had to redesign my kitchen too, but that was okay. SC: Because kitchens change so much. JM: No, it wasn't that. I was getting electric shocks from my refrigerator because where I had it was at right angles to the stove, I mean the sink, and when I did something, I think. I don't remember how long after we did it. SC: It's always nice to redo a kitchen. JM: Yeah, we are lucky. 46 years we had the house. SC: So he has the mechanical skills, and you have the decorating? JM: Well, he's wiring. We had all kinds of wiring because we had HiFi. We had CDs. And Mort didn't tell you, but we had 350 LPs that we gave to Cedar Crest College. SC: Oh, that's nice. JM: I wish we would've kept some vinyls. SC: So you turned vinyls into CDs? JM: Yes. First, they were cassettes. SC: This was beautiful - thank you so much. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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Mort and Judy Miller, June 25, 2014
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Mort Miller talks about growing up around his father’s contract sewing business. Later, Mort partnered with his brother-in-law to open their own contract sewing factory. Originally they made women’s underwear, later they switched to making women’s lingerie, which wasn’t as price competitive.
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2014-05-25
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
Oral History
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
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Mort Miller
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5.4 May 31, 2016 Mort Miller, May 31, 2016 LVTNT-25 19:42 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Mort Miller Judy Miller Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 MillerMort_20160531 1.0:|21(2)|40(3)|55(12)|80(7)|101(7)|124(9)|149(14)|166(16)|187(2)|210(4)|233(8)|260(8)|285(10)|304(9)|327(12)|348(15)|365(8)|378(10)|399(10)|412(7) 0 https://youtu.be/rLHvGqO_Ork YouTube video 0 Introduction—Mort Miller GE: So right now, it's recording.
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes, it's going on, yes. OK. OK. Today is May 31, 2016, and we'd like to start with and continue with what your full name is, where you were born and where you lived in your life.
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 ; MM: My name is Morton Jay Miller. I was born in Brooklyn, New York, on February 12th, 1924. 0 38 Family History SC: And we'll go back now into your family history. As much as you know about your family history. Where did they come from? Where did they work, et cetera? 
 ; 
 ; MM: My father was an immigrant from Poland. He lived in a town called Kolno, which is 50 miles northwest of Warsaw. He arrived in this country in 1910. My mother was born in this country, in Brooklyn, and her father came to this country in eighteen eighty-five, I think. And her mother came about when my mother's mother, my grandmother came about the same time. I never saw my Polish grandmother. She died in Europe. My father, my grandfather — my maternal grandfather — did come to this country, and I did know him.
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 ; SC: Do you know where they specifically lived or and also what they did as far as work is concerned here? From the time they left Poland or what they were doing in Europe and then came to this country?
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 ; MM: My father, he came here in 1910, for a while lived with relatives in Mount Vernon, New York. And then he started a business shortly after he came here, manufacturing raincoats. And he did that until 1917 when he was drafted into the army for World War One. My mother was born in Brooklyn. She lived in Brooklyn until she, until she, moved actually to Allentown, which was in 1938. That's when our family moved from New York, from Brooklyn, to Allentown in 1938. 0 448 Education MM: I said I was born in Brooklyn in community of Boro Park, which was almost 100 percent Jewish community. Interesting community in the sense that it was. . . and to this day, it's the only community in the United States that was started by Jews, in the late eighteen 1800s, and to this day has never been anything but Jewish. Today it is ultra-orthodox, as a matter of fact. Anyway, I went to a Hebrew school, a yeshiva, started in kindergarten, went through ninth grade. When I was at that point, I was 14 years old. At that point, my parents moved to Allentown. My father had a business in Brooklyn, but in 1934 he moved it to Allentown, and he commuted for four years. His sister moved here with him, so he had a place to live. And in 1938, our family moved to Allentown. And I've been here ever since. I attended Allen high school. And I then went on to the University of Pennsylvania. And in my beginning of my sophomore year . . . the war had started my freshman year. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I was drafted. I was in the Army for almost three years, came back and then finished school. And I graduated from Penn — University of Pennsylvania — in nineteen forty-seven. The Wharton School. 0 546 Success of Miller Underwear (Father's Business) SC: Yes. And so what- do you have any memories of your father's business when you were young?
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 ; MM: Not really, we were very little involved with his business. It was a very successful business. Even during the Depression, my family was financially, reasonably well off. We never suffered from the Depression at all. And I think it was a good-sized business that employed about two hundred and fifty people. This was in Brooklyn and then employed almost the same number when they moved here to Allentown. At that time, he was no longer manufacturing raincoats, he was manufacturing ladies sleepwear, and eventually when I graduated from college, I went into my father's business for two years. 0 661 Serving in the U.S. Air Force JM: I think you didn't tell them what you did in the Army.
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 ; MM: Would you want to know that? 
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes, that would be wonderful.
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 ; MM: Right. In the Army, I was in the Air Force. I was not a flier because I had gone to the Wharton School. I got into finance, and I spent two years overseas in England, which is the best possible thing. I was stationed, again, 50 miles from London. And there was a train that ran directly from the town that I was stationed in into London. And every month I got a four-day pass to London. I spent four days in London every month for two years. 0 752 Miller Underwear (cont'd) GE: You want to tell us a little bit about your father's business once in Allentown.
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 ; JM: Why did he come to Allentown, tell them that? 
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 ; GE: And also, once in Allentown, you and your brother-in-law went into your own business. Was that where he stayed with his son, with another son in business, or what was what? And what was the sequence of your father's business?
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 ; MM: OK, my father moved as best as I say here in nineteen thirty-four. There was a depression and things were difficult. And to be very honest, he moved here . . . he was unionized in New York, in Brooklyn, and he moved here to escape the union, which he did. A union did try to unionize them here in Allentown. They were never able to. He remained in business until nineteen forty-five, at which time he sold the business and retired. He then bought a building, good-sized building, in Bethlehem on Seneca Street. And after two years, in nineteen forty-seven, he decided that he was too young to be retired. And he went back into business and he then merged his business with a cousin who was- had a business in New York. And they manufactured not sleepwear like where they manufactured children's pajamas. And that's all right. And he remained in that business until nineteen forty-nine, I think, at which point he became ill, and he can no longer work. And he then sold his interest in the business. 0 964 Origins of the ARDRU Label MM: The name on the label, on the garments that we sold was ARDRU Undergarment – A-R-D-R-U. We got the name . . my nephew was Shepherd, we took the last three letters of his name, and our son was Andrew, we took the last two letters of his name and it became ARDRU undergarment and that was the label that was on our . . . 0 1061 Millcrest Manufacturing Company—Benefits of Nonunion Work MM: As I say, we started our business in 1949, and we were nonunion, and the union did try to unionize us, the ILG, and they tried for 40 years, and were not able to. And one of the interesting things was one of the women who worked for me, she and two of her sisters and a niece, all worked for me, and her husband, this woman's husband was the president of the Bethlehem Steel Union. And I said to her, I said, Margaret, your husband is the head of the Bethlehem Steel Union. How does he feel about all of you working in a non-union shop? And she said, Mort, we've talked about this. And my husband says to me, they're good people, you like them, they treat you well, they pay you the same wages and give you the same benefits as a union. You don't have to work in a union shop, stay where you are.
 ; 
 ; JM: Tell them why a union, I mean nonunion shop was good for the women?
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 ; MM: One of the advantages of working in our shop as opposed to . . . women had particular jobs in a union shop. If you were a collar setter, you set collars. If you were a cuff setter, you set cuffs, but you did nothing else except that. And if there wasn’t any work for collar setters, you were sent home. 0 MovingImage Mort Miller talks about growing up around his father’s contract sewing business. Later, Mort partnered with his brother-in-law to open their own contract sewing factory. Originally they made women’s underwear, later they switched to making women’s lingerie, which wasn’t as price competitive. Interview with Mort Miller, May 31, 2016 GAIL EISENBERG: So right now, it's recording. SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Yes, it's going on, yes. OK. OK. Today is May 31, 2016, and we'd like to start with and continue with what your full name is, where you were born and where you lived in your life. MORT MILLER: My name is Morton Jay Miller. I was born in Brooklyn, New York, on February 12th, 1924. SC: And we'll go back now into your family history. As much as you know about your family history. Where did they come from? Where did they work, et cetera? MM: My father was an immigrant from Poland. He lived in a town called Kolno, which is 50 miles northwest of Warsaw. He arrived in this country in 1910. My mother was born in this country, in Brooklyn, and her father came to this country in eighteen eighty-five, I think. And her mother came about when my mother's mother, my grandmother came about the same time. I never saw my Polish grandmother. She died in Europe. My father, my grandfather -- my maternal grandfather -- did come to this country, and I did know him. SC: Do you know where they specifically lived or and also what they did as far as work is concerned here? From the time they left Poland or what they were doing in Europe and then came to this country? MM: My father, he came here in 1910, for a while lived with relatives in Mount Vernon, New York. And then he started a business shortly after he came here, manufacturing raincoats. And he did that until 1917 when he was drafted into the army for World War One. My mother was born in Brooklyn. She lived in Brooklyn until she, until she, moved actually to Allentown, which was in 1938. That's when our family moved from New York, from Brooklyn, to Allentown in 1938. SC: So and the other side of your family, do you know what the grandfathers did working? MM: Yeah, I'm not sure, my grandfather came from Odessa. And he came to this country when he was only 16 years old, I think, or 18 years old, and he found some sort of work selling plumbing materials. And he eventually went into business for himself, did rather well, and he acquired some real estate in New York, in the Lower East Side of New York. And that's basically how they supported themselves. I don't know anything about really about my maternal grandmother. I don't know exactly where she came from, in Europe, it was Russia, and I'm not really sure where. JUDY MILLER: Your mother's family was from Odessa? MM: Well, I don't know about that. MM: Well, maybe. SC: Thank you. MM: My father's family came from Kolno. JM: And what did they do there? MM: My father's family in Europe had a flour mill in the little town of Kolno. I would say the town was about 50 miles from Warsaw and it was two thirds of the town was Jewish. And unfortunately, it was only six miles from the German border, and when World War II started, within a few days, all the Jews in the city would be killed. None survived. I think my father did have family in this little town. They were all killed during the German occupation. SC: But he had already left. MM: He left in 1910. JM: His sister . . . [unintelligible] MM: He left after the war, that was World War I, but here they were killed in World War Two. SC: Yes. So so the family- the sister and brother were both okay. MM: Yes. But they had other family. He had a father, had three sisters, all who came to this country and one brother who came to this country and his father. JM: Tell the story that they went to Germany. The story that the grandmother was a smuggler. SC: Was a smuggler . . . oh MM: So they lived only six miles from the German border and they had this flour mill, and they used to send wagon loads of flour into Germany. And the wagon would go with flour and my grandmother, apparently would hide a few things in the wagon, which were then sold in Poland. And they would come back with things in Germany, and they would come back with things from Germany. SC: They could smuggle some people away from Germany. They didn't wouldn't have thought of that. MM: No, no, no, no, no. No need to smuggle. SC: Not then. JM: There's no need to . . . [unintelligible by Judy Miller] . . . She brought pearls and fabric . . . because fabric was really essential because no one was manufacturing them. MM: My father had a cousin in this little town who went to Germany and went to medical school in Germany. And my father used to often go to Germany and visit with him. And as a result, my father was reasonably fluent in German. SC: It's coming. I'm watching the red button. So let's go to your youth. Can you talk about what you did as a young boy, where you worked, if you worked anywhere through your entire life? But stop at when you got, you know, when you started working as an adult. MM: I said I was born in Brooklyn in community of Boro Park, which was almost 100 percent Jewish community. Interesting community in the sense that it was. . . and to this day, it's the only community in the United States that was started by Jews, in the late eighteen 1800s, and to this day has never been anything but Jewish. Today it is ultra-orthodox, as a matter of fact. Anyway, I went to a Hebrew school, a yeshiva, started in kindergarten, went through ninth grade. When I was at that point, I was 14 years old. At that point, my parents moved to Allentown. My father had a business in Brooklyn, but in 1934 he moved it to Allentown, and he commuted for four years. His sister moved here with him, so he had a place to live. And in 1938, our family moved to Allentown. And I've been here ever since. I attended Allen high school. And I then went on to the University of Pennsylvania. And in my beginning of my sophomore year . . . the war had started my freshman year. At the beginning of my sophomore year, I was drafted. I was in the Army for almost three years, came back and then finished school. And I graduated from Penn -- University of Pennsylvania -- in nineteen forty-seven. The Wharton School. SC: Yes. And so what- do you have any memories of your father's business when you were young? MM: Not really, we were very little involved with his business. It was a very successful business. Even during the Depression, my family was financially, reasonably well off. We never suffered from the Depression at all. And I think it was a good-sized business that employed about two hundred and fifty people. This was in Brooklyn and then employed almost the same number when they moved here to Allentown. At that time, he was no longer manufacturing raincoats, he was manufacturing ladies sleepwear, and eventually when I graduated from college, I went into my father's business for two years. And then my brother-in-law and my sister had just gotten married. This was in nineteen forty-seven. In nineteen forty-nine, my brother-in-law and I started our own business. I remained in business until I was sixty-six years old. I retired in nineteen ninety. What's that? JM: What's the name of the name of the business? MM: It was Millcrest Manufacturing Company. SC: Would you spell that? MM: We also manufacture primarily sleepwear, and we sold to department stores and chain stores all over the country. It is Millcrest. All one word, M-I-L-L-C-R-E-S-T Manufacturing. SC: And that's where we have, we- Is there anything that you can think of? JM: We had a story. Yes, yes. Yes. I think you didn't tell them what you did in the Army. MM: Would you want to know that? SC: Yes, that would be wonderful. MM: Right. In the Army, I was in the Air Force. I was not a flier because I had gone to the Wharton School. I got into finance, and I spent two years overseas in England, which is the best possible thing. I was stationed, again, 50 miles from London. And there was a train that ran directly from the town that I was stationed in into London. And every month I got a four-day pass to London. I spent four days in London every month for two years. SC: Do you know the name of the town that you were in south of London? MM: Yes. It was not south of London. It was north of London, Sudbury, Sudbury and East Anglia. Another story, I was just talking with a friend a few days ago, we were only about 20 miles from Cambridge, and a friend and I, on a number of occasions, would go into Cambridge and spend time there and go through the various buildings at the university. We met a few people. We never really got friendly with anybody there. SC: That's a pretty area, East Anglia Base. MM: Yeah, I've been back to my air base three times. Security back there and my children have actually been back with us. GE: You want to tell us a little bit about your father's business once in Allentown. JM: Why did he come to Allentown, tell them that? GE: And also, once in Allentown, you and your brother-in-law went into your own business. Was that where he stayed with his son, with another son in business, or what was what? And what was the sequence of your father's business? MM: OK, my father moved as best as I say here in nineteen thirty-four. There was a depression and things were difficult. And to be very honest, he moved here . . . he was unionized in New York, in Brooklyn, and he moved here to escape the union, which he did. A union did try to unionize them here in Allentown. They were never able to. He remained in business until nineteen forty-five, at which time he sold the business and retired. He then bought a building, good-sized building, in Bethlehem on Seneca Street. And after two years, in nineteen forty-seven, he decided that he was too young to be retired. And he went back into business and he then merged his business with a cousin who was- had a business in New York. And they manufactured not sleepwear like where they manufactured children's pajamas. And that's all right. And he remained in that business until nineteen forty-nine, I think, at which point he became ill, and he can no longer work. And he then sold his interest in the business. And move to El Paso, Texas, as a matter of fact. The reason for that being that he had developed a terrible skin condition -- terrible, he had broken out all over his entire body. They could not do anything to cure Father. He went to a doctor in New York and the doctor said, Mr. Miller, there's only one thing that's going to cure you. You have to move to El Paso, Texas. My father said, are you crazy? And he said, that's the only thing that's going to cure you. In fact, he was so desperate, he moved to El Paso, stayed there for two or three years, and it did cure him. And he came back and it never came back after that. SC: Is there a reason why El Paso. . . MM: Yes, it has a very dry because it's a very dry state. Yeah. Yeah. It's warm most of the time and very, very dry and sunny. [some conversation about Phoenix--hard to hear and not relevant] GE: What was the name of your father's. . . MM: Actually, it was Miller Underwear, and he also had the trade name of Millcrest, which at that point he had stopped using, and my brother-in-law then took that as the name for our business. SC: Do you have any other questions about the business? JM: [hard to understand . . . talk about the name of the label] MM: The name on the label, on the garments that we sold was ARDRU Undergarment -- A-R-D-R-U. We got the name . . my nephew was Shepherd, we took the last three letters of his name, and our son was Andrew, we took the last two letters of his name and it became ARDRU undergarment and that was the label that was on our . . . [chatter by everyone . . . hard to understand] MM: It was Stanley's father, who combined his business with my father's business. They had a factory in New York that they wanted to get out of that also. And they moved here. A distant cousin. [chatter by everyone, unimportant, and hard to understand] SC: OK, so you were talking about that Harry gave them donuts. Could you talk about the union and say, you know. MM: As I say, we started our business in 1949, and we were nonunion, and the union did try to unionize us, the ILG, and they tried for 40 years, and were not able to. And one of the interesting things was one of the women who worked for me, she and two of her sisters and a niece, all worked for me, and her husband, this woman's husband was the president of the Bethlehem Steel Union. And I said to her, I said, Margaret, your husband is the head of the Bethlehem Steel Union. How does he feel about all of you working in a non-union shop? And she said, Mort, we've talked about this. And my husband says to me, they're good people, you like them, they treat you well, they pay you the same wages and give you the same benefits as a union. You don't have to work in a union shop, stay where you are. JM: Tell them why a union, I mean nonunion shop was good for the women? MM: One of the advantages of working in our shop as opposed to . . . women had particular jobs in a union shop. If you were a collar setter, you set collars. If you were a cuff setter, you set cuffs, but you did nothing else except that. And if there wasn't any work for collar setters, you were sent home. We didn't do that. If you, if you were a collar setter, and we had no collars, you could do something else. So our people were never sent home. They were never unemployed. And that was really an advantage. And also, they didn't have to pay dues to the, to the union, which was. . . JM: You want to hear that? Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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00:19:42
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Mort Miller, May 31, 2016
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Mort Miller talks about growing up around his father’s contract sewing business. Later, Mort partnered with his brother-in-law to open their own contract sewing factory. Originally they made women’s underwear, later they switched to making women’s lingerie, which wasn’t as price competitive.
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LVTNT-25
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2016-05-31
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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a6cc59c61829ff223d4eb144e4334054
Dublin Core
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Title
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Judy Miller
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5.4 May 31, 2016 Judy Miller, May 31, 2016 LVTNT-05 23:35 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Judy Miller Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 MillerJudy_20160531.mp4 1.0:|25(2)|48(16)|69(13)|90(6)|111(12)|130(18)|151(11)|168(13)|187(6)|210(2)|229(11)|258(14)|299(6)|324(4)|347(16)|372(3)|397(16)|432(6)|455(14)|482(16)|513(18)|534(12)|563(9)|572(12) 0 https://youtu.be/ZsV2nCZa3Mc YouTube video 0 Introduction—Judith Miller nee Farmer SC: Okay. Yes. Would you say your full name, when you were born, and where you were born?
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 ; JM: Okay. Judith Rose Miller — at that time, I was Rose Miller. Now I'm Judith Farmer Miller. 
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 ; SC: So your maiden name was Farmer?
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 ; JM: Right, right. I was born in, coincidentally, Borough Park, Brooklyn. My mother and father lived in Brooklyn at that time, at the same hospital that Mort [Miller]’s brother and sister were born — same hospital, which is no longer there, of course. It was a maternity hospital. I was born February 19th, 1931. That’s- And shortly after I was born, my parents moved to Manhattan on West 79th Street. I think it was 181. 0 75 Family History SC: But can you talk about your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents on both sides as much as you know?
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 ; JM: Well, I do not know my maternal great-grandparents- well. I don't really know them. No, my grandmother came to the United States from probably Russia or Poland, wherever the borders were at the time, to Newark, New Jersey, at 15 and worked in the cigar factory. I don't really know anything about my paternal grandfather. I don't know where he came from, but he was also an immigrant. They- when they married — which I don't know when that was either — they were in the shoe business. My grandfather had a shoe store. That's- and that's probably goes back to the ‘30s because then I was born and I was more aware of what was going on there. He had a- just a general shoe store and they owned the building that had, I think- was a three storey building, and I think they had apartments there. And- and my grandfather had this shoe store and they were very active in the Workmen's Circle at the time. We won’t say what that was, right? And they lived in- and that was in Newark, New Jersey. That's my- my maternal side. 0 417 Judith Miller's Childhood and Early Education in New Jersey JM: My mother- in the 40s, we then moved from Manhattan. I do not remember where I went to school, to kindergarten. I don't know why I have no memory of this. I was not happy to move to New Jersey. We had to move to my grandparents’ house and I went to an elementary school, probably I think- I know it was third grade, maybe second half of second grade. At that time, we had half, half years. Then we moved to Hillside, New Jersey, from Newark, because my mother went into business. She had a children's shoe store, and that's why we moved. 0 482 Mother's Children's Shoe Store in Newark, NJ JM: My mother was working. It was pre-and post-war, post-war, World War II, and she worked every night. I think the store was open until seven o'clock at night. And I had a very happy, successful time in Hillside. I never really knew that things were not too good when the big bands failed. I never felt deprived. And because of my mother, we both were sent to college and my brother is a physician.
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 ; SC: So did you live near the store or above the store? 
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 ; JM: We lived- we lived in Hillside and she worked- The store was in Newark. It was- we lived very close. I guess it was maybe four or five, maybe six blocks away. 0 563 Attending Cedar Crest College in Allentown, PA JM: I graduated from Hillside High School and I am go- I was one of four of us. We were all Home EC majors because we had a wonderful teacher. One of us became a designer, she was an artist. Two of us- three of us were education majors. Anyhow, I applied to the University of Maryland. It was post-war, I was there twice. They did not give me housing because women had to live in approved housing. The veterans were all coming back. It is June. I have nowhere to go to college because I really wanted to go to the University of Maryland. And my mother said, oh one of her friends had a daughter who went to the school in Allentown. And I said, “Where's Allentown?” She said, “That's where the Meislins come from, who you may have- Yeah, that’s Ruth!” Well, it was Ira, her husband. His mother spent summer at camp where my brother and I went, and my mother met her. So I came to Allentown for an interview and I was accepted and I never left Allentown. 0 684 Meeting Mort Miller JM: At the time, the Lehigh Valley Railroad went from Allentown to Newark. And I, of course, was at- where? Well, it went to New York, but I got off at Newark. And I was on a return trip to Allentown and I sat with this lady, was a very nice lady, and we started to talk. And when we got off the train in Allentown, her son was picking her up and she said, “You told me there are no nice Jewish girls in Allentown, at Cedar Crest. Here is one.” So the next Sunday-
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 ; MM: I tell you that the- this woman was the mother of my very, very-
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 ; JM: Oh, that’s right. He- Mort’s best friend. 
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 ; MM: We were almost like brothers. 0 842 Identity as a Homemaker and Volunteer for the Jewish Community Center SC: So how do you see yourself? Do you see yourself as the homework maker, do you see yourself as-
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 ; JM: Yes. I was a homemaker. We have two children. Do we do that, do you want that? 
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes.
 ; 
 ; JM: Andrew, who was born in 1953, and Nancy, who was born three years later, 1956, both of them in October, one in the beginning and one at the end. I was home with the children. I did a lot of volunteer work. I started the blood bank here, which is no longer- not the blood bank, the Jewish Community Center had a drive. I visited my grandmother at the Princeton Hospital and did a double take because on the wall it said something about blood — “It is never necessary to replace blood here.” And I went back in and then I said, why? And they said, because we have enough donors from the college. And I came back and I went to the Center and they- we started it. As a matter of fact, the woman who started it with me was Miller, Lois Miller, Stanley's wife. She was very organized. And then after the first year, she left for her career. In any case, I did that, I guess, for twenty-four or five years. And now you don't have to do that because they replaced blood or your insurance pays for it. So that was what I did. 0 935 The Hole in the Wall Outlet Store JM: And then I guess Nancy was in high school, maybe before- yeah, maybe high school, I'm not sure. And I had an outlet store at the factory. I sold overruns and peace goods and lace and elastic, in a little shop that was called the Hole in the Wall. 
 ; 
 ; MM: [inaudible]
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes, yes it was. And my showcases were tables that my father-In-law made out of doors. He was a collector of wooden doors, do you remember that? Yes. So that's about it, I guess. I don't think, you know, I was never a president, but I was always involved in the organization.
 ; 
 ; SC: That’s important.
 ; 
 ; JM: I read to two blind children, that's right. 
 ; 
 ; SC: So you do see your role as wife and mother as being the primary, and this was after the fact-
 ; 
 ; JM: Yeah, when they were grown up. Probably made a mistake, I should probably have done something more of a- But that was the ‘50s! The ‘50s. I might not have gotten married so young either.
 ; 
 ; GE: Was that the ‘70s and ‘80s when you were running that store? 
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes, I think so. 0 1054 Father's Career as a Musician GE: When your family moved from Manhattan to New Jersey, can you just tell us what was the impetus, why did they have to move? 
 ; 
 ; JM: I think there was no more business for my father. And also, I think he was involved in some- trying to sell- I don't know, he always had a get rich scheme, like he was doing importing pasta machines. It didn't work. And something happened with a recording company, I don't- it was, what was it? RCA Victor, it was a big one and the guy was crooked. My father was the sweetest, nicest man, but people-
 ; 
 ; MM: He was not a businessman.
 ; 
 ; JM: He was not a businessman, although he was very, very active in the Musician's Union. 0 1210 Home Addresses SC: Do you know where you lived, what street you were on in Manhattan? 
 ; 
 ; JM: Yes, West 79th Street, 181. And in New York? forget what street I lived on, but I know where I lived in Hillside. 
 ; 
 ; SC: Good.
 ; 
 ; JM: You want to know that?
 ; 
 ; SC: Yes.
 ; 
 ; JM: I lived on Williamson Avenue in Hillside, New Jersey. 
 ; 
 ; SC: Okay. And where did you live in Allentown?
 ; 
 ; JM: We lived- oh! We lived at the Highland Apartments when we were first married on the third floor. 0 1310 Elizabethtown Gas Company JM: You want to know what I did as a home service representative? They don't do that anymore. When you bought a stove, a hot water heater, a dryer because they had gas dryers, they would send me out with a car and I would come to your house and show you how to use it. And I would adjust thermostats, which I can't do anymore. But now it's too digital, and that's about it. And that's why I knew what was being built in the neighborhood. And it was Elizabeth, New Jersey, which was the next town from Hillside. 0 MovingImage Judy Miller talks about growing up in New York and New Jersey then later attending Cedar Crest College in Allentown. While there, she met Mort. Many years later, when their children were older, Judy opened a small outlet store at the family factory. Interview with Judy Miller, May 31, 2016 GAIL EISENBERG: Ready? SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Okay. Yes. Would you say your full name, when you were born, and where you were born? JUDITH MILLER: Okay. Judith Rose Miller -- at that time, I was Rose Miller. Now I'm Judith Farmer Miller. SC: So your maiden name was Farmer? JM: Right, right. I was born in, coincidentally, Borough Park, Brooklyn. My mother and father lived in Brooklyn at that time, at the same hospital that Mort [Miller]'s brother and sister were born -- same hospital, which is no longer there, of course. It was a maternity hospital. I was born February 19th, 1931. That's- And shortly after I was born, my parents moved to Manhattan on West 79th Street. I think it was 181. I'm not sure. What else do we want here? SC: Okay, and- JM: I'm sorry. SC: No, that's fine. And so, when you were small, we'll come back to that. But can you talk about your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents on both sides as much as you know? JM: Well, I do not know my maternal great-grandparents- well. I don't really know them. No, my grandmother came to the United States from probably Russia or Poland, wherever the borders were at the time, to Newark, New Jersey, at 15 and worked in the cigar factory. I don't really know anything about my paternal grandfather. I don't know where he came from, but he was also an immigrant. They- when they married -- which I don't know when that was either -- they were in the shoe business. My grandfather had a shoe store. That's- and that's probably goes back to the '30s because then I was born and I was more aware of what was going on there. He had a- just a general shoe store and they owned the building that had, I think- was a three storey building, and I think they had apartments there. And- and my grandfather had this shoe store and they were very active in the Workmen's Circle at the time. We won't say what that was, right? And they lived in- and that was in Newark, New Jersey. That's my- my maternal side. You want my grandparents now? GE: Yes. JM: On the other side? My grandfather, whom I never knew, died at forty-five of cancer. But he was from this long line of barber men, musicians. There all the men are musicians, the women, no talent. I being one of no talent. And my father had a sister also who was not a musician. There were three- yes, three boys and the grandfather and they lived- also lived in Borough Park, Brooklyn. They did not know each other, our families -- although I think so? Somebody knew your uncle, but that's okay. SC: So the types of musicians that they were? JM: Yes, okay. I think the great-grandfather was a violinist and he- I think played in Warsaw somewhere. The whole family came to the States. I think one of my father's oldest brothers was born in Europe. One, the oldest- the second oldest one was a very, very successful musician, played with- want to know that? The A& ; P Gypsies, which was the first radio program on early radio. And he was responsible for getting my father into the music business. My father was thirteen years old and my uncle was asked to go on tour, on the road with- I don't know which band of all these bands. And they said, well, what instrument does he play? Well, what instrument do you need? And at that point, my father, who I think was playing the violin, became a drummer because they needed a drum. That's- what'd I forget here? Nothing, huh? SC: So- JM: But everybody else- ah, the other uncle, what it is, what did he do? He was a musician, and then there's a cousin from that side of the family, are all musicians as well, but one of them is a Juilliard graduate and a composer and a timpanist player. He was the youngest- one of the youngest members with the Boston Symphony until he retired. But my brother, on the other hand, he plays instruments, his children play instruments, and his grandchildren. So it only goes down on the men's side, although one is a little girl, one of the grandchildren, who is very, very talented. That's about it. I mean, they lived in Brooklyn all that time until my father married my mother. I don't know where they met. Huh? Oh and my father had a big band! I forgot that. In the 30s. SC: In New York? JM: In New York City, and as I have written in that book, that he- the only time I saw him [perform], I was five years old. He was on the radio also. I was taken to Rockefeller Center and- for lunch, and his band was playing, I guess, a tea dance or something. So that was the first time, and then I never heard his band again until we went to a wedding, after our wedding, of a friend. And I think I've said that to you before, that he was- he looks so happy. And I said, you're having a good time. You always said you hated the music business. He said, that's right. I hated the business. But look, everybody is having a good time and I'm the reason. So that was my father. My mother- in the 40s, we then moved from Manhattan. I do not remember where I went to school, to kindergarten. I don't know why I have no memory of this. I was not happy to move to New Jersey. We had to move to my grandparents' house and I went to an elementary school, probably I think- I know it was third grade, maybe second half of second grade. At that time, we had half, half years. Then we moved to Hillside, New Jersey, from Newark, because my mother went into business. She had a children's shoe store, and that's why we moved. And oh! I have a brother, forgot my brother. He's four years younger, and I was ten, and he was six. No! Yeah, right, that's right.. And I pretty much took care of him. My mother was working. It was pre-and post-war, post-war, World War II, and she worked every night. I think the store was open until seven o'clock at night. And I had a very happy, successful time in Hillside. I never really knew that things were not too good when the big bands failed. I never felt deprived. And because of my mother, we both were sent to college and my brother is a physician. SC: So did you live near the store or above the store? JM: We lived- we lived in Hillside and she worked- The store was in Newark. It was- we lived very close. I guess it was maybe four or five, maybe six blocks away. And coincidentally, Philip Roth was a customer of my mother's. And when she read that book, Portnoy's Complaint, "I never knew Philip was- knew those things!" That's just an aside. I guess that- did I miss anything? I don't know when she went out of business. Okay, then it's time for me to go to college. We want that? I graduated from Hillside High School and I am go- I was one of four of us. We were all Home EC majors because we had a wonderful teacher. One of us became a designer, she was an artist. Two of us- three of us were education majors. Anyhow, I applied to the University of Maryland. It was post-war, I was there twice. They did not give me housing because women had to live in approved housing. The veterans were all coming back. It is June. I have nowhere to go to college because I really wanted to go to the University of Maryland. And my mother said, oh one of her friends had a daughter who went to the school in Allentown. And I said, "Where's Allentown?" She said, "That's where the Meislins come from, who you may have- Yeah, that's Ruth!" Well, it was Ira, her husband. His mother spent summer at camp where my brother and I went, and my mother met her. So I came to Allentown for an interview and I was accepted and I never left Allentown. I met Mort in the second half of my senior year, probably just around the time of our birthdays, and that was it. We were married in December, Christmas Eve. My father played the wedding, his band in New York City at the Ambassador Hotel, which is probably no longer there. It isn't. And that's our story. Did I miss anything? SC: And what college did you go to in Allentown? JM: Oh I forgot! Cedar Crest College. MORT MILLER: It was my luck that she couldn't get into, to Maryland. JM: Yeah well, you know how we met. Isn't that on the second half of that--? GE: I think so, but why don't you just tell us. JM: You want that again? SC: I think so. I'm not sure if it was. I didn't see it. JM: At the time- right. At the time, the Lehigh Valley Railroad went from Allentown to Newark. And I, of course, was at- where? Well, it went to New York, but I got off at Newark. And I was on a return trip to Allentown and I sat with this lady, was a very nice lady, and we started to talk. And when we got off the train in Allentown, her son was picking her up and she said, "You told me there are no nice Jewish girls in Allentown, at Cedar Crest. Here is one." So the next Sunday- MM: I tell you that the- this woman was the mother of my very, very- JM: Oh, that's right. He- Mort's best friend. MM: We were almost like brothers. JM: No no! She never traveled alone, my mother-in-law. GE: Lanethea's father-in-law, I assume. Is that who it was? MM: What's that? GE: Lanethea's. Was it her father-in-law -- Schultz? MM: Yes. JM: Yes! Who are you saying? GE: Lanethea JM: Oh of course, yes! John. SC: John's father. JM: John's Pappa, John 's father. Right. Mort and Murray were like this, from day one. And then they ended up at college together after the war. Everything together. We- in fact, we introduced them. MM: What's that? JM: We introduced them. SC: Lanethea and Jonathan? JM: No, Murray and Elaine, Jonathan's mother. I mean, that's a small world. Anyhow, so the next weekend, Murray called me for a date. Mort called my roommate for a date. She couldn't go, she had a French exam. And by the end of the evening. Mort and I were- MM: Well Murray said come along. JM: Come along anyhow. So he joined us. MM: And by the end of the evening, Murray was out of the picture. JM: And had gone back to his house, his mother gave us dessert. I still remember what she did it -- in little compote dishes, she gave us ice cream with creme de mints on them, and that was pretty something. So that's the story of Allentown, and then by Christmas Eve, we were married. After graduation, we were engaged. We weren't engaged until the end of October because his mother and father were just coming back from El Paso. And then they- they stayed. They stayed, at that point. We waited for them to come home. SC: So how do you see yourself? Do you see yourself as the homework maker, do you see yourself as- JM: Yes. I was a homemaker. We have two children. Do we do that, do you want that? SC: Yes. JM: Andrew, who was born in 1953, and Nancy, who was born three years later, 1956, both of them in October, one in the beginning and one at the end. I was home with the children. I did a lot of volunteer work. I started the blood bank here, which is no longer- not the blood bank, the Jewish Community Center had a drive. I visited my grandmother at the Princeton Hospital and did a double take because on the wall it said something about blood -- "It is never necessary to replace blood here." And I went back in and then I said, why? And they said, because we have enough donors from the college. And I came back and I went to the Center and they- we started it. As a matter of fact, the woman who started it with me was Miller, Lois Miller, Stanley's wife. She was very organized. And then after the first year, she left for her career. In any case, I did that, I guess, for twenty-four or five years. And now you don't have to do that because they replaced blood or your insurance pays for it. So that was what I did. And then I guess Nancy was in high school, maybe before- yeah, maybe high school, I'm not sure. And I had an outlet store at the factory. I sold overruns and peace goods and lace and elastic, in a little shop that was called the Hole in the Wall. MM: [inaudible] JM: Yes, yes it was. And my showcases were tables that my father-In-law made out of doors. He was a collector of wooden doors, do you remember that? Yes. So that's about it, I guess. I don't think, you know, I was never a president, but I was always involved in the organization. SC: That's important. JM: I read to two blind children, that's right. SC: So you do see your role as wife and mother as being the primary, and this was after the fact- JM: Yeah, when they were grown up. Probably made a mistake, I should probably have done something more of a- But that was the '50s! The '50s. I might not have gotten married so young either. GE: Was that the '70s and '80s when you were running that store? JM: Yes, I think so. When was Nancy-- Yeah. No, wait. She was born in '53. GE: So she was in high school in the later '60s. JM: Well yeah, '60s and '70s, I guess. MM: Well she graduated from high school- I mean from college in 1979, I know that. JM: Right. GE: So therefore '75. JM: Or maybe even before that. Yeah, you're right, the '70s -- until Mort retired. GE: And then may I ask you a quick question? JM: Go ahead. SC: Sure. Yes. GE: So when your family moved from Manhattan to New Jersey- JM: No. I'm sorry, yes, yes. GE: When your family moved from Manhattan to New Jersey, can you just tell us what was the impetus, why did they have to move? JM: I think there was no more business for my father. And also, I think he was involved in some- trying to sell- I don't know, he always had a get rich scheme, like he was doing importing pasta machines. It didn't work. And something happened with a recording company, I don't- it was, what was it? RCA Victor, it was a big one and the guy was crooked. My father was the sweetest, nicest man, but people- MM: He was not a businessman. JM: He was not a businessman, although he was very, very active in the Musician's Union. And that was part of the business, I think, where he didn't like, I mean, because things were tough then. And that was about the time -- no, it was later. When you had to have live musicians on the stage in spite of the fact there was recording music, recorded music. So they used to have to have- depending on the size of the house, he did play some shows. He did do something with Mike Todd. With that, I have pictures of that. But it's- that's- that was it. And I was miserable, I have to tell you, in New Jersey. But I think my mother was miserable. I think everything was not good then, but I don't know. And I never felt deprived. So, isn't that interesting? [cross chatter] GE: So when you went to New Jersey, your father continued to work in the music industry. JM: Oh yeah, he went to New York. GE: It was just there, it was much cheaper the living. JM: I think my grandparents weren't charging them rent. GE: Oh they were living with- you were living with your grandparents? JM: No, not with them. This was a multi- I think there were maybe five or six apartments. It was a three-story walk up and the store was below. I used to play dominoes with my grandfather in the back. And it was also- well no, during the Depression, my father made a very big living because like the movie business, people who had any money wanted to be entertained. It was so terrible. And they were, and he was really making a lot of money, which is, I guess, why they moved to Manhattan. GE: Right. JM: So that's it. SC: Do you know where you lived, what street you were on in Manhattan? JM: Yes, West 79th Street, 181. And in New York? forget what street I lived on, but I know where I lived in Hillside. SC: Good. JM: You want to know that? SC: Yes. JM: I lived on Williamson Avenue in Hillside, New Jersey. SC: Okay. And where did you live in Allentown? JM: We lived- oh! We lived at the Highland Apartments when we were first married on the third floor. And then we had Andy, and we bought a lot. And we didn't think we were going to build right away, but we built a house right away. We built a split level- Oh I forgot! I did have a career. I forgot. I was a home service representative for the Elizabethtown Gas Company after graduation. Not very long because we got engaged and after I graduate- before I graduated, I got the job. And that was 1952, and everybody was building split levels. Well, when it came time for us to build a house, Mort wanted a two story. No, you wanted a ranch, and I always lived in apartments, I wanted steps. So we built this split level which is why we moved out of our house and we are now at an apartment. Okay, so that was pretty much- we built our house and I thought I knew everything. Okay. You want to know what I did as a home service representative? They don't do that anymore. When you bought a stove, a hot water heater, a dryer because they had gas dryers, they would send me out with a car and I would come to your house and show you how to use it. And I would adjust thermostats, which I can't do anymore. But now it's too digital, and that's about it. And that's why I knew what was being built in the neighborhood. And it was Elizabeth, New Jersey, which was the next town from Hillside. That's- I forgot about that, it was so short. Okay? We're done. SC: Yes. Okay, thank you. JM: You're getting out in time? GE: Yeah, yeah, no it's perfect. It's going to be fine anyway. Honestly, I remember, it's just- JM: You've got so many people. GE: We've had a lot of people. At this point, we've interviewed- JM: Are you almost done? GE: Yeah, we're going to continue to do this this year, this summer. We've been doing every summer for a while. This summer and next summer, and then at the end, is the collection. [cross chatter] JM: You've brought a lot of stuff back! Just not that. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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Judy Miller, May 31, 2016
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Judy Miller talks about growing up in New York and New Jersey then later attending Cedar Crest College in Allentown. While there, she met Mort. Many years later, when their children were older, Judy opened a small outlet store at the family factory.
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LVTNT-05
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2016-05-31
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
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Murray Platt
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5.4 July 26, 2012 Murray Platt, July 26, 2012 LVTNT-17 55:10 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Murray Platt Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 PlattMurray_20120726 1.0:|23(7)|48(4)|81(2)|116(11)|143(11)|170(3)|193(7)|222(6)|251(5)|272(8)|301(4)|326(5)|345(10)|372(8)|397(2)|418(13)|443(14)|474(3)|495(13)|514(11)|535(8)|558(4)|579(5)|604(7)|627(16)|654(15)|677(12)|700(10)|727(9)|748(8)|775(6)|800(5)|813(15)|838(6)|859(7)|882(18)|901(5)|926(19)|957(5)|982(5)|1005(5)|1030(5)|1063(6)|1104(5)|1133(7)|1158(4)|1189(4)|1214(4)|1239(15)|1264(11)|1279(10)|1302(3)|1325(9)|1348(6)|1375(9)|1376(2) 0 https://youtu.be/OcDadcjftl4 YouTube video 0 Introduction—Murray Platt SC: Mr. Platt, would you tell your full name, birthday and where you were born?
 ; 
 ; MP: Murray Platt, born in Brooklyn, New York, 1925.
 ; 
 ; SC: What was the address in Brooklyn? Do you remember?
 ; 
 ; MP: I know we moved pretty often. In those days, rents were very cheap, but most people had no money. They’d give you like three months free rent. What happens is that you lived in a place for a couple months, the first months were free. Then in a couple months you had to pay the rent and until they came to kick you out, you found another place. 0 54 Family History SC: Can you talk a little big now about your family background? As far back as you know - your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and what their names were and where they lived?
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 ; MP: Only my maternal grandfather, his name was Isadore Platt. He came here as a young man. I never knew anything about great grandparents.
 ; 
 ; GE: Wait, your maternal grandfather?
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 ; MP: My mother’s father.
 ; 
 ; GE: His name wouldn’t have been Platt.
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 ; MP: It’s always confusing because my mother remarried. My biological father died when I was real young. My mother remarried an Isadore Platt, not my grandfather, but cousin with the same name and I assumed his name. My birth name was not Platt.
 ; 
 ; SC: What was it?
 ; 
 ; MP: Tuller. T-u-l-l-e-r. 0 394 Lehigh Valley Shirt Manufacturing SC: [Y]our step-father, what did he do? 
 ; 
 ; MP: He was part of the business.
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 ; GE: What did he do?
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 ; MP: He was in the apparel business.
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 ; SC: So that was in Brooklyn?
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 ; MP: They started in New York. It was he and two partners.
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 ; GE: And what were they doing there? Were they tailors?
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 ; MP: They had a factory. And then the union came along and they were chased out over here. 
 ; 
 ; SC: That’s a typical story.
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 ; MP: After years here, the union came here. Local businesses went out and most went down south.
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 ; SC: What part of the garment industry did they produce for?
 ; 
 ; MP: The name of the firm was Lehigh Valley Shirt Manufacturing Company. 0 837 Religious Practices as a Youth GE: When your mother and stepfather married in 1936, from what you remember, was he working here and coming home on the weekends?
 ; 
 ; MP: Yes. As a matter of fact I remember going to the subway station and helping him carry his bags. He made me do the Haftorah every Saturday morning. I could do any Haftarah.
 ; 
 ; GE: He made you do the Haftarah.
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 ; MP: He was very religious and we followed suit.
 ; 
 ; SC: Were you as religious before that?
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 ; MP: Not really. I was Bar Mitzvahed after he married my mother. As a matter of fact, I laid Tifillin until I went into the army. 0 897 The War Years—Education, Work Experiences, & ; Army Service SC: What year did you go into the army?
 ; 
 ; MP: 1945.
 ; 
 ; GE: You went into the army in 1945?
 ; 
 ; SC: So you would have been 20.
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 ; MP: During the second half of the war and then afterwards, in peacetime.
 ; 
 ; SC: Where were you deployed after you went into the army? Were you in Germany?
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 ; MP: No, stateside.
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 ; SC: Stateside the whole time. I know some people did go over and went to Japan or after the war went to Germany during the times of refugees.
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 ; MP: I had majored in chemistry when I went to City College and I kept getting deferred from being drafted until I graduated. Once I graduated, then they inducted me into the army. After basic training they sent me to Randolph Field in Texas to work in a laboratory. So I never saw real action. 0 1118 Murray Platt's Parents GE: Do you have any memory of your father?
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 ; MP No, I was five when he died.
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 ; GE: What did he die from?
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 ; MP: He was a house painter. No one really remembers if it was his heart or was it lead poisoning. In those days they used lead. I remember an uncle was also a house painter, it was one of his brothers, telling him, “Abie, wash your hands!” My father’s name was Abraham. He never washed his hands, most of them didn’t. He didn’t die here…..he went to Poland – to Warsaw – to see his parents, and he died there. 0 1281 Childhood in Brooklyn GE: During this time when it was you and your mom, I know the Depression was going on, what was life like? Were you very poor?
 ; 
 ; MP: If we were poor, we didn’t know it - we had nothing to compare it to.
 ; 
 ; GE: Did you rent? Did you live in an apartment?
 ; 
 ; MP: Oh yes, $45.00 a month rent and the first two months were free!
 ; 
 ; SC: Do you have any memories of what you did in New York playing games? What the children did?
 ; 
 ; MP: I remember playing handball against the wall with some other kids. There was a store right around the corner and the wall was brick – we played handball there. The guy would come out and yell at us. Years later, we bought a home in Brooklyn, this was before we came here, an end of the row. Then the other kids came and played handball against our wall. 0 1410 Stepfather's Family and Businesses GE: Murray, you were an only child weren’t you?
 ; 
 ; MP: My stepfather had a daughter, Phyllis Steinberg. Does the name ring a bell?
 ; 
 ; GE: Well, Judge Steinberg?
 ; 
 ; MP: That’s her son.
 ; 
 ; GE: So his mother was your step-sister.
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 ; MP: Well, I didn’t refer to her as a step-sister, we were very close.
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 ; GE: Isn’t that nice. When your mother married Platt, you were 11, how old was she?
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 ; MP: She was ten years older than me.
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 ; GE: Was she already married?
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 ; MP: She got married the same year. She got married in July, my mother got married to my step-father in November.
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 ; GE: So you always had a close relationship with her. 0 1626 Murray Platt's Role in the Family Business SC: Going back then to when you were part of the business, what did you do when you first became part of your step-father’s business? 
 ; 
 ; MP: Our partners, while my father was the general factory man, one of the other partners was a mechanic and the third partner took care of the cutting and went to New York to collect money for payroll. In those days you had to wait for it to come by mail. [unintelligible] It was a pretty big payroll, don’t forget there was pretty many people working. When we came into the business, I took over my father’s job of being on the floor, as they say, in production. The mechanic’s son took over the mechanics and the other son took over the cutting – he was in charge of the cutting room. 0 1737 Jewish Involvement in the Textile and Needle-Trade Industries GE: Was it hard, as a Jewish person, to get a job as a chemist?
 ; 
 ; MP: Yes. As a chemist, in a bank . . . a lot of places. The going salary was $35.00 per week. 
 ; 
 ; GE: There were a few things - One, it was hard to get a good job as a Jewish person and secondly, it was not that lucrative. It was perhaps more lucrative to go into business.
 ; 
 ; SC: We’ve asked people, “ Why do you think in this region, there was so many Jewish textile or garment industry people.” Do you think there is an answer to that?
 ; 
 ; MP: No, except that the Jews gravitated towards this business. It was easy to get into. It didn’t require much capital so you didn’t have to go borrow money. You set up your own factory and in those days there was a big demand. 0 1804 Murray Platt's Business Partners and Contacts GE: Who actually was the salesperson or the liaison person with the manufacturers? 
 ; 
 ; MP: Samuel Simon. He was the one who would go to New York every week to collect money for payroll.
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 ; GE: That’s also the guy you said was the cutting.
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 ; MP: Right. 
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 ; GE: Was he, let’s say for instance, was he also the one when a contract would run out – he was the one who would negotiate the contract?
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 ; MP: We didn’t have any formal contracts – nothing was in writing. You just did the work for them and you hoped they would send you more fabric and it was an on-going deal. 0 2071 The Decline of Lehigh Valley Shirts Manufacturing Company MP: I retired in 1987. I turned the business over to a young man who had been working for me.
 ; 
 ; SC: So you gave him an opportunity?
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 ; MP: He was the son of the foreman when the factory came to Allentown.
 ; 
 ; SC: What was his name – the foreman?
 ; 
 ; MP: Sam Lutz. He wasn’t Jewish.
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 ; SC: He was Pennsylvania Dutch probably.
 ; 
 ; GE: Did the business survive for a while longer?
 ; 
 ; MP: For a while, but this guy didn’t pay much attention to the business. People, customers, would call, they’d want you, they didn’t want an office person and he wasn’t there. So he lasted a few years, every week it was less and then he just left. 0 2166 More on the Family Business SC: Did the ethnicity of the workers change between the late ‘40’s until 1987? Did they come from different family backgrounds?
 ; 
 ; MP: Towards the end we had more Latino people - as they came along - moving into town.
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 ; SC: Because this was a good entry work job.
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 ; MP: At the beginning, it was always Pennsylvania Dutch, Czechoslovokian people, Irish people, but the last few years things were changed.
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 ; SC: As far as where the factory was…did it stay on Franklin Street the whole time?
 ; 
 ; MP: Yes.
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 ; SC: Franklin is between 14th and 15th?
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 ; GE: No, 13th and 14th.
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 ; MP: No, it was between 14th and 15th. 0 2403 Involvement in the Jewish and Allentown Communities GE: Tell us what was the community like? What did you and Dot think when you came here? The Jewish community . . . and when did you start having children?
 ; 
 ; MP: We went to the JCC as soon as we got here. In those days it was still at 6th Street.
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 ; GE: 6th and Chew I think it was.
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 ; MP: This building wasn’t built until 1958 or 59.
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 ; SC: How about the community in general? What did you think about the community? Was it friendly?
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 ; MP: Hess’s was great. That was a focal point. 
 ; 
 ; SC: I haven’t interviewed anyone that hasn't talked about it.
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 ; MP: You mention Allentown and Hess’s and people say, “oh yes, I know Hess’s”
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 ; GE: And the whole downtown was great.
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 ; MP: There was no Sunday shopping, and it was only open Monday and Thursday evenings. My wife, when she was pregnant, a month or so afterwards she went there and they said, “what did you have, a boy or a girl?” They was a very homey atmosphere. 0 2527 Murray Platt's Children GE: When did you start having children?
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 ; MP: Our oldest daughter was born in New York and Dennis, the middle son was born here – right after we moved here.
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 ; GE: So your oldest child was born in what year?
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 ; MP: 1949.
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 ; GE: So your oldest is about 62-63 years old.
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 ; MP: Right.
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 ; GE: And then your second child?
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 ; MP: Dennis – he was born here.
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 ; GE: That was nineteen . . .?
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 ; MP: 54.
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 ; GE: 1954. The first two, those were boys?
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 ; MP: No, the first one was a girl.
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 ; GE: What was her name?
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 ; MP: Arlene, and she never married. 0 2715 Relationship with Buyers SC: [A]s far as the business is concerned, are there any memories you have – really vivid memories you have of some times in the business – either highs or lows when you were in the business?
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 ; MP: Except that we took the various customer’s agents out to lunch.
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 ; GE: Oh, so the customer’s agents – did they often come to your . . .?
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 ; MP: Yeah, they come once or twice a week.
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 ; GE: Was that more just to pick up and drop off?
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 ; MP: Just to see how things were going - how their products were being manufactured. To make sure everything is right and to go to lunch.
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 ; GE: The manufacturer’s agent – were they employees of the manufacturer?
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 ; MP: Yes.
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 ; GE: Oh, they were actually employees. I wasn’t sure if they were employees or if they kind of had their own business. 0 2776 Unions SC: Were you unionized?
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 ; MP: Yes.
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 ; SC: Which union?
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 ; MP: Amalgamated Textile Workers. There were two apparel unions - one was the International Ladies Garment Workers and the other was Amalgamated. Since we had made men’s wear to start with, it was Amalgamated. Then in later years, we didn’t make any more shirts, but the other union didn’t bother us.
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 ; SC: Were you a member of the manufacturer’s associations?
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 ; MP: Probably.
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 ; GE: Like Arnold Delin? Does that sound familiar?
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 ; MP: Delin was the other union.
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 ; SC: Right he was the IGLU – I hope I said it right. There were two manufacturer’s associations in the region. 0 2847 Business Procedures and Products GE: Did you ever become very automated?
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 ; MP: No.
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 ; GE: So yours always stayed pretty basic.
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 ; MP: Right. Tama did and that’s why they lasted longer than everyone else. They just closed two or three years ago. Now I understand all the off-shore plants are automated. [unintelligible] with computers.
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 ; GE: Right - I guess that’s really primarily in terms of the business. You said that your product changed - let’s say you did shirts and blouses, is that what you did the whole time?
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 ; MP: Yes.
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 ; SC: Is there a reason why you stopped doing shirts?
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 ; MP: Well, because it became too competitive. Shirts were the first ones to go down south. Blouses, it was more specialty, dresses also the same thing. 0 3099 Dottie Platt's Family History DP: When you are an immigrant, you come here with empty pockets and your children – they don’t have anything. You have to realize this, now come in, and I’ll show you my blouses. Then I married Murray because he graduated college at 19, and I thought he was older than that, and he thought I was younger than I am because my mother was looking for the fountain of youth. She lost her hair at as a young girl. There’s a name for this illness.
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 ; MP: Alopecia. 
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 ; GE: Oh.
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 ; DP: Some people in our area, now, the doctor’s wife, I want to say, don't have hair. Do you know Dr. Silverman?
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 ; MP: Diane.
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 ; GE: Oh yes. 
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 ; DP: So, my mother had that illness.
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 ; MP: To make a long story short, my wife worked in the factory – in the office for several years. 0 MovingImage Murray Platt talks about how his father’s family began in New York making women’s shirts, failed due to the unions, and then came in the late 1930s to the Lehigh Valley. Murray’s father, with two partners, established Lehigh Valley Shirt Manufacturing Company. They were contractors for manufacturers in New York and in Philadelphia. They cut, sewed and finished the products. The business continued by the sons of these three original partners. An Interview with Murray Platt, July 26, 2012 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Mr. Platt, would you tell your full name, birthday and where you were born? MURRAY PLATT: Murray Platt, born in Brooklyn, New York, 1925. SC: What was the address in Brooklyn? Do you remember? MP: I know we moved pretty often. In those days, rents were very cheap, but most people had no money. They'd give you like three months free rent. What happens is that you lived in a place for a couple months, the first months were free. Then in a couple months you had to pay the rent and until they came to kick you out, you found another place. SC: Can you talk a little big now about your family background? As far back as you know - your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and what their names were and where they lived? MP: Only my maternal grandfather, his name was Isadore Platt. He came here as a young man. I never knew anything about great grandparents. GAIL EISENBERG: Wait, your maternal grandfather? MP: My mother's father. GE: His name wouldn't have been Platt. MP: It's always confusing because my mother remarried. My biological father died when I was real young. My mother remarried an Isadore Platt, not my grandfather, but cousin with the same name and I assumed his name. My birth name was not Platt. SC: What was it? MP: Tuller. T-u-l-l-e-r. SC: So, when your maternal grandfather came to the United States, where about did he come from? Do you know about when he came? MP: Poland or Russia. In those days there was a very fluid line between them. One day I was Polish the next day I was Russian. GE: What was the name of the town or big city it was near? MP: Somewhere near Warsaw. SC: Did your father come by himself? And did he leave family behind? MP: My grandfather, he came by himself. He left his wife there, after a while she died. He remarried here. Then he had his children, which my mother was one of them. By then he had a coal yard. GE: I'm sorry he had what? MP: He had a coal yard. GE: In Poland? MP: No here. GE: What is a coal yard? MP: In the old days, most of heat was done by coal. As a matter of fact, I remember the coal delivery in New York, he had to park perpendicular to the sidewalk of the house and run a big chute down to the basement, dumped the coal out. We kids had a great time underneath the chute! GE: When your grandfather came from Poland, how old was he? MP: Pretty young. GE: But, he was already married. MP: Maybe in his 20's. GE: So, the hope was, he came from Poland, how many children did he have at the time? MP: Three. GE: He had three children in Poland. MP: My mother and 2 brothers. GE: The idea was that he came and then he was going to bring his wife and children. MP: I don't know about his wife, she died somewhere in between. GE: Right. MP: We never even saw a picture of her. In those days there was no hanky-panky. A wife was a wife. GE: Right. SC: So he came to the United States. This is your birth grandfather. When he came here how did he meet his second wife? Do you know anything about that? MP: Not really, I guess he went to a bar or something! SC: So he owned a coal yard and that was a fun place to be. MP: It was a small community, everybody lived downtown. GE: When you say downtown, do you mean downtown Brooklyn? MP: Mostly Manhattan -- the Lower East Side. SC: So with the coal yard were there ever any stories of people coming to the coal yard and taking coal to heat their places, at night or anything? MP: Not that I know of. GE: Did he work at the coal yard or did he own the coal yard? MP: I think he owned it. GE: Or at least eventually. So he left behind his wife and three children, the wife died, did he bring all his three children over? MP: They all came together. I guess it was right after the First World War. SC: So he came before the First World War. That would make sense. And then you were born in 1925. GE: Do you know how old your mother was when she came over? MP: She was around 18-19 or somewhere around there. GE: So she was already that grown up. What was she? Was she the oldest? The middle? Youngest? MP: She was in the middle. There was one older brother and one younger brother. Matter of fact, there is a picture of my mother you might like to take a look at. GE: Yes, I did, I already saw it. She's gorgeous. SC: I'll take a look at it later. GE: So there were two sons. SC: So is Dottie, so is Dottie. Your father's family, do you know anything about your father's family, the Platts, uh Tullers-- your birth father? MP: I know there was a brother, my late father's brother. Matter of fact, he died in his 90's. He lived in Washington DC. Then there was another brother, somehow we lost track of him. We were never close to any of that side of the family. SC: So your -sort of- adopted father, your step-father, what did he do? MP: He was part of the business. GE: What did he do? MP: He was in the apparel business. SC: So that was in Brooklyn? MP: They started in New York. It was he and two partners. GE: And what were they doing there? Were they tailors? MP: They had a factory. And then the union came along and they were chased out over here. SC: That's a typical story. MP: After years here, the union came here. Local businesses went out and most went down south. SC: What part of the garment industry did they produce for? MP: The name of the firm was Lehigh Valley Shirt Manufacturing Company. GE: How about in New York? MP: I'm not sure. GE: But it was shirts? MP: Probably. GE: But you're not sure. SC: So they came in the 1930's to the Lehigh Valley. Do you know about what year it was? MP: Not sure. Before or during the war, because they all made garments for the troops. GE: They were definitely here sometime in the 30's . . . MP: late 30's, early 40's. GE: And who came here? Was it your step-father came here? MP: Yes GE: So he actually who established the business? MP: Yes, and two partners. SC: Do you know the partners' names? MP: Yes, Samuel Barkan and Samuel Simon. Do you know Marian Barkan? GE: I don't recognize the name. SC: Is she still in the area? Well, that's another contact. So, they made shirts -- how big an industry was it in the early years? MP: I thought our plant was one of the middle size. We had about 80 or 90 employees. SC: And, where was it located in Allentown? MP: Right on Union Street. SC: Did it stay there when you were involved with it? MP: Yes, and then the city bought that plot and now its low income housing development. The 400 block of Union Street. SC: They bought it after the business closed? MP: No, then they moved to North Franklin Street. GE: And North Franklin is where? MP: Between 13th and 14th Streets. SC: When it was at Union, did they buy that property? MP: They bought the building before we came. Every partner had a son and it was worked out that the three sons would belong to the business. SC: When the city bought that property. Was that during the Little Lehigh Urban Renewal? MP: Probably. GE: Or when did that occur? MP: The early 70's. SC: A lot of my projects intersect. When you moved to Franklin Street, did all three of you (sons) come into the business? MP: We went into the business when it was still on Union St. SC: So you bought a new place-- MP: We didn't buy it, we rented it. SC: And you continued to make shirts? MP: Shirts, blouses, dresses-- SC: Were you a contractor for a New York company? MP: Mostly, although we had some Philadelphia stuff. Did you ever hear of Gordon in Philadelphia. J.G. Hook? GE: J.G. Hook, right. SC: Was J.G. Hook women's blouses? MP: Womens of all kinds. We just made the blouses. SC: Gordon, was that blouses or shirts? MP: Again, we made only the blouses. SC: Only the blouses for both of them. Can you talk a little bit about how the business was organized in your step-father's time and in your time? What is very highly capitalized? Did you have a lot of machinery? What type of people did you hire? MP: The sewing industry was the easiest one to get into. You didn't require a lot of capital and I don't know anything about the place in New York. When we came here, the building had three floors. There was sewing on one floor, cutting on another floor and the bottom floor was pressing, shipping and so on. GE: So the finishing. It was sewing, cutting and finishing. SC: What groups of employees did you have over the years? Were they wives of maybe people working in other industries? Were they working class? Was there a certain ethnicity? MP: All manufacturers were women. We always had a mechanic there in the cutting room. As a matter of fact, Irwin Salitsky worked with us - because his business went out too. [unintelligible] GE: Yes. So you were a young child when they came here? MP: No, we were all in our twenties when we went into the business. GE: In other words, if you were born in 1925 when your father came here, he established himself here, about how old do you think you were? MP: Well, I didn't know him until he married my mother. GE: When did he marry your mother? MP: In 1936. GE: Therefore, you were about 11 years ago when he married your mother? MP: Right. GE: At that time was he already here? Or was he still in New York when they got married? MP: I think they just come here. GE: So did you move at that time to Allentown? MP: No, No. My wife and I got married during the war, in 1945, and we lived in New York for a while. I didn't go right into the business. I did different jobs in New York. GE: When your mother and stepfather married in 1936, from what you remember, was he working here and coming home on the weekends? MP: Yes. As a matter of fact I remember going to the subway station and helping him carry his bags. He made me do the Haftorah every Saturday morning. I could do any Haftarah. GE: He made you do the Haftarah. MP: He was very religious and we followed suit. SC: Were you as religious before that? MP: Not really. I was Bar Mitzvahed after he married my mother. As a matter of fact, I laid Tifillin until I went into the army. GE: And that's where you do Morning prayer and Evening prayer. SC: What year did you go into the army? MP: 1945. GE: You went into the army in 1945? SC: So you would have been 20. MP: During the second half of the war and then afterwards, in peacetime. SC: Where were you deployed after you went into the army? Were you in Germany? MP: No, stateside. SC: Stateside the whole time. I know some people did go over and went to Japan or after the war went to Germany during the times of refugees. MP: I had majored in chemistry when I went to City College and I kept getting deferred from being drafted until I graduated. Once I graduated, then they inducted me into the army. After basic training they sent me to Randolph Field in Texas to work in a laboratory. So I never saw real action. SC: And so what made you decide to go into chemistry at City College and did you use it at all once you went into the business? MP: Very little. Some TV shows where you had to say what the signs were for certain chemicals and what certain elements were. Now the element for gold is Au. Did you know that? GE: I did, from chemistry. MP: Then, Sodium was Na. It's weird. GE: Some things stick with you. Did you ever work as a chemist? MP: No. SC: Because you would only have been 20 when you were drafted. MP: I graduated from City College when I was nineteen and a half. Then I worked for a company in New York for a few months, called American Cystoscope Makers. Do you know what a cystoscope is? GE: Is it medical? MP: It's a device where they look into . . . GE: For the bladder. MP: And they were setting up a laboratory, so they hired a main chemist and then he hired me. It was only a couple of months and then I was drafted. SC: Do you remember his name? MP: No. SC: So you were drafted? How long were you in the Armed Services? MP: A little over a year. SC: So it was 1946. MP: As a matter of fact, I was supposed to go overseas. In the Army you get orders, it tells you what to do. I had orders to go to Greensboro, NC, which was a replacement depot for overseas. I was there for a couple of weeks. Then all of a sudden I got orders to go to Massachusetts, there's a big field out there for discharge. I was wondering, how was I so lucky? But, that's the way it went down. I think they made a mistake on me. SC: That's a good mistake! GE: Murray, when you were a child, your mother remarried, you were eleven years old. Do you have any memory of your father? MP No, I was five when he died. GE: What did he die from? MP: He was a house painter. No one really remembers if it was his heart or was it lead poisoning. In those days they used lead. I remember an uncle was also a house painter, it was one of his brothers, telling him, "Abie, wash your hands!" My father's name was Abraham. He never washed his hands, most of them didn't. He didn't die here--..he went to Poland -- to Warsaw -- to see his parents, and he died there. GE: From the time that you were five until eleven, until your mother married this man, where did you and your mom live? MP: We lived with my grandparents for a while, the one who had a coal yard -- they didn't have it then anymore. We lived with them for a while. Then my mother met another woman, a friend, and they took an apartment together. GE: Did your mom work during that time? MP: Yes, in the apparel industry, in New York. Let me tell you a very funny incident. She didn't have any experience [unintelligible] and she applied to a job after my father died. She didn't know anything about sewing, so the man told her to sit down and sew. He sees that she can't sew and he can't use her. She says, well look, (she was very young and beautiful at the time) can you show me how the machine works? He said, sure. Then she went down, went around the corner to another factory to get a job there -- she told the lady that she had experience. My mother didn't have book learning, but she was smart. GE: Did she work as a sewer? MP: Right. GE: Is that the time you moved a lot? MP: We moved a lot after my mom and stepfather were married. We lived in New York for a couple of years, around Brooklyn. GE: During this time when it was you and your mom, I know the Depression was going on, what was life like? Were you very poor? MP: If we were poor, we didn't know it - we had nothing to compare it to. GE: Did you rent? Did you live in an apartment? MP: Oh yes, $45.00 a month rent and the first two months were free! SC: Do you have any memories of what you did in New York playing games? What the children did? MP: I remember playing handball against the wall with some other kids. There was a store right around the corner and the wall was brick -- we played handball there. The guy would come out and yell at us. Years later, we bought a home in Brooklyn, this was before we came here, an end of the row. Then the other kids came and played handball against our wall. GE: Do you remember what school was like? Do you remember playing much? Were you very studious? Did you play a lot? MP: I must have been [studious] because I advanced. In those days they had what they called"RA" - rapid advancement. I guess I had all those courses because I graduated high school at 16, college at 19. I guess I must have been studious. SC: Do you remember playing "kick the can?" MP: I remember playing stick ball -- in the middle of the street. If the ball hit a car, it was out! There weren't many cars then. We played stick ball with a broom handle. SC: Any other memories from your childhood? You have a wonderful memory! Anything else that sticks out to you? Experiences or stories? GE: Murray, you were an only child weren't you? MP: My stepfather had a daughter, Phyllis Steinberg. Does the name ring a bell? GE: Well, Judge Steinberg? MP: That's her son. GE: So his mother was your step-sister. MP: Well, I didn't refer to her as a step-sister, we were very close. GE: Isn't that nice. When your mother married Platt, you were 11, how old was she? MP: She was ten years older than me. GE: Was she already married? MP: She got married the same year. She got married in July, my mother got married to my step-father in November. GE: So you always had a close relationship with her. SC: That's very nice, and she wasn't living in your house at that time? MP: No. Her husband, Henry, had been a lawyer in New York and, I don't know, things, I guess, weren't that great. Anyhow, he had an uncle who had moved a plant to North Carolina and so Henry came down there to work for him. GE: So Henry was an attorney but he also went into textiles. MP: Yes, as a matter of fact, he had a plant in Emmaus. After he worked in North Carolina for a couple of years, then he came up here and this man who came here when he was ten years old -- Samuel Fuchs with six dollars in his pocket - when he died, he was a multi-millionaire. GE: And who is Samuel Fuchs? MP: That is my step-sister's mother's brother. GE: So your step-sister's uncle. SC: How do you spell Fuchs? MP: F-U-C-H-S. I know it's not a nice name----. SC: I always ask because there are so many different spellings -- for the future. MP: He came here as a boy. He started to work in a sewing factory, a couple of years later he bought the factory. Then he started expanding. GE: Was that one of the very first factories? MP: It was in Allentown for a while then he moved to North Carolina --a town called Kinston. He had a big factory, then he went to building and as I said when he died he was a multi-millionaire. SC: Any other memories about your childhood and youth? MP: Not really. GE: About Brooklyn and what it was like? MP: I know we went to Dodgers games. GE: Okay, tell us about it. MP: The Brooklyn Dodgers - twenty-five cents to sit in the bleachers. There was a pitcher, Carl Hubbell -- I don't know if you ever heard of him? He had in one year, won 26 and lost 6 -- and that record still stands. He is the originator of the screwball. Did you hear of that in relation to pitching? That was his thing. SC: Going back then to when you were part of the business, what did you do when you first became part of your step-father's business? MP: Our partners, while my father was the general factory man, one of the other partners was a mechanic and the third partner took care of the cutting and went to New York to collect money for payroll. In those days you had to wait for it to come by mail. [unintelligible] It was a pretty big payroll, don't forget there was pretty many people working. When we came into the business, I took over my father's job of being on the floor, as they say, in production. The mechanic's son took over the mechanics and the other son took over the cutting -- he was in charge of the cutting room. SC: When you say mechanic -- what exactly did that job entail? MP: Well, the machines had to be fixed. Some were bought new, some were bought used, and so on. SC: So did his father then teach him that trade or did he go to school anywhere for it? MP: No, we were all college graduates. GE: You were college graduates but you learned the business by being in the business. Why didn't you go into something, for instance, you were a chemist? Why did you go into the business rather than pursuing . . . .? MP: I always wanted to go into business. GE: Do you think that's true for all three of you? That you just wanted to be in business. MP: Yes. We never had a real profession, although we were all college grads, we hadn't really worked at it. GE: Was it hard, as a Jewish person, to get a job as a chemist? MP: Yes. As a chemist, in a bank . . . a lot of places. The going salary was $35.00 per week. GE: There were a few things - One, it was hard to get a good job as a Jewish person and secondly, it was not that lucrative. It was perhaps more lucrative to go into business. SC: We've asked people, " Why do you think in this region, there was so many Jewish textile or garment industry people." Do you think there is an answer to that? MP: No, except that the Jews gravitated towards this business. It was easy to get into. It didn't require much capital so you didn't have to go borrow money. You set up your own factory and in those days there was a big demand. GE: Who actually was the salesperson or the liaison person with the manufacturers? MP: Samuel Simon. He was the one who would go to New York every week to collect money for payroll. GE: That's also the guy you said was the cutting. MP: Right. GE: Was he, let's say for instance, was he also the one when a contract would run out -- he was the one who would negotiate the contract? MP: We didn't have any formal contracts -- nothing was in writing. You just did the work for them and you hoped they would send you more fabric and it was an on-going deal. GE: Let's say that things were slowing a little, who found a new manufacturer to work for? MP: By then Simon was his garment [unintelligible] and things weren't slow until, I don't know, the 70's or thereabout. GE: So prior to that it was just constant -- all you had to do was fulfill it in a sense. You didn't have to look for it. SC: How were the New York manufacturers different than the Philadelphia manufacturers? Was there a different system going? MP: No. SC: Were the manufacturers bigger in New York and smaller in Philadelphia? MP: Gordon in Philadelphia was a big, big outfit. J. G. Hook -- they are still around, but not as popular. SC: The reason I ask this was New England and New York seem to be larger initially, and many of the Philly textile people were more special order in the late 19th century and very early 20th century. So it had changed by that time . . . MP: We knew only the manufacturers. We did not know other contractors in those areas. SC: As far as you being on the floor, did that mean that you learned every element of sewing and did you actually know how to sew? MP: Oh I know, I still know how to sew. I showed different girls how to sew. SC: So you knew all of the operations so you really could be a hands-on employer. One of the partners was cutting in the cutting room and the other one was the mechanic. Did all of you stay together for a long time? MP: For a while and then gradually they died. GE: Were they older than you? MP: They must have been. One of the partners died in 1976 and the other partner died in 1980. GE: But you stayed together as partners until they were deceased. MP: Not that we didn't have any fights! SC: That's wonderful and unusual too. As far as the business was concerned, did it grow and did you add more machinery and more employees? Maybe different people cutting? MP: Slightly in the beginning, but then it became more and more difficult, it didn't really go downhill, but it was tough to get customers. We had stable customers - Gordon in Philadelphia, J.G. Hook . One company called [unintelligible]. And another one was . . . I forget the name of it. GE: So it was a stable business, not really a growing business. MP: Right, then, I retired in 1987. I turned the business over to a young man who had been working for me. SC: So you gave him an opportunity? MP: He was the son of the foreman when the factory came to Allentown. SC: What was his name -- the foreman? MP: Sam Lutz. He wasn't Jewish. SC: He was Pennsylvania Dutch probably. GE: Did the business survive for a while longer? MP: For a while, but this guy didn't pay much attention to the business. People, customers, would call, they'd want you, they didn't want an office person and he wasn't there. So he lasted a few years, every week it was less and then he just left. SC: Do you know what happened to him, where he went after that? MP: He went to Tama. He was going to cut. GE: He went where? MP: He went to the cutting room at Tama. GE: Tama -- that's Fogelman? MP: After that I don't know what happened. He ended up owing me some money. We had a contract that he would give me so much a week up until a certain amount. [unintelligible] SC: Did the ethnicity of the workers change between the late '40's until 1987? Did they come from different family backgrounds? MP: Towards the end we had more Latino people - as they came along - moving into town. SC: Because this was a good entry work job. MP: At the beginning, it was always Pennsylvania Dutch, Czechoslovokian people, Irish people, but the last few years things were changed. SC: As far as where the factory was--did it stay on Franklin Street the whole time? MP: Yes. SC: Franklin is between 14th and 15th? GE: No, 13th and 14th. MP: No, it was between 14th and 15th. SC: How far up north or was it pretty far down south? MP: It was in the 400 block. SC: It was fairly close to the older factory? MP: Yes, 4th and Union to Franklin. SC: That was pretty many blocks. So, it was in south Allentown. Where did you live when you moved to Allentown? Where did your family live? MP: Valley View Apartments. Do you know where they are? SC: No. GE: This is when you first came. Where is that? MP: South -- right off 15th street - 15th and Elm. The rent there was $92.00 a month. SC: So the three of you lived in an apartment? MP: The others somewhere else. GE: It was just you and Dot? MP: Right. SC: So where did they live? MP: One lived in Tremont Apartments, and I don't know where the other one lived. SC: As far as the older generation -- were they still around? Living in Allentown? MP: No, they had died by then. GE: Your fathers had all passed away. When did your step-father pass away? MP: 1976. GE: Okay, but when you went into the business. . . You went into the business when? Nineteen . . . MP: 54-55. GE: Around 1955 you came here. You went into the business, rather . . . before that you were living in New York -- you and Dottie. When you came here, your father and the two partners were still in the business. MP: Right. GE: You were just coming in with them, and then you stayed in the business with them until -- when did they retire? When did your father retire? MP He never came into the business the last few years, but he still drew a small salary. The other two likely died, I forget the years they died. GE: You went into business around 1955 and those men, as long as they were alive, they were drawing a salary, so you just gradually moved into the business. In 1955, you were doing the production part, were the other two sons of the other two partners, were they now in the business, as well? MP: Yes. They all came in. GE: At that time, this was a very active -- the textile industry was very active. MP: And doing well. GE: Yes, and doing well. Tell us what was the community like? What did you and Dot think when you came here? The Jewish community . . . and when did you start having children? MP: We went to the JCC as soon as we got here. In those days it was still at 6th Street. GE: 6th and Chew I think it was. MP: This building wasn't built until 1958 or 59. SC: How about the community in general? What did you think about the community? Was it friendly? MP: Hess's was great. That was a focal point. SC: I haven't interviewed anyone that hasn't talked about it. MP: You mention Allentown and Hess's and people say, "oh yes, I know Hess's" GE: And the whole downtown was great. MP: There was no Sunday shopping, and it was only open Monday and Thursday evenings. My wife, when she was pregnant, a month or so afterwards she went there and they said, "what did you have, a boy or a girl?" They was a very homey atmosphere. GE: And that was even at the department store. SC: Did you go to the Patio at all? MP: No, I think it was too expensive for me. GE: The Patio was just the restaurant? MP: Yes. They had these great big ice cream things. SC: And strawberry pie. GE: You joined the JCC -- did you find that you easily met people from that? MP: Oh yeah, we had a big circle of friends. Most of them aren't around now. Some moved to Florida, some died. GE: When did you start having children? MP: Our oldest daughter was born in New York and Dennis, the middle son was born here -- right after we moved here. GE: So your oldest child was born in what year? MP: 1949. GE: So your oldest is about 62-63 years old. MP: Right. GE: And then your second child? MP: Dennis -- he was born here. GE: That was nineteen . . .? MP: 54. GE: 1954. The first two, those were boys? MP: No, the first one was a girl. GE: What was her name? MP: Arlene, and she never married. GE: Your second is Dennis. And then your youngest? MP: Ken. GE: What year was he born? MP: Now you're making me think. GE: How old is he? MP: 61. GE: So he was born in '61 -- so he's about 51. MP: He just got his AARP card -- now you get it at 50. SC: Did any of them want to come into the business? MP: Oh no. SC: What did they end up doing? MP: Well, Dennis is a lawyer in Philly. Ken is a pediatrician in Connecticut. and Arlene works for the state in the Welfare Department. She's a supervisor. GE: In the Welfare Department? MP: Yes. SC: Does she work in the Allentown area or in Harrisburg? MP: In Philly. SC: So two of them are together in Philly? MP: No. GE: They both work in the Philly area. MP: They are close. GE: Did they never want to go into the business or did you not want them to go into the business? MP: Combination of both. Although when they were kids, they came and helped work out in the summer. We never urged them. GE: Why? MP: I don't know, we wanted them to be professionals. GE: I'm just curious, were you already seeing the business didn't have that long of a future? MP: Not at that time, we didn't know what the future would be. But, we knew that we wanted the kids to be professionals. SC: It's the American Dream. MP: We were lucky that we could help them out -- we could afford it. SC: Where did they go to school, college? MP: Dennis went to Syracuse undergrad and to Villanova Law School. Ken went to U of P and Duke Medical School, and Arlene went to Penn State, which in those days the tuition, I think, was $1100.00. GE: Things were a little different. SC: Also, as far as the business is concerned, are there any memories you have -- really vivid memories you have of some times in the business -- either highs or lows when you were in the business? MP: Except that we took the various customer's agents out to lunch. GE: Oh, so the customer's agents -- did they often come to your . . .? MP: Yeah, they come once or twice a week. GE: Was that more just to pick up and drop off? MP: Just to see how things were going - how their products were being manufactured. To make sure everything is right and to go to lunch. GE: The manufacturer's agent -- were they employees of the manufacturer? MP: Yes. GE: Oh, they were actually employees. I wasn't sure if they were employees or if they kind of had their own business. SC: Were you unionized? MP: Yes. SC: Which union? MP: Amalgamated Textile Workers. There were two apparel unions - one was the International Ladies Garment Workers and the other was Amalgamated. Since we had made men's wear to start with, it was Amalgamated. Then in later years, we didn't make any more shirts, but the other union didn't bother us. SC: Were you a member of the manufacturer's associations? MP: Probably. GE: Like Arnold Delin? Does that sound familiar? MP: Delin was the other union. SC: Right he was the IGLU -- I hope I said it right. There were two manufacturer's associations in the region. GE: I think one was the Lehigh Valley? SC: Were you a member there? MP: I don't remember. SC: Do you have any other business questions? We could talk about the community then. GE: Did you ever become very automated? MP: No. GE: So yours always stayed pretty basic. MP: Right. Tama did and that's why they lasted longer than everyone else. They just closed two or three years ago. Now I understand all the off-shore plants are automated. [unintelligible] with computers. GE: Right - I guess that's really primarily in terms of the business. You said that your product changed - let's say you did shirts and blouses, is that what you did the whole time? MP: Yes. SC: Is there a reason why you stopped doing shirts? MP: Well, because it became too competitive. Shirts were the first ones to go down south. Blouses, it was more specialty, dresses also the same thing. GE: So you stayed in blouses and dresses. MP: There were smaller, smaller lots -- a group was called a "lot". The shirts could be under the dozens -- all the same - but blouses - a lesser amount. GE: In a sense, the business - niche that you built for yourself was doing specialty -- like smaller lots? MP: More or less, and that's why we existed as long as we did. GE: And it was primarily dresses and blouses? MP: Yes. SC: As far as the 1960's and '70's -- did the business change at all because people became more casual? Did that have an effect on you? MP: No, because we still made classic garments. We made blouses that my wife still has today. They look as good as they did then. There are always certain classics. GE: The dresses you were making, were they typically for young girls, for older women? MP: Older Women. GE: Because dresses -- young women stopped wearing dresses. MP: These were classic types of things. SC: Does your wife still have any blouses that you manufactured? MP: Tons of them. SC: It would be nice to see some of them so we could photograph them. GE: We'll get them later. SC: That's pretty good with the business. GE: You said with the women, it was very boring work. MP: Honey [talking to his wife], these girls would like to see one of your blouses. DOTTIE PLATT: Okay. MP: When's your appointment? Soon? DP: Yes, and I wanted to eat something. You girls, living in this area, what's your second name? GE: Eisenberg. DP: I've heard of that. GE: You've seen me over the years at the Synagogue and things. And she is Susan Clemens. DP: And you grew up in this area? SC: Susan Clement-Bruder. I grew up in Ewing Township, outside of Trenton, New Jersey. GE: And I grew up in Philadelphia - in a very modest home. DP: But it must be very nice. When you are an immigrant, you come here with empty pockets and your children -- they don't have anything. You have to realize this, now come in, and I'll show you my blouses. Then I married Murray because he graduated college at 19, and I thought he was older than that, and he thought I was younger than I am because my mother was looking for the fountain of youth. She lost her hair at as a young girl. There's a name for this illness. MP: Alopecia. GE: Oh. DP: Some people in our area, now, the doctor's wife, I want to say, don't have hair. Do you know Dr. Silverman? MP: Diane. GE: Oh yes. DP: So, my mother had that illness. MP: To make a long story short, my wife worked in the factory -- in the office for several years. As a lot came along, she took a blouse from each one. The one blouse each added up to many blouses over the years. DP: The girl there smoked. Smokers are so addicted that even though they know it hurts them, they sometimes continue. MP: I hope you girls don't smoke. GE: No. DP: There was an article written about a smoker in the Reader's Digest who was a doctor, and he thought it would never happen to him, and he died. I have the article. MP: We had two office girls and one of them developed emphysema. DP: So I came in -- I didn't take anyone's job. I came in to help and I just stayed there. I took one from every lot! It's there for the taking, girls, and I grew up with one blouse. GE: Were you born here? DP: I was born here. GE: You were born here, just your parents came over. DP: Yes. GE: Frankly, my mother was also born here. My father, he didn't come over until 1949. His family was still in Europe and everyone got killed except for him. DP: That really is pretty late to come over. GE: When your family went through the war, that's when you came over. DP: When did Sarah and Sasha come over? MP: Somewhere in the late 40's. GE: If they were after the war they came over, because afterwards, they went to DP camps. MP: Some went to Israel, some came here. DP: So come on, I'll show you my blouses. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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00:55:10
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Murray Platt, July 26, 2012
Description
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Murray Platt talks about how his father’s family began in New York making women’s shirts, failed due to the unions, and then came in the late 1930s to the Lehigh Valley. Murray’s father, with two partners, established Lehigh Valley Shirt Manufacturing Company. They were contractors for manufacturers in New York and in Philadelphia. They cut, sewed and finished the products. The business continued by the sons of these three original partners.
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LVTNT-17
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2012-07-26
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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b2e78c7c8e5129bef3cb4fa25fb18f3d
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Irwin Salitsky
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5.4 May 26th, 2011 Irwin and Claire Salitsky, May 26th, 2011 LVTNT-02 2:08:03 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Irwin Salitsky Claire Salitsky Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 SalitskyIrwin_Claire_20110526.mp4 1.0:|25(15)|58(6)|73(4)|104(2)|127(11)|152(4)|165(12)|182(13)|197(16)|214(10)|229(13)|244(9)|267(7)|284(10)|299(6)|316(5)|335(7)|350(9)|365(15)|390(3)|415(7)|450(12)|475(16)|506(2)|539(4)|560(15)|591(3)|620(4)|649(7)|668(2)|691(6)|712(8)|739(2)|760(5)|785(2)|806(2)|837(13)|880(6)|903(9)|920(12)|941(7)|960(3)|993(3)|1008(15)|1023(10)|1044(4)|1061(6)|1086(2)|1103(12)|1122(8)|1137(9)|1166(11)|1191(4)|1208(9)|1237(9)|1258(10)|1273(5)|1288(4)|1309(5)|1328(12)|1353(6)|1376(7)|1395(8)|1422(3)|1445(9)|1464(7)|1485(18)|1512(10)|1531(15)|1550(12)|1571(6)|1596(4)|1627(7)|1652(11)|1673(17)|1702(10)|1719(7)|1736(3)|1753(7)|1770(11)|1795(11)|1814(8)|1837(3)|1856(7)|1871(8)|1888(7)|1915(10)|1934(14)|1959(7)|1976(16)|1999(7)|2022(11)|2059(5)|2084(14)|2107(12)|2132(15)|2157(7)|2180(7)|2225(5)|2262(8)|2287(3)|2308(8)|2331(13)|2360(4)|2383(6)|2400(13)|2429(2)|2456(7)|2485(3)|2520(12)|2545(14)|2570(2)|2605(12)|2640(8)|2669(4)|2696(16)|2721(2)|2742(16)|2765(9)|2784(15)|2813(10)|2838(2)|2861(7)|2880(10)|2899(19)|2922(10)|2949(8)|2978(10) 0 https://youtu.be/WTiPcTtC44A YouTube video 0 Introduction—Irwin Salitsky SCB: Today is-
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 ; GE: May 26th.
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 ; SCB: Yeah. Today is May 26th, 2011, and we are at an- an interview for the Lehigh Valley Sewing Needle-Trades Oral History Project. That’s what we’re calling it at the moment. So, would you tell me your full name?
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 ; IS: Irwin Salistky, NMI: “No Middle Initial.”
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 ; SCB: And would you spell it for me just for the future? Because everything I ask, it seems really stupid, it's just for people in the future.
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 ; IS: Do you want to read that? It gives you a feeling of the...
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 ; SCB: I will after, I can, I will afterwards. Yeah. So would you spell your name?
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 ; IS: I-R-W-I-N S-A-L-I-T-S-K-Y
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 ; SCB: And also, we are going to be putting you into some kind of personal context. Where were you born? And-
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 ; IS: Brooklyn, New York.
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 ; SCB: Do you know the street? Do you know the region?
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 ; IS: Peck Memorial Hospital, which has been eliminated since. No longer there.
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 ; SCB: Do you know where your parents lived when you were born?
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 ; IS: Yes, Empire Boulevard, three blocks from where now my grandson lives. 0 108 1932: Salitsky Family Moves from Brooklyn, NY to Allentown, PA SCB: And what year did you come?
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 ; IS: 1932.
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 ; SCB: To- And that was to Allentown?
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 ; IS: Pardon?
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 ; SCB: Is that your birthday or was that to Allentown?
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 ; IS: No, what it is- Not only did my parents or my father come, but a lot of the garment industries for some reason or other formed in 1932. It was a great time to leave the city, because of what you'll read later. And we started with nothing. I remember they- My father couldn't afford a car ; his partner, Izzy Weinstein had a car, an old Packard. It was in such bad shape that the door wouldn't stay closed, I remember seeing it, and they had the door tied with a piece of rope around the window frame. They came with my Uncle Morris, who was our family accountant. His- He came from New Jersey and his firm grew into the largest accounting firm in the state of New Jersey.
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 ; SCB: What part of New Jersey?
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 ; IS: Asbury Park.
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 ; SCB: And so, you moved when you were four and your brother was one to Allentown?
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 ; IS: We lived on that street, we moved to 231 South West Street. We lived there for ten years until my father could afford to buy a house, which was ten years later, and made their money during the war. 0 255 Irwin's Father—Cutter and Marker in the Garment Industry IS: I educated myself a great deal more than my father did. He never knew how to sew, never cared to learn. He was happy running the cutting room and making markers—that's laying out the patterns for the best yield possible. And he did the paperwork reporting to the manufacturer what the result was of a spread. In other words, the manufacturer had a rough idea of what the yield should be, based on the total yardage that he sent. They would send us the fabric and we would make a marker based on the width and the type of fabric, because the different fabrics had to be done differently. For example, there is such a thing as a one-way pattern where all- it's a print, where all of the patterns had to go in one direction, and that takes more of a yield. There are a lot of tricks to the trade. I'll- Well, I’ll go over some of them with you. 0 347 Irwin's Education SCB: Where were you educated?
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 ; IS: Educated- I graduated from Allentown High School in 1945. I always had an addiction for flying. So, I was in touch with Parks Air College which is now a part of St. Louis University. And it's in East St. Louis, a shayna [Yiddish for pretty] town you never saw. And this was twenty miles south of East St. Louis. I was a little snot nose kid of 17 and it started July 1st of 1945. It was on a trimester basis. We left, it was funny, we always took a vacation July 4th because that's when the annual vacation for the garment industry was, when the mills were closed and you had a compulsory 2-week vacation. So I got there three days late, because I was up at the Concord, which is in the- in the Borscht Belt. 
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 ; GE: In the Catskills.
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 ; SCB: Yeah.
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 ; IS: I left by a Jitney into Penn Station ; we had a reservation at Penn Station for a non-stop train into St. Louis. It didn't stop in East St. Louis which is across the Mississippi, I was- East St. Louis is in Illinois. I- They knew I was going to be late. Classes started July 1st, 1945 and I was still, in July 4th, at the Concord chasing the waitresses. But it was a great experience. 0 923 1945: Irwin Leaves Parks Air College to Join the Family Business IS: So I thought my future was all laid out. But this was in 1945 and it was after the war and my father's business was very good. And I liked it because I went into the factory from age 16 over the summer and I had my own checking account, money wasn't a problem with my family at that time. We had- They had bought a house, took them 10 years but they had finally accumulated enough money to buy this house on 27th and Washington. And I lived there until we got married.
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 ; GE: So so, you didn’t stay- You didn't graduate from school?
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 ; IS: No. I- I found out- They had representatives of the various corporations would come on campus, and what they were offering in salary, I would blow in a weekend. So I said, “What am I doing? I'm going to knock my brains out for what?” 0 1005 Jewish Fraternities SCB: For the future, “AZA”, what- what is that? 
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 ; GE: It's a Jewish- It’s a Jewish-
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 ; IS: This was a Jewish high school fraternity. It was- We were competitors with AZA. AZA is still active- active. Sigma Alpha Rho, my fraternity, was mainly out of Philadelphia and a lot of the conventions were there and it was, it was- We had a great time. I- I kept saying how lucky I am, growing up in Allentown, maturing with my friends. 0 1047 Early Courtship with Claire IS: At this time when I came home, Claire lived- I was in 27th and Washington, Claire was in 27th and Greenleaf, down the back alley. I needed some surgery for I had a hernia when I came home, and I wanted to take care of it because I kept it in case I was called up for service, which I didn't want to do, go into the service. When I turned 18 in November of that year, I had to go to Chicago because everybody in Illinois had to go to the recruiting station in Chicago. So that was an overnight train deal. I found that, after all the problems, they didn't want to take me because of a hernia, but it was operable. So I waited ‘til I came home and I made- my mother and I made arrangements with a- a urologist in Allentown and I had it taken care of. All of a sudden I'm in the hospital, and I’m lying in bed, and who should come to visit me? Claire. She brought her girlfriend with me- with her because she didn't want to make it too obvious.
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 ; CLAIRE SALISTSKY: But I had gone out with you already.
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 ; IS: Yeah, I had dated her. Well, some of the detail you’ll remember better than I.
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 ; SCB: So you weren’t ever drafted, even though it went to the Korean War years?
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 ; IS: No, no. I got- I got married in ‘48 and had a child in ‘49. So I was a- I was a husband and a father and that was that.
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 ; CS: We went to Muhlenberg
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 ; IS: I went to Muhlenberg for- for 6 months. 0 1329 Recreational Activities at the Jewish Community Center, 1930s-40s IS: One thing about growing up in Allentown, you couldn't lie about your age. Everybody knew everybody else, and what they didn't know they tried to dig up. But growing up was great because the Jewish Community Center was very active. I lived on South West Street for ten years, West and Fairview. All I had to do was walk up to Hamilton Street, take a trolley car—they worked- they worked on Hamilton Street—to 6th street, and if I was lazy, I would take a transfer, get a northbound trolley that would leave me off at Chew Street or I could walk four blocks to the center.
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 ; GE: Where was it located? 6th and Chew?
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 ; IS: 6th and Chew, the old center.
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 ; SCB: Right and then that became the Negro Cultural Center?
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 ; CS: That's right.
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 ; SCB: And now it's the Housing- Housing and Health Center, yeah.
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 ; IS: But it was great because they had Sunday afternoon dances ; they had a jukebox, and we had an active man, George Feldman, who did a fantastic job of being the director. There were many meetings held, they had a restaurant there for a while, a kosher restaurant. AZA and Sigma Alpha Rho had a meeting room by itself on the third floor.
 ; 0 1445 1948: Marriage to Claire IS: So I guess that about sums up my high school, except that, well I might as well swing into getting married. I was- wasn't even 21, but I had sown my wild oats. And Claire was 19 going on 20 in July.
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 ; CS: No. How old are you?
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 ; IS: I got two years on you.
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 ; CS: How old are you? 
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 ; IS: Eighty-three.
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 ; CS: And how old am I? 
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 ; IS: Eighty-one.
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 ; CS: And how long are we married?
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 ; IS: Sixty-two years.
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 ; CS: Yes, so how old was I?
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 ; IS: Nineteen, you were, weren't you? Eighteen. 
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 ; CS: Yeah, I was 19 that month, two weeks later.
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 ; IS: Yeah, you were 18 when we got married July 4th because the mills were closed.
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 ; SC: The factories were closed.
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 ; IS: And her birthday is July 16th, so she was two weeks short of being 19.Is that right? Okay. We got married in New York because the Temple wasn't built yet and we had a big wedding. 0 1585 First Home and Neighbors After Marriage IS: When we got married, Schnitzer built those apartments at 18th and Hamilton on the northwest- the northeast corner, those two separate buildings.
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 ; GE: Okay, right by the synagogue? Right by the little synagogue.
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 ; IS: Yes, a block away.
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 ; CS: And I used to walk up with him. He'd walk me- He’d make me walk every day to the temple and we'd walk through-
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 ; IS: We would check the progress of the building.
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 ; CS: And then come back at 4:30 and take me back to see what they did during the day.
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 ; IS: It was a ball living there because it was a prime apartment. My next- across the hall neighbor was Max Stetner and his father, who was a widower ; and Jerry Bright who was a few years older than me and lived across the hall. His mother’s and all my friends- We had Anne a year later. They would all come and play with her, because I was the first one married, even though I was the youngest of my immediate group. Murray Goodman, the multimillionaire, still lived with his parents, and Murray was a builder in Florida. 0 1728 Salitsky Children and Grandchildren IS: And fortunately my daughter—you could wake up in the middle of the night and she was always happy, had a smile, never cried. It was funny when- This was a one bedroom apartment and when we'd go to bed, her crib was in the bedroom with us, and I got a kick out of- We were lying in bed and we'd hear her rustling. Then two little hands would appear on the railing, and then a- a blonde head with real curly hair and big blue eyes would show up. And she just was curious, and she was always that way, even to this day. She would never go and join in playing with anybody until she sat and watched and decided that she wanted to go in because she would never wanted to make a fool out of herself. Even from her childhood days, she was always that way. She went to the right school and thank God they were all right, all right kids.
 ; 
 ; GE: Your daughter's name?
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 ; IS: Anne. Anne Eleanor. And she was born in 1949. I timed it right—they were all two years apart. In ‘50- ‘51, Irene Vivian was born. She was the first girl admitted to Lafayette [College] when it became co-ed.
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 ; GE: Oh wow.
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 ; IS: And was the first girl to be Phi Beta Kappa at Lafayette. Her daughter went to the Johns Hopkins, also Phi Beta Kappa. 0 1941 Family Businesses: Clyde Shirt and Highland Sportswear SCB: Could we move on to your- your- the business and a couple of things to think about: Who started the business? And we sort of have some of that on here, but maybe we should have it together. Did they own or manage the business? How did they become connected to the business? So-
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 ; IS: Well, they were partners in New York before they came to Allentown to escape the union. And they started almost at the time that Billera’s formed the pants factory in Northampton.
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 ; GE: Who- Who’s Billera? 
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 ; IS: Huh?
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 ; GE: You said Billera started the pants—who is that, that's a company?
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 ; CS: The Billera family.
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 ; IS: Four or five brothers that were tailors in Italy. And they started Clyde Shirt, which was the four story building. Clyde Shirt was- My Father and Izzy Weinstein, they were on the first and fourth floor. Universal Pants, there were two brothers who ran that, in the second and third floor. Then, further west, they started- they made only pants, but they started a, a—what the hell’s the name of that? 
 ; 
 ; CS: Joey’s father?
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 ; IS: No. I had it this morning. A clothing business where they made jackets and suits and sport jackets. That was at 21st Street and Main Street in Northampton.
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 ; CS: And did you have a plant there too?
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 ; IS: When- When- When Weinstein and my father, shortly after they started Clyde Shirt, business was good, so they started Highland Sportswear in Allentown. 0 2139 Relationships with the Villager and Ladybug Companies in Philadelphia IS: So we were able to make different kind of garments, for example, we made shirts, and if you were from Philadelphia you would know them—Villager and Ladybug, do you remember them?
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 ; GE: Yes, I do remember them.
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 ; IS: We were their chief- Most of their-
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 ; CS: We used to stay at their house. Norman Raab.
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 ; IS: When Norman Raab needed contractors, he came to Allentown and stayed at my parents’ house! And we were lucky, we got their-
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 ; GE: And that was- that was a Philadelphia firm. I've heard the name, definitely.
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 ; SCB: And they had an outlet in Telford.
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 ; IS: They made everything. They made purses, they made raincoats, they made shoes.
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 ; SCB: Huge outlet in Telford, I’ve seen it.
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 ; GE: Did you know, you know now that you’re saying it, I think it was related to that—my father had a cousin named Bernie Rutberg, and he’s about your age, a little older than you actually. And after- during the war, I think he worked for somebody, then after the war, he went into making dresses, and I thought it was Villager.
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 ; CS: Probably. 
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 ; IS: Yeah, they made dresses too. 0 2346 Irwin's Role in the Family Businesses SCB: [W]hat was your role in the business when you came back home and worked for your father?
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 ; IS: Oh I- I imitated my father. We had a good marker maker. But I decided to educate myself much further just in case. And I took- learned pattern making. They would give me a sample garment which was usually a medium- a medium and I would grade a small from it, a large, a medium-large, an extra-large, you know, how to operate it. I used a spec sheet—a specification sheet—and I would enlarge the length or I’d you know, I'd make the patterns. 0 2401 1960s: Irwin Leaves the Family Buisness/Salitsky and Weinstein Families Split the Business Partnership IS: And it served me well because my father and I got into a bruha one time and I had to go around knocking on doors looking for a job. So what had happened, I applied- I knocked on all of the doors I knew in Allentown which a lot of my friends owned businesses. Only one of them would say, "Irwin, I don't want to hire a friend. What do you do if it don’t work out—how do you fire a friend?" So I read the handwriting on the wall. And I- did I get a job locally? I don’t think so. 
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 ; CS: What?
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 ; IS: I didn't work locally at all, did I?
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 ; CS: No, you went to New York.
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 ; IS: I- My friend- Nate Braunstein made belts and he subscribed to Women's Wear Daily, so he would save me all of the issues. That was the Bible of the sewing business. And I would borrow his old copies and I would check the ads in the back and I would call and make appointments for an interview. Now I never led on that I was calling from Pennsylvania because I rightfully figured that they didn’t want to hire anybody that had to travel that distance. But I did it for probably about five, six years or more. I would get up at 5 in the morning. I was on the road at 5 in the morning, I’m sorry. And I would get there about 7:30 a.m. We would work from about 8 to 12, 15 minutes for lunch ; but we would quit at 4, so it took me a couple of hours at 4, I was home by 6-6:30. It was just like working here, but a lot more mileage on the car. 0 2912 Highland Sportswear Customers—Government Contracts and Villager IS: At Highland we were so diversified, and I didn't mention this before, we made army shirts, we made blouses for the WAVES—white with a Peter Pan collar—the WAVES of the navy girls. We made raincoats with a hood for the women's air force. We even made shirts for the Florida Highway Patrol. 
 ; 
 ; SCB: So you made government contracts?
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 ; IS: We had government contracts for marine corps shirts with the epaulets, the whole schmear. And we did army shirts, too. And in between we did blouses, which were seasonal, and when that wasn't busy, we made shirts. We had a backbone of Villager because they were always busy, they had two basic styles—a Peter Pan collar, or like a dress collar, long and short sleeves but the patterns were all the same. 0 2985 Overcuts IS: Now the secret of our business was overcuts. That is the ability to make a marker, laying out the patterns, better than they figure that they can do. The way we did this, we’d get the piece goods in, let’s say 60 inch goods. We had a 60 inch- one table was about 66 inches wide so that we could spread wide goods. But- Butting into it was 48 inch table for 45 inch goods. This we learned over time, I mean I make it sound like it’s nothing. But doing it, for example, if we got piece goods in and maybe ten percent of the piece goods were 42 inches wide, the rest were 40 inches. So we took the time and trouble to remake a marker for that extra width. And we were able to have a higher yield. And-
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 ; GE: So-so with this overcuts, what you're saying that the profit margin is very much if you can get a higher yield?
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 ; IS: Right.
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 ; GE: You’ll get a little more production out of it.
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 ; IS: Right, and then sell them on the open market for cash.
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 ; GE: Oh, okay. So in other words, if you're supposed to make 95 for the manufacturer, if you're able to make 100, then the other 5 you can sell?
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 ; IS: Right. I mean...
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 ; CS: It’s how flea markets operate.
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 ; SCB: And would that have been also labeled as Villager or not?
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 ; IS: Mainly Villager because I had a traveling salesman who we were friendly with, who traveled all the way out to Central Pennsylvania. And I made him promise that do not sell any retail establishment in a city that has Villager on the label, that sells Villager, because it will blow my business there, they would cut me out. And they could tell by the markings on the boxes where it came from, you know, we stamped the lot number, the style number, the size, you know. So fortunately, we didn’t get caught. 0 3421 Irwin Moves to Albany, GA Seeking Work in the Garment Industry After Leaving the Family Business IS: But I was conscientious, I was never late, I was always there on time. But when things got slow, it was like a one-dimensional kind of thing and I was the latest hire and they could supervise a cutting room without me. I even went down South—one of the ads I saw was a big company in- outside Albany, Georgia, near Peanut Country. And I went to New York, the owner worked in- out of New York in the sales room. They made athletic wear, matching pants and jackets with different fabric.
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 ; SCB: Like a sweatsuit?
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 ; IS: Like athletic jogging suits. Like a jogging suit kind of.
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 ; GE: Now are we in the 1970s at this point?
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 ; SCB: We should be, yeah.
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 ; IS: About then, yeah. So I went to New York and explained my background and he said, “Irwin, you're hired. Go down, find a place to live,” and he always had a motel in Albany because where the plant was—about 20 miles northeast—it was in a very rural area. So we could talk while we're going to work together, you know. He- He would go down every six weeks or so. And the plant manager was a Jewish guy, was a Kochalech [Yiddish-- possibly a shortened version of kochleffel, a pot stirrer]. He was in charge of the plant and was used to doing things his own way, and I let it go at that. I mean I- He didn't bother me, this was a tremendous cutting room. It was about eight cutting tables. 0 3843 Irwin's Education and Community Values (cont'd) IS: Before my time, then they had three junior high schools—Raub, Central, and Harrison-Morton. Harrison-Morton was down around 3rd Street, where all the Hispanics and Blacks went, the poorer families. Central was around 9th and Liberty, somewhere around there. 
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 ; CS: Linden.
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 ; IS: And that was for what I called the Jewish middle class. There were few Jews there, but it was working class people who worked in the downtown area. Raub was in the western end. It was the most- for the most wealthier citizens, most of the Jewish kids went to Raub. And-
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 ; GE: Where did you go?
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 ; IS: To Raub. I went to Raub for first through ninth grade. And I walked, it was within walking distance of where I lived. But as I said, it was a- It was annoying at the time, but when I look back now, it was a great advantage. For example, we- we didn’t need the- the Gentiles ; we had our own clique, our own friends. I had a high school fraternity of about 15-18 guys, Jewish friends. AZA was big at that time also. Claire missed out on a lot of that because her father struck it rich early. She lived in a nice area, what I call the deep west end of Allentown. So she missed out, she got her- her growing up through the Center, she was lucky that way. But I got mine on a daily basis, from the people I associated with and where I lived. 0 4364 Relationship to Morris and Lena Senderowitz CS: Morris Senderowitz was a great benefactor of Muhlenberg.
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 ; GE: Oh, was he?
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 ; CS: And he was a very good friend of the families. He lived at 18th and Hamilton Street, and Morris got the boys into Muhlenberg and Cedar Crest was the same story. Because my trunk went to Rhode Island, I was going to Pembroke, which is part of Brown and I decided I didn’t want to leave my mother. And my mother told me to be honest, if it was that I was Irwin’s, say it. So she- I said well, I’d rather stay in Allentown. So Lena Senderowitz, we got a phone call, and she was on the board at Cedar Crest, and I went to Cedar Crest.
 ; 
 ; SC: Well that’s a good segue. 0 4505 Introduction—Claire Salitsky SCB: So Claire, I’d like to ask you what your full name is and more about your family background, a little bit more about your family background. But let’s- let’s talk a little bit about where your family came from. 
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 ; CS: Oh, I have that inside. Irwin, on the table there’s that paper from Anne, you know, our oldest daughter. I mean, from Alison, our oldest granddaughter, is very interested in genealogy, so I gave her all the records I had and she- she gave me where they came from.
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 ; SCB: Well, let me just ask you, what is your full name, when were you born, and where were you born?
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 ; CS: My full name is Claire Joy Wiener Salitsky. 
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 ; IS: W-I-E-N-E-R.
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 ; CS: And I was born in Paterson, New Jersey, July 16th, 1929. My mother’s name was Mary Mendelson Wiener and my father was Louis Wiener. My mother was born in Paterson ; she was one of nine children who grew up ; there were fifteen originally. 0 4565 Claire's Family History CS: My mother’s name was Mary Mendelson Wiener and my father was Louis Wiener. My mother was born in Paterson ; she was one of nine children who grew up ; there were fifteen originally.
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 ; IS: That was before television.
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 ; CS: And she came from a- a very religious, orthodox family, and she was second from the end. I have a picture of them hanging on the wall. My father was born in Poland in a shtetl [Yiddish for small Jewish village in Eastern Europe] called- Ojikauf is the name of the burial society, but he was born in 1907. No, 1903, and he came to this country in 1907. He was the third child in the family. Now, my grand- My father’s family they were- they were silk weavers. They lived in the shtetl near “Lodz” [Claire pronounces it LODZ]. Lodz was a silk weaving- 
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 ; GE: Lodz [pronounced LUDJ]? I think that’s Lodz. 
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 ; CS: Yes, and they lived in- According to what was found, they lived in- they called it D-O-L-Y-S-Z-I-N. But they called it Russia. Now Lodz was Lodz at that point, you know the boundaries were constantly changing. You didn’t know. My grandmother’s maiden name was Warshawsky. Now I did get a copy of the marriage thing. And her husband, my grandfather’s name was Joel Robilinsky. Okay. In order to get out of the country, he- his- my- took his brother-in-law’s army papers. He was out of the army already. And he came to the United States with his brother-in-law’s army pass. His brother-in-law’s name was Joel—“Yo’el”, Yo’el, whatever—something like Wiener. 0 4771 1987: The Salitskys Seek Family History in Russia SC: My mother’s family, my grandfather, came from a shtetl named Barstitzti, B-A-R-S-T-I-T-Z-T-I, near—I knew it as Lithuania. 
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 ; GE: Right, right now, Vilna, Vilna. 
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 ; CS: Vilna. It was right near Vilna, because when I went to Russia the first time, I went on to Lithuania, and all I could- there I heard- I found anti-Semitism. Terrible. The bus driver wouldn’t take us. There was a group of Jewish girls on the trip. 
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 ; GE: When was this around?
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 ; CS: The first time I went to Russia was 19- When did I open my travel agency? 1980? Your 60th birthday, how old are- how- When was that? 1929… 1989. 
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 ; IS: [19]87.
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 ; CS: Eighty- 1987, it was around then. And they wouldn’t take us, and we got a cab, and I took my sister-in-law who had never been out of the country with me to Russia. My father almost had a bird that the two of us were going where they had struggled to get out. I found it fascinating. 0 4866 Claire's Family History (cont'd) CS: They lived near Vilna and he was a farmer there. When he came to the United States, he came first in ‘04 and she- and he came over in 1896 and she followed in 19- 1897 with one, two, let’s see… The three sons, the one daughter, four of the kids, and every year she had another- another child. But he started out as a huckster guy, and then he got involved in the building business. And he became—as I never found this out, I mean, I knew he owned tenement buildings, because every Friday at three o’clock when we got out of school, we got in the car and we went to Slatington, where my father’s factory was, to pick up my father and he’d drive to Paterson because we had to get there before Shabbos [Yiddish for Sabbath]. And we would come home Sunday night. So on Sundays I would go with my cousin and we would collect the rent. To me it was fun! We went in and out of these buildings on- And there were blocks of them. I- I didn’t know from anything. And- But years later, in Florida, I met somebody and he happened to admire what I was wearing. It was a Valentine’s Day party and I was wearing something red. And he said to me, where are you from? And I said from Allentown, Pennsylvania. And I said where are you from? He said Paterson, New Jersey. I said, oh, I was born there. Oh! Well what did you, you know, what is your name? We go through this whole thing and it ended up he had bought my aunt’s house. And, you know, he said, your grandfather was William Mendelson. I said, yes. He said he gave a lot of money to charity but he was a slum landlord. 0 5293 Louis Weiner's Silk Weaving Business CS: My father was in business with his father in Paterson when the Depression hit. 
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 ; SCB: What kind of business was that?
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 ; CS: He was in the silk weaving business. 
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 ; SCB: He was in the silk weaving business, yeah.
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 ; CS: And he had- He- He couldn’t make it and so he knew he was going to have to go bankrupt. And he went to his father-in-law and he explained the situation. And his father-in-law and his two brothers, two of the three brothers-in-laws agreed he should go through bankruptcy, it wouldn’t hurt. My father went to a stranger who gave- lent him the money to pay all his bills. And he had this opportunity, I don’t know how he heard about it, but there was an empty factory in Slatington. And he- He went- He came here and he was able to make a deal with the city of Slatington, and he was just very fortunate. He- he had- He had when he came here a partner from Paterson, an older man, whose last name was also Wiener, but was spelled W-E-I-N-E-R. And he had a son named Jack who he had- He wanted his son to learn the business so my father- He came along and he was married. He wanted to live in Slatington, my father would not allow my mother- My mother- He thought my mother would want to stay in Paterson and he’d come home weekends. Well, my mother was told by her mother, you go with your husband. And so she came, and she- they lived in Allentown at 2445 Union Street. 0 5772 For Years, Mary Wiener Pays the Dairy Bill for Local Jewish Families Who are Less Fortunate CS: Oh, it was a Triumvirate. Mitchell Katz, he was the family doctor, Rabbi William Greenburg, and Nettie Klass, Mrs. Aaron Klass. And they would find these people who needed help.
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 ; GE: Now is this like the 1950s?
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 ; CS: Oh this is- I’m married 63 years.
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 ; IS: [19]49 or ‘48. Early ‘50s.
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 ; CS: And it was- All I know is, when she went to Florida, she [my mother] said to me, “I’m leaving you signed checks for Freeman’s dairy.” I said for what? She said, “Well,” she says, “I pay for milk for people, and so I want you, you know, to pay the bill.” I said all right. But you know, this went on year after year after year. And one day, I walked- I was then already involved with the Federation, and I asked George Feldman—well then it was called UJA—I asked him, the executive director of the Center and the UJA, I said, “I- I have to ask you something, Mr. Feldman. My mother is buying milk for all these people.” I said, “Do you know—do they still have little children?” And he looked at me and he said, “No.” He said, “Really I should tell Mary to stop.” So I said, “Well, I’m going to tell Mary, I’m not-” Do you know she got mad at me? And she said you will continue and I will continue while I’m alive. If they don’t need it, maybe their children need it. 0 6033 Claire's Childhood and Education in Allentown, PA CS: Well anyway, we grew up ; I walked- I used to walk to school from 25th and Union to the Raub School. I mean when I think about it today, that our parents could let us walk that distance, and it was a- and our neighborhood was gentile. Across the street was a Rumberger family and they were wonderful. I grew up with Janet Rumberger. And we had an empty lot next to the house, my father got permission from the city to clear it. And he put toys out there, you know, kids’ things. But unfortunately, older kids would come and trash it, so my father took it down, took down the toys and that was it. But that’s where we lived. And- Well the Samuels family lived a block away and they were very nice to my parents when they moved here. And then when I was in third grade, I remember it was my parents’ fifteenth wedding anniversary, we moved to the house 2710 Greenleaf Street. And I used to go to school with Ruthie Rappaport, there were very few Jewish kids in the Muhlenberg School. 
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 ; GE: Very few?
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 ; CS: Very few. And- But I guess- My- My childhood memories of Allentown were wonderful. I think this is a wonderful place for kids to grow up. I was happy here, I mean- and then I went to Raub Junior High, and then I went to Allen- It was Allentown High School in those days. 0 6642 The Hess Family (Owners of Hess's Department Store) as Neighbors SCB: So, were your parents good friends of the Hesses?
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 ; CS: Pardon me?
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 ; SCB: Were your parents good friends of the Hesses?
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 ; IS: Nobody really was good friends with the Hesses. 
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 ; CS: Well Max Hess lived on Livingston Street at- at 27th. And he- Richard was his- You see, there was a table in Hess’s patio in the back. A big round table where local businessmen used to eat, the Jewish men. And Max Hess would always join them. And he- I remember once they were working on a thing for the Center, counting Jewish families, and he says you count me, but not my wife and my children. He was married to a gentile woman, Betty Douglass. 0 6889 Louis Weiner's Contributions to the Allentown Jewish Community GE: Going back with your father, Louis Wiener, do you want to tell us a little bit? Because I know he was a major pillar in the community, the Jewish community with the institutions. What were some of the- Was he a president of the synagogue?
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 ; CS: No, he would never be the president. But he was the chairman of the board for umpteen years. And when he gave it up, he felt that it was time for the younger people to take over, he believed strongly in that. And they made him the honorary chairman of the board, which he has- had... 
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 ; IS: He was the driving force for the new building of the new Temple. 
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 ; GE: On 17th and Hamilton?
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 ; IS: Yeah. At that time, Claire and I were just married, and we were living with them until- We didn’t have our own house then. 0 7051 How the Jewish Community Has Grown and Changed Through Its Members Commitment and Philanthropy CS: These men were a different generation. They aren’t like the men of today. Bobby Hammel is like these men. Bobby Hammel is a good- he’s- he’s wonderful. 
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 ; GE: You’re right. Very philanthropic and very community-minded. 
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 ; CS: Yes. These men believed in Rabbi Greenburg. He just drew them in. And he- he felt we needed a bigger synagogue, we had more members, the Hebrew school. I went to Hebrew school at the Lincoln School and confirmation- confirmation class at Greenburg’s house. I was in his first confirmation class and we had up on the Temple of- on 12th and Walnut, I swear the mice used to be running in the cotton. We had one big room. It was awful. So they wanted this. We had the Center, and we needed our synagogue. And these men, they gave from the heart. 
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 ; IS: They were all like Bobby Hammel, but in different stages, it was what they could afford. They had the same ideas like Bobby of being generous and what they could afford and that’s the way most of the men were and that’s the way the Temple was really built. 
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 ; CS: And it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. 0 7328 1970 Bus Accident on Route 22—the Allentown Jewish Community's Response to the Tragedy CS: But you know, we had our center, we had our synagogues, and we had our community. 
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 ; IS: We didn’t have to bother with Gentiles, actually. 
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 ; CS: When we- You know, years and years ago we had that terrible bus accident. 
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 ; GE: I heard about that, I heard.
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 ; CS: That was a terrible, terrible thing.
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 ; GE: This was a bus accident on Route 22, is that the one that you’re saying? 
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 ; CS: It was yeah, out past- 
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 ; GE: It was where it was slippery out by Lafayette.
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 ; CS: It was a terrible bus accident and I know it was a Thursday afternoon. And it was my birthday weekend and my daughter, Joanie was coming home, she was at- went for a summer in Richmond. And she was flying home that weekend. And my- Everything Thursday I was working then for Sandy Zales and Nina. 0 MovingImage Irwin Salitsky talks about how his father (Barney Salitsky) and his partner (Izzy Weinstein) moved the business from New York to Allentown in 1932 to escape the unions. Irwin was four years old. Irwin’s father and his partner started Clyde Shirt and later Highland Sportswear. Irwin loved growing up in Allentown and living in the heart of the Jewish neighborhood [around West and Walnut St.]. Barney Salitsky and Izzy Weinstein were partners for about 40 years. Eventually, when the sons were in the business, the partnership was dissolved.
 ; 
 ; Claire Salitsky affectionately talks about the wonderful role models her parents were. Her father was a silk weaver in Paterson, NJ with his father. But when the depression hit, things quickly soured. There was an available factory in Slatington, PA for Claire’s father to purchase but he needed a loan to do so. A veritable stranger gave him the loan and Claire’s father and new partner became very successful. Due to that generosity, Claire’s parents actively helped others in the community who were less fortunate and needed financial assistance.
 ; Interview with Irwin Salitsky, May 26th, 2011 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Today is- GAIL EISENBERG: May 26th. SCB: Yeah. Today is May 26th, 2011, and we are at an- an interview for the Lehigh Valley Sewing Needle-Trades Oral History Project. That's what we're calling it at the moment. So, would you tell me your full name? IRWIN SALISTKY: Irwin Salistky, NMI: "No Middle Initial." SCB: And would you spell it for me just for the future? Because everything I ask, it seems really stupid, it's just for people in the future. IS: Do you want to read that? It gives you a feeling of the... SCB: I will after, I can, I will afterwards. Yeah. So would you spell your name? IS: I-R-W-I-N S-A-L-I-T-S-K-Y SCB: And also, we are going to be putting you into some kind of personal context. Where were you born? And- IS: Brooklyn, New York. SCB: Do you know the street? Do you know the region? IS: Peck Memorial Hospital, which has been eliminated since. No longer there. SCB: Do you know where your parents lived when you were born? IS: Yes, Empire Boulevard, three blocks from where now my grandson lives. GE: Oh, isn't that something? IS: I couldn't wait to get out of Brooklyn and he loves it! Course I was four- four years old at the time, and he was- He was an infant. I am- I was four- No, we came here, I was five, he was one. I'm four years older than him. SCB: And what year did you come? IS: 1932. SCB: To- And that was to Allentown? IS: Pardon? SCB: Is that your birthday or was that to Allentown? IS: No, what it is- Not only did my parents or my father come, but a lot of the garment industries for some reason or other formed in 1932. It was a great time to leave the city, because of what you'll read later. And we started with nothing. I remember they- My father couldn't afford a car ; his partner, Izzy Weinstein had a car, an old Packard. It was in such bad shape that the door wouldn't stay closed, I remember seeing it, and they had the door tied with a piece of rope around the window frame. They came with my Uncle Morris, who was our family accountant. His- He came from New Jersey and his firm grew into the largest accounting firm in the state of New Jersey. SCB: What part of New Jersey? IS: Asbury Park. SCB: And so, you moved when you were four and your brother was one to Allentown? IS: We lived on that street, we moved to 231 South West Street. We lived there for ten years until my father could afford to buy a house, which was ten years later, and made their money during the war. GE: So- So this was an apartment? IS: It was a four- It was a double unit with an upstairs. There were four- four units on South West Street. SCB: Do you remember the number? IS: 231 South West Street. SCB: 231 South West Street. IS: Right. SCB: And where did you live in- IS: 27th and Washington. SCB: Oh, the second one? And when you were in Brooklyn, what- what did your father do when-? IS: He was a cutter. SCB: He was a cutter. IS: I educated myself a great deal more than my father did. He never knew how to sew, never cared to learn. He was happy running the cutting room and making markers--that's laying out the patterns for the best yield possible. And he did the paperwork reporting to the manufacturer what the result was of a spread. In other words, the manufacturer had a rough idea of what the yield should be, based on the total yardage that he sent. They would send us the fabric and we would make a marker based on the width and the type of fabric, because the different fabrics had to be done differently. For example, there is such a thing as a one-way pattern where all- it's a print, where all of the patterns had to go in one direction, and that takes more of a yield. There are a lot of tricks to the trade. I'll- Well, I'll go over some of them with you. SCB: Okay, could we just talk a little bit first about- IS: Oh sure, go ahead. SCB: Also, your- Your educational history. IS: Pardon? SCB: You- How- Where were you educated? IS: Educated- I graduated from Allentown High School in 1945. I always had an addiction for flying. So, I was in touch with Parks Air College which is now a part of St. Louis University. And it's in East St. Louis, a shayna [Yiddish for pretty] town you never saw. And this was twenty miles south of East St. Louis. I was a little snot nose kid of 17 and it started July 1st of 1945. It was on a trimester basis. We left, it was funny, we always took a vacation July 4th because that's when the annual vacation for the garment industry was, when the mills were closed and you had a compulsory 2-week vacation. So I got there three days late, because I was up at the Concord, which is in the- in the Borscht Belt. GE: In the Catskills. SCB: Yeah. IS: I left by a Jitney into Penn Station ; we had a reservation at Penn Station for a non-stop train into St. Louis. It didn't stop in East St. Louis which is across the Mississippi, I was- East St. Louis is in Illinois. I- They knew I was going to be late. Classes started July 1st, 1945 and I was still, in July 4th, at the Concord chasing the waitresses. But it was a great experience. One thing about Allentown--and Claire will bare me out--we loved living in Allentown. You may not be aware of some of the reasons, but in 1932, everybody was new. We had a bunch of fellows that I was friendly with, like Jerry Neff for example. When I tell people that he's been a friend of mine for 70 years, they think I'm crazy. They don't even know their next-door neighbor where they live. But what it did- Having a great group of friends, you mature fast. Claire is two years younger than me, but she was in a different clique. I didn't get together with Claire- Well I'll come to that later on. But we were a different group. In other words, when one guy learned how to jitterbug, we all got to learn. And at the time, I was six feet tall like I am today. And believe it or not, I weigh now what I did then. I used to weigh a little over 200 and now I weigh 165. So, I was able to lie about my age and get away with it. So what had happened--they met me, the grounds- the head groundskeeper met me at the station in St. Louis and brought me to the campus which was in a little village of Cahokia in Illinois. It's a- the scene of a big Monsanto chemical plant. You always got the stink from the chemicals. And what is a kid of 17 do when he doesn't know a soul, never been there before, the first weekend? So I looked up in the telephone book the address of the YMHA or Jewish Community Center. And I got the address and I found out how to get there. I had to take a bus from the campus into East St. Louis, another bus crossing the Mississippi and this, the YMHA, was in West St. Louis. I took another bus there. I had a car which my father sold but really I should have had it there. It annoyed the hell out of me because when my kid brother, who was four years younger, went to college he had a car. I was low man on the totem pole. But anyhow, I go to the YMHA and they had- It was a great deal because Scott Field was an army air base in Illinois about 20 miles from St. Louis. And the Lambert Municipal Airport in St. Louis was a naval training station. They had a lox and bagel deal every Sunday morning for the servicemen who came to the YMHA and they also honored veterans. I'm 17 years old. Nothing- I lied my way all the way through, but I was able to get away with it because I was tall, I even grew a mustache for the occasion. And I come there and who do I see walking in the door? Three of my high school fraternity brothers from Wilkes Barre. We had a high school fraternity in high school, and we had branches in Wilkes Barre, Scranton, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, and we always had conventions. GE: Is this like AZA? IS: Well yeah. GE: That type of thing? IS: We were competitors. AZA was there at the Jewish Community Center, where we met. And it helped us mature. I was able to lie about a lot of things. In fact, I was dating a girl--gorgeous, 24 years old--she said, "I would never go out with anybody younger than me." But I lied and I got away with it. Anyhow, one of the guys that I met was Mendy [Yiddish name] Rudolph. The name may not mean anything to you, he ended up being a very well-known basketball referee for professional basketball. And he was still in the army. His father was a basketball referee, he came from Wilkes Barre. And there were a couple other guys that I used to see. And I met- we met girls, and I had lox and bagels, and I'll never forget- This is in July, and it's coming up to November, and I made a sob story that we're gonna have spam for Thanksgiving. So I got myself invited to Thanksgiving dinner by one of the girls there. And I- I had a ball, I really enjoyed it. I learned how to fly, I- I had 5 hours solo in an airplane by myself. But as things went along, I was never that studious. I would say I was above average intelligence, but not- nothing super. What I liked about this school was I hated taking a foreign language in high school and it wasn't a requirement. So that sort of cemented why I would go there ; plus it was a- an accelerated program, a trimester for three years, at which time you graduated with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Aeronautical Engineering and an A& ; E Certificate which allowed you to work on airplane engines--I could get a job as a mechanic--and a private pilot's license, that you had to accumulate 25 hours of solo. So I thought my future was all laid out. But this was in 1945 and it was after the war and my father's business was very good. And I liked it because I went into the factory from age 16 over the summer and I had my own checking account, money wasn't a problem with my family at that time. We had- They had bought a house, took them 10 years but they had finally accumulated enough money to buy this house on 27th and Washington. And I lived there until we got married. GE: So so, you didn't stay- You didn't graduate from school? IS: No. I- I found out- They had representatives of the various corporations would come on campus, and what they were offering in salary, I would blow in a weekend. So I said, "What am I doing? I'm going to knock my brains out for what?" SCB: Couple follow-ups. For the future, "AZA", what- what is that? GE: It's a Jewish- It's a Jewish- IS: This was a Jewish high school fraternity. It was- We were competitors with AZA. AZA is still active- active. Sigma Alpha Rho, my fraternity, was mainly out of Philadelphia and a lot of the conventions were there and it was, it was- We had a great time. I- I kept saying how lucky I am, growing up in Allentown, maturing with my friends. At this time when I came home, Claire lived- I was in 27th and Washington, Claire was in 27th and Greenleaf, down the back alley. I needed some surgery for I had a hernia when I came home, and I wanted to take care of it because I kept it in case I was called up for service, which I didn't want to do, go into the service. When I turned 18 in November of that year, I had to go to Chicago because everybody in Illinois had to go to the recruiting station in Chicago. So that was an overnight train deal. I found that, after all the problems, they didn't want to take me because of a hernia, but it was operable. So I waited 'til I came home and I made- my mother and I made arrangements with a- a urologist in Allentown and I had it taken care of. All of a sudden I'm in the hospital, and I'm lying in bed, and who should come to visit me? Claire. She brought her girlfriend with me- with her because she didn't want to make it too obvious. CLAIRE SALISTSKY: But I had gone out with you already. IS: Yeah, I had dated her. Well, some of the detail you'll remember better than I. SCB: So you weren't ever drafted, even though it went to the Korean War years? IS: No, no. I got- I got married in '48 and had a child in '49. So I was a- I was a husband and a father and that was that. CS: We went to Muhlenberg IS: I went to Muhlenberg for- for 6 months. CS: No. IS: Yeah, it was- Wasn't it? Somewhere along three months, whatever. CS: It was longer. IS: Claire, of course, was 19. Not even 19, you were- CS: You went to Muhlenberg and- while I was still in seminary, Moravian Seminary. IS: Yeah, she went to Moravian Seminary. CS: You were- You went to Muhlenberg by two years, Irwin. IS: Yes, two years. Claire was very bright. She had her choice of colleges. Her father was well to do and she could afford any college, but she chose Cedar Crest much to her parents' annoyance, because she didn't want to leave dear old Irwin. SCB: You know, you and Max Hess both left Muhlenberg. IS: Max Hess? SCB: Yes, he came back home from World War II, went to Muhlenberg for a while, and then left Muhlenberg to take over the business. IS: Max Hess lived up the block from- We lived- She lived on Greenleaf Street and 27th Avenue, he lived on 28th Street and- CS: And Livingston. IS: Greenleaf. Not Greenleaf. CS: Livingston. Max Hess lived on Livingston. IS: Livingston Street. GE: Is he a contemporary of yours? CS: No, he was older. IS: No, he was a little older. CS: He- He- He was actually, well he was younger than my father, but they were friends. IS: Yeah. We had the first two- Max Hess and my father-in-law had the first extra large screen television set in the city of Allentown. It was one of those, not a direct tube that large, it was a projection model. GE: Oh my goodness. SCB: Yeah. I was talking about Max Hess Jr., came home and- CS: No, are you- You're talking about his son. SCB: Yes, his son. Came home and went to Muhlenberg College and then dropped out. CS: There were three Max Hesses. IS: Max Hess was Max Hess Jr., actually. That was his real name. His son was I guess the third. CS: Tommy. SCB: Tommy? IS: Tommy. CS: Tommy was his son. Tommy was Anne's age. IS: One thing about growing up in Allentown, you couldn't lie about your age. Everybody knew everybody else, and what they didn't know they tried to dig up. But growing up was great because the Jewish Community Center was very active. I lived on South West Street for ten years, West and Fairview. All I had to do was walk up to Hamilton Street, take a trolley car--they worked- they worked on Hamilton Street--to 6th street, and if I was lazy, I would take a transfer, get a northbound trolley that would leave me off at Chew Street or I could walk four blocks to the center. GE: Where was it located? 6th and Chew? IS: 6th and Chew, the old center. SCB: Right and then that became the Negro Cultural Center? CS: That's right. SCB: And now it's the Housing- Housing and Health Center, yeah. IS: But it was great because they had Sunday afternoon dances ; they had a jukebox, and we had an active man, George Feldman, who did a fantastic job of being the director. There were many meetings held, they had a restaurant there for a while, a kosher restaurant. AZA and Sigma Alpha Rho had a meeting room by itself on the third floor. GE: And this is the 1930s and 1940s? IS: Yes, in- Well in- CS: The '30s even. Late '30s into '40s. IS: So I guess that about sums up my high school, except that, well I might as well swing into getting married. I was- wasn't even 21, but I had sown my wild oats. And Claire was 19 going on 20 in July. CS: No. How old are you? IS: I got two years on you. CS: How old are you? IS: Eighty-three. CS: And how old am I? IS: Eighty-one. CS: And how long are we married? IS: Sixty-two years. CS: Yes, so how old was I? IS: Nineteen, you were, weren't you? Eighteen. CS: Yeah, I was 19 that month, two weeks later. IS: Yeah, you were 18 when we got married July 4th because the mills were closed. SC: The factories were closed. IS: And her birthday is July 16th, so she was two weeks short of being 19.Is that right? Okay. We got married in New York because the Temple wasn't built yet and we had a big wedding. Her- My parents and Claire's parents were very well known in Allentown. My father-in-law was chairman of the board of the Center. My father was on the committee that built the Temple and my father-in-law was the chairman of the building committee... GE: This is which synagogue? Temple Beth El? IS: Of the new building. GE: Okay, this is when it was just being built on 17th and Hamilton. When was that built? Right around this time? CS: I- I would have to think. Anne is going to be 62 in June, correct? So Anne was born in '49--yeah we were married in '48. IS: We were married in '48. CS: Anne was born in '49, the Temple was being constructed. And I remember walking, every morning--my father's first stop in the morning was to pick me up, stop at the- and then- I lived- We lived at 18th and Hamilton. IS: When we got married, Schnitzer built those apartments at 18th and Hamilton on the northwest- the northeast corner, those two separate buildings. GE: Okay, right by the synagogue? Right by the little synagogue. IS: Yes, a block away. CS: And I used to walk up with him. He'd walk me- He'd make me walk every day to the temple and we'd walk through- IS: We would check the progress of the building. CS: And then come back at 4:30 and take me back to see what they did during the day. IS: It was a ball living there because it was a prime apartment. My next- across the hall neighbor was Max Stetner and his father, who was a widower ; and Jerry Bright who was a few years older than me and lived across the hall. His mother's and all my friends- We had Anne a year later. They would all come and play with her, because I was the first one married, even though I was the youngest of my immediate group. Murray Goodman, the multimillionaire, still lived with his parents, and Murray was a builder in Florida. CS: He built Village West. And he built- GE: Village West is what? CS: Shopping center, across the street from you know, at Tilghman and Cedar Crest Boulevard. GE: Oh, oh, oh, where Giant is? CS: Where the Giant is. SC: And that's Murray Goodman? IS: Where the Giant is, yeah. He was a commercial- His father was a commercial builder, but he out-distanced his father. CS: He made it big time. IS: And Stanley Finkel lived there, and I mustn't forget Larry Somach, the crazy one--the cheap SOB. GE: You know, I know the Somach family very well. IS: He was just married. CS: He was married the same summer. SCB: That was Larry Somach? IS: Larry Somach. Norman grew up with me, his brother, his younger brother. And- CS: Mrs. Bright only wanted to know which one was my husband? She always saw me with all these guys! IS: They kept coming in to play with my daughter, 'cause you know, they were all bachelors. And fortunately my daughter--you could wake up in the middle of the night and she was always happy, had a smile, never cried. It was funny when- This was a one bedroom apartment and when we'd go to bed, her crib was in the bedroom with us, and I got a kick out of- We were lying in bed and we'd hear her rustling. Then two little hands would appear on the railing, and then a- a blonde head with real curly hair and big blue eyes would show up. And she just was curious, and she was always that way, even to this day. She would never go and join in playing with anybody until she sat and watched and decided that she wanted to go in because she would never wanted to make a fool out of herself. Even from her childhood days, she was always that way. She went to the right school and thank God they were all right, all right kids. GE: Your daughter's name? IS: Anne. Anne Eleanor. And she was born in 1949. I timed it right--they were all two years apart. In '50- '51, Irene Vivian was born. She was the first girl admitted to Lafayette [College] when it became co-ed. GE: Oh wow. IS: And was the first girl to be Phi Beta Kappa at Lafayette. Her daughter went to the Johns Hopkins, also Phi Beta Kappa. CS: And what about Jared, her son? IS: Her son? Well... CS: He was Phi Beta Kappa at Wesleyan [University]. IS: Yeah, at Wesleyan, decided he wanted to be a lawyer. GE: This is still Irene's children? IS: Irene's children. She had three children. Anne never wanted children. She wanted to travel. And that's why she got divorced, because before they got married, Richard and she agreed they weren't going to have children, but he was an athletic kind of guy. In a pickup basketball game he got elbowed in the neck and he lost his voice. Temporary thing. But he realized how helpless he was because he couldn't even answer the telephone. And they decided to get a friendly divorce. So they got a divorce and he married another Jewish girl. [Some lost conversation here]-- Paid for the wedding. My father had to pay for his own wedding. CS: Did you tell Gail where your father met your mother? In Roseland. IS: In Roseland. In New York. They were both good dancers. Claire's parents unfortunately weren't--I had to push your mother around the floor. But the Salistskys were good dancers. SCB: Could we move on to your- your- the business and a couple of things to think about: Who started the business? And we sort of have some of that on here, but maybe we should have it together. Did they own or manage the business? How did they become connected to the business? So- IS: Well, they were partners in New York before they came to Allentown to escape the union. And they started almost at the time that Billera's formed the pants factory in Northampton. GE: Who- Who's Billera? IS: Huh? GE: You said Billera started the pants--who is that, that's a company? CS: The Billera family. IS: Four or five brothers that were tailors in Italy. And they started Clyde Shirt, which was the four story building. Clyde Shirt was- My Father and Izzy Weinstein, they were on the first and fourth floor. Universal Pants, there were two brothers who ran that, in the second and third floor. Then, further west, they started- they made only pants, but they started a, a--what the hell's the name of that? CS: Joey's father? IS: No. I had it this morning. A clothing business where they made jackets and suits and sport jackets. That was at 21st Street and Main Street in Northampton. CS: And did you have a plant there too? IS: When- When- When Weinstein and my father, shortly after they started Clyde Shirt, business was good, so they started Highland Sportswear in Allentown. GE: So Clyde Shirt was your father and Izzy Weinstein's company? IS: Right. And they were partners all the way through. They were partners in Highland. The reason they chose the name Highland, Izzy Weinstein's daughter went to Highland Manor which was a fancy girls' private school. CS: And Clyde Shirt was from the steamship company. IS: Yeah, Clyde- there was a Clyde steamship company in New York. I don't know how they found that. GE: So Clyde Shirt made shirts and blouses? IS: Well, we did a lot of things. We-- We had about over one hundred operators there. GE: With Clyde Shirt? IS: With Clyde Shirt. And they mainly did shirts. But Highland was a fairly large company. We had over 100 machines there. And our girls, we treated them right and they stayed. So we were able to make different kind of garments, for example, we made shirts, and if you were from Philadelphia you would know them--Villager and Ladybug, do you remember them? GE: Yes, I do remember them. IS: We were their chief- Most of their- CS: We used to stay at their house. Norman Raab. IS: When Norman Raab needed contractors, he came to Allentown and stayed at my parents' house! And we were lucky, we got their- GE: And that was- that was a Philadelphia firm. I've heard the name, definitely. SCB: And they had an outlet in Telford. IS: They made everything. They made purses, they made raincoats, they made shoes. SCB: Huge outlet in Telford, I've seen it. GE: Did you know, you know now that you're saying it, I think it was related to that--my father had a cousin named Bernie Rutberg, and he's about your age, a little older than you actually. And after- during the war, I think he worked for somebody, then after the war, he went into making dresses, and I thought it was Villager. CS: Probably. IS: Yeah, they made dresses too. CS: When Anne went to college- IS: Let me talk, please! CS: Oh, okay. IS: When- We had such a close relationship. When my oldest daughter left for college, they said--and they made everything, from soup to nuts, I mean from purses to coats, to- everything but bras and panties I think they made. They said, "Bring your daughter to Philadelphia and she could have whatever she wants." GE: Wow, that's very lucky. IS: She made a complete- CS: Outfit. IS: Outfits. CS: Wardrobe. IS: When my daughter, Joan, went to college--she went to BU, Boston--she went with a halter and jeans. GE: I was going to say, everything changed. Because I know- CS: And what did it say on the shirt? IS: Shit. CS: No, it didn't. It said, come on. IS: What? CS: "Damn It". IS: Oh, "Damn It", whatever. CS: I was so mad at her all the way up to Boston, and when I got there, I apologized. They were all dressed the same way, I saw. IS: But Anne- GE: It's- It's really changed, it's amazing. IS: She didn't give a damn about clothing, you know? And- And Anne, when she went, she came to a new dorm that was just built. CS: At University- She went to the University of Chicago. IS: Chicago. Irene went to- CS: Northwestern for a year, and then transferred. IS: Irene went to Northwestern, and she started going with her soon- eventually husband, who was at Muhlenberg. And that's why she switched to Lafayette. GE: I see. IS: And we know him, since they're married, I mean, he's taking her out. I regard him as a son, not a son-in-law. He's a wonderful guy. SCB: So at that time, after you graduated from high school and then went to college, etc., what- what was your role in the business when you came back home and worked for your father? IS: Oh I- I imitated my father. We had a good marker maker. But I decided to educate myself much further just in case. And I took- learned pattern making. They would give me a sample garment which was usually a medium- a medium and I would grade a small from it, a large, a medium-large, an extra-large, you know, how to operate it. I used a spec sheet--a specification sheet--and I would enlarge the length or I'd you know, I'd make the patterns. And it served me well because my father and I got into a bruha one time and I had to go around knocking on doors looking for a job. So what had happened, I applied- I knocked on all of the doors I knew in Allentown which a lot of my friends owned businesses. Only one of them would say, "Irwin, I don't want to hire a friend. What do you do if it don't work out--how do you fire a friend?" So I read the handwriting on the wall. And I- did I get a job locally? I don't think so. CS: What? IS: I didn't work locally at all, did I? CS: No, you went to New York. IS: I- My friend- Nate Braunstein made belts and he subscribed to Women's Wear Daily, so he would save me all of the issues. That was the Bible of the sewing business. And I would borrow his old copies and I would check the ads in the back and I would call and make appointments for an interview. Now I never led on that I was calling from Pennsylvania because I rightfully figured that they didn't want to hire anybody that had to travel that distance. But I did it for probably about five, six years or more. I would get up at 5 in the morning. I was on the road at 5 in the morning, I'm sorry. And I would get there about 7:30 a.m. We would work from about 8 to 12, 15 minutes for lunch ; but we would quit at 4, so it took me a couple of hours at 4, I was home by 6-6:30. It was just like working here, but a lot more mileage on the car. GE: Now this is the 1950s? CS: No, this is later. GE: 1960s? CS: You were in business with your father after you- Don't forget, when the Weinstein's kids got married, and you were married, all these kids were taken in and the fathers decided better they split. IS: No, no, let me get into that. CS: That was- that was- that was about the '50s. IS: Harris was about four years younger than me and he got well-trained even though his father had a Jewish accent that you could cut with a knife, but the importance- My father had an overestimated, and frankly--and I call a spade a spade--he had an overestimated opinion of his ability. GE: Your father? IS: My father. GE: Of his ability? Your father's. IS: Right, right. And his value to the business. Make a long story short, Harris came into the business about four years after, and his father trained him in pricing garments. And the most important part of the business was securing business from manufacturers in New York, and he learned that very well. And he realized that my father, being an equal partner with his father, earned the same amount of money, but he could be replaced for a man of $200-$250 a week. So why the hell should he be your partner? Even though they were in business together about 40 years. And I was mad as hell, he insisted that they break the partnership. In the meantime, they- we had three factories going on--Highland, in 10th and Walnut over the bowling alley ; Clyde Shirt, which was the biggest, but both of those had cutting departments. And then we had Sylvania Sportswear up at 18th and Main, which was a small three-story building that didn't have cutting facilities. In other words, it- they used to cut- Well what they- They broke up the partnership, they did us a favor in as much as they instigated the break up. They gave us the choice of whoever took up Clyde, the other two factories would be opposite, and in addition, there would be a monetary exchange because Clyde was still bigger than the other two combined. So we opted to take the two factories. GE: You took Highland and then also Sylvania? IS: Highland and Sylvania Sportswear. GE: Sportswear. How many operators were at Sports- Sylvania? IS: About 50. And we- My cousin, Sydney, who was my uncle's son, older son, was discharged from service and needed a job and we took him in with us to run Sylvania, to learn the business. And he would stop at Highland, and after the trimmers cleaned up the garments, we'd roll it up by the dozen and tie it and they would take it up to Sylvania for pressing and finishing. There was pressing there- There was a pulley, you put a truck on the bottom, you pull the rope, you can hoist it up to the third floor. We made it through that way- and that way... In retrospect I can't really blame Harris for what he did. I was mad as hell, but my father kept saying, "Oh they're gonna go broke in no time." Well they never did. He had my mother sold on his ability, but I call a spade a spade. And I knew that sooner or later I'm going to have to get out of here. So when that happened, and I went around- I couldn't get a job locally, and I'd seen- GE: So that's when you went to New York? IS: That's when I checked out the ads and called, made it sound like I lived in Jersey or you know--because everyone commuted a half hour, an hour to work. Even if you lived in Long Island, it took you an hour by train to get into downtown New York. So I set up appointments and I did- I went to interviews and I got jobs. But it was an expense, because I drove and I had to go- I went to 12th Avenue because that was the cheapest rental you know for a garage to park your car and if you worked in the garment center it was very expensive- those garages. GE: And about when is this? Is this around 1960 now or? CS: It was- I would say the '60s. IS: The '60s. GE: And- and- Did you think that the business that, the business that your family took--Sylvania and Highland--was it not viable? Did that- IS: It was average. We worked like hell and we made a profit, but barely. CS: But Irwin, then your father decided he wanted to get out. Remember? So then you were back with him. IS: My father- Oh. Because my- At Highland we were so diversified, and I didn't mention this before, we made army shirts, we made blouses for the WAVES--white with a Peter Pan collar--the WAVES of the navy girls. We made raincoats with a hood for the women's air force. We even made shirts for the Florida Highway Patrol. SCB: So you made government contracts? IS: We had government contracts for marine corps shirts with the epaulets, the whole schmear. And we did army shirts, too. And in between we did blouses, which were seasonal, and when that wasn't busy, we made shirts. We had a backbone of Villager because they were always busy, they had two basic styles--a Peter Pan collar, or like a dress collar, long and short sleeves but the patterns were all the same. Now the secret of our business was overcuts. That is the ability to make a marker, laying out the patterns, better than they figure that they can do. The way we did this, we'd get the piece goods in, let's say 60 inch goods. We had a 60 inch- one table was about 66 inches wide so that we could spread wide goods. But- Butting into it was 48 inch table for 45 inch goods. This we learned over time, I mean I make it sound like it's nothing. But doing it, for example, if we got piece goods in and maybe ten percent of the piece goods were 42 inches wide, the rest were 40 inches. So we took the time and trouble to remake a marker for that extra width. And we were able to have a higher yield. And- GE: So-so with this overcuts, what you're saying that the profit margin is very much if you can get a higher yield? IS: Right. GE: You'll get a little more production out of it. IS: Right, and then sell them on the open market for cash. GE: Oh, okay. So in other words, if you're supposed to make 95 for the manufacturer, if you're able to make 100, then the other 5 you can sell? IS: Right. I mean... CS: It's how flea markets operate. SCB: And would that have been also labeled as Villager or not? IS: Mainly Villager because I had a traveling salesman who we were friendly with, who traveled all the way out to Central Pennsylvania. And I made him promise that do not sell any retail establishment in a city that has Villager on the label, that sells Villager, because it will blow my business there, they would cut me out. And they could tell by the markings on the boxes where it came from, you know, we stamped the lot number, the style number, the size, you know. So fortunately, we didn't get caught. SCB: Would some of them have possibly gone to an outlet? Like the one in Telford. IS: What? SCB: Would some of those garments have gone to the Telford outlet, the Villager, or was that totally- IS: Oh yeah! In other words, they would say- My father would make out the cutting report when we finished cutting it. For example, let's say there was- we took- They wanted a man's shirt. Small, medium, medium-large, and extra large. The extra large was always the least amount. Next came small, next the larger, and the medium was the most numerous. And dependent- You had to study the cutting table. In other words, they may want a scale of two small, five mediums, three and a half large- medium large, and two extra large. So we would take the half amounts, the two and a half for example, and if another size was a half, we would put the two together because if you spread two sizes, you can make a tighter mark than a single bundled marker. Do I- Do you understand what I'm saying? SCB: Yes, I sewed a lot when I was young. GE: Well she understands better than I do. IS: Okay. And we always had overcuts, because we knew what the hell we were doing. SCB: Well it's like an intelligence test when they take things apart and you have to figure out how to put them back together again. If you can do that well, then you can make a lot more. IS: Oh, yeah. Well, we took the extra labor we did by making a 62 inch marker and also a 60 inch marker with the same scale ratio of sizes. And we also had- We cut- We saved the cuttings when you cut a lot you know you have some parts, you don't have everything butting up. So we saved the cuttings and we sold the rags. GE: Did you sell those rags to like Sheftel? IS: That's what they did, but we didn't use them, we used-- CS: Jack Pearlman. IS: Jack? CS: Pearlman. IS: Pearlman. CS: That was your father's start, the same Pearlman. GE: But that same- And they all- right right. CS: And all the- They all did this. I mean not just him, they all- IS: It was great for the classification of the fabric. In other words, white all-cotton paid the most because that was shipped to like Crane Stationary. A fine stationary. If it had a rayon content, it was maybe two cents a pound. White cotton was maybe like ten cents a pound. And it was, you know, the- the- the guy who would pick up the rags would store them under the cutting room and they deliver- Was putting fifty pound burlap potato bags. The cutter would clip it, keep all fabrics the same, and if they didn't finish loading the bag, they would put it aside and wait for a similar kind of fabric, and that was sold for us. Mainly I found that knocking around like I did, going to New York, I worked in Staten Island, I worked in Manhattan, I worked in Long Island, and I gave it- I worked right before the Holland Tunnel one time. They broke into my car there and I had a- a... telephone. It came in- GE: A car phone. IS: Those little boxes and I had it there because I wanted to amuse myself. They broke into my car. But I was conscientious, I was never late, I was always there on time. But when things got slow, it was like a one-dimensional kind of thing and I was the latest hire and they could supervise a cutting room without me. I even went down South--one of the ads I saw was a big company in- outside Albany, Georgia, near Peanut Country. And I went to New York, the owner worked in- out of New York in the sales room. They made athletic wear, matching pants and jackets with different fabric. SCB: Like a sweatsuit? IS: Like athletic jogging suits. Like a jogging suit kind of. GE: Now are we in the 1970s at this point? SCB: We should be, yeah. IS: About then, yeah. So I went to New York and explained my background and he said, "Irwin, you're hired. Go down, find a place to live," and he always had a motel in Albany because where the plant was--about 20 miles northeast--it was in a very rural area. So we could talk while we're going to work together, you know. He- He would go down every six weeks or so. And the plant manager was a Jewish guy, was a Kochalech [Yiddish-- possibly a shortened version of kochleffel, a pot stirrer]. He was in charge of the plant and was used to doing things his own way, and I let it go at that. I mean I- He didn't bother me, this was a tremendous cutting room. It was about eight cutting tables. GE: Here you were used to just a couple of cutting tables? IS: Right, and what I did, I wanted to increase production. And I made big signs, numerical signs, and as soon as they were finished spreading, I had it cut right away and I said, "When you're done, you go to table number three, you go to table such and such," and I kept them busy that way. They didn't need to wait around for the next assignment. So I built up production. Then it came out that somebody mentioned that they used to sell the garments to the workers. And somebody once mentioned, "Oh I can buy the same thing cheaper in town, there's an outlet store." So the next time my boss comes, I mention that, "You know you have a retail outlet?" I told him where it was, he went out, and he couldn't very well fire the manager because he was a more valuable asset than I was. You know, he was responsible for running the whole shabang. So, and I worked there for what, about 6 months? CS: I don't know, but I went down and I took one look at that place and I said it was a shame! And Rabbi Greenburg- IS: Wait a minute! CS: Knew the rabbi- IS: After I was there a couple of months, and this was before this incident happened, the boss came down and then got the report and saw what I had done, and he said, "Irwin, tell your wife to come down. Make- Make plans to move here permanently." So--and I was living in a motel--and Claire comes and we knew that this town Albany, Georgia was named after Albany, New York. It was about 20,000 people, it had one hospital, one synagogue, a reformed synagogue, and we met the rabbi and we told him of our background. Claire had already been the president of Beth El. CS: No, I wasn't President. IS: Oh, wasn't? Oh, whatever. CS: Sisterhood. IS: We impressed him. CS: No, but he knew Rabbi Greenburg. And I just got this feeling, he was telling me, "Don't come here!" And I wasn't about to go because I took one look at that red dust and- and- you picked up the telephone and heard music or cowboy music or whatever type of music. And I had just lost my sister. And I remember my mother, when I told her I was going down, and she started to cry and my father said, "You go where your husband goes. Your mother came with me to Allentown." He said, "If that's where you want to be, then you go. And don't listen to your mother, she will stop crying, she'll be all right. She has me." Well I went, and I said to her, "Well, I'm not staying! This is not for me!" SCB: Was the population in-in-in the factories, were they mostly African American or were theySouthernsers? IS: No, they were Southerners. For example, they got away with so many things that-that the way that- that- because of the way that the place was built that they would never do up North. For example, the whole place was cement block. The men's room--there was no mens or ladies, they--they were just booths with a door in the front with a lock on it and a toilet, not a urinal, just a regular toilet. And to wash your hands afterward you had to go out and there was a couple of few sinks close by, no ceiling--[lost some conversation] CS: Can I talk? IS: Only Buck Friedman who was exceptional- exceptional in sports was able to get on an Allentown High School athletic team. CS: Your brother played football for Raub. IS: Well, it was a little different. Before my time, then they had three junior high schools--Raub, Central, and Harrison-Morton. Harrison-Morton was down around 3rd Street, where all the Hispanics and Blacks went, the poorer families. Central was around 9th and Liberty, somewhere around there. CS: Linden. IS: And that was for what I called the Jewish middle class. There were few Jews there, but it was working class people who worked in the downtown area. Raub was in the western end. It was the most- for the most wealthier citizens, most of the Jewish kids went to Raub. And- GE: Where did you go? IS: To Raub. I went to Raub for first through ninth grade. And I walked, it was within walking distance of where I lived. But as I said, it was a- It was annoying at the time, but when I look back now, it was a great advantage. For example, we- we didn't need the- the Gentiles ; we had our own clique, our own friends. I had a high school fraternity of about 15-18 guys, Jewish friends. AZA was big at that time also. Claire missed out on a lot of that because her father struck it rich early. She lived in a nice area, what I call the deep west end of Allentown. So she missed out, she got her- her growing up through the Center, she was lucky that way. But I got mine on a daily basis, from the people I associated with and where I lived. There were a lot of many Jews around me, the working class. There was a kosher meat market a half a block away that a lot of Jews patronized and so forth. So growing up with all of these friends, we learned from each other. We learned how to jitterbug--one guy learned how to jitterbug, the rest of us learned. I realized this when I left college. I left and started college at 17. I always wanted to fly, study aeronautical engineering. When do I leave for college? I graduate high school in June ; college would normally start around September. Unfortunately, in the garment industry, July 4th is a vacation time where all the factories close down for the first two weeks of July. When does my college curriculum start? It's on a trimester basis, it starts- it starts July 1st. I graduated the middle of June and I had to go to college two weeks later. What the hell did I know about being away from home? Anyhow- CS: But you went to camp. IS: That's different. You're there with a bunch of Jewish guys, it's like at home. SC: Which camp? IS: Camp Hickory Run. It's run by the Federation, its White Hall- White- White Haven, Pennsylvania, where Boulder Field is. You know where Boulder Field is? SCB: Yes. IS: It's right near there. So I'm- It's July 1st, of 1945, that's when my college career started. Where is Irwin? Irwin is up at the Concord, with my parents. I'm having a ball for the two-week vacation. But I left early--I left after four days. I took a jitney to Penn Station in New York--17 years old, never been away from home--I got on the train to St. Louis, because it- The college was in East St. Louis, south of East St. Louis in Illinois. But the closest I could get to was in St. Louis. The head groundskeeper knew I was coming late. He picked me up in St. Louis and took me to campus. And I got- I was the last one to arrive. I had missed four or five days of school already. Luckily, the one remaining room spot was with another Jewish guy who was graduating. But from him I didn't learn much because he wasn't in a classmate, or didn't have any classes that I had. So I had a double job. I had to learn all about the campus, and I had to make new friends from my classmates. So, I managed to do- do that because I was personable, because of my growing up with all my boyfriends, not afraid to talk. And I was very, very personable. So the first weekend rolls around, what does a nice Jewish boy do when he's there for the first time? He doesn't have a car. He goes to town. So I took a bus into downtown East St. Louis, another bus from East St. Louis across the Mississippi River to St. Louis, and I looked up the address of the YMHA in St. Louis, which was in the west end, Union and Delmar. I took another bus all the way out there. And every Sunday morning, this was in '45, the war was just about over, and every Sunday morning they would have a bagel breakfast. They had Jewish hostesses for veterans and St. Louis was a hub for military activity. Lambert Field, which was the St. Louis municipal airport, was a naval air station. And 20 miles east in Illinois was Scott Field, which was an army air base. And all the Jewish boys like me would grab a ride into St. Louis and we'd meet. I go walking in there the first Sunday and whom do I see? Four of my high school fraternity brothers from Pennsylvania. Well what a reunion we had. I bullshitted about my age because I was about the same height and weight as I am now. I even grew a mustache. And I passed myself off for a veteran, so I met girls, I had a breakfast every Sunday morning, and that was my social activity. We had a dance about 3 weeks later--my classmates would have to depend--and it was a Catholic nursing school in East St. Louis--they would have to depend on the girls. I brought the best looking girl I found in the Y. And they said, "Irwin, how the hell do you know a nice looking girl already?'' They didn't stop to think that the Jewish [unclear]. "How do you know somebody nice looking that don't have to depend on- on the dating list?" I said, "Well, I have abilities." But I blame it on my growing up. If I didn't have the background, I wouldn't have been able to pass myself off. I wouldn't have been able to enjoy the lifestyle I did. Fortunately, it was just after the war, my father was in much better financial shape. I had a- my own bank account, you know, I could do what I wanted. The only mistake I made, I didn't- I let him sell my car. I should have driven out, I didn't realize it was so far away from everything. But I only stayed there a year, and I went back with my father. He wanted me to come into the business. And they were doing interviews in my school for engineers, and the salaries at that time--I was spending more on the weekend. So I said this isn't for me, I'll go back to Pennsylvania, which I did. Then a couple of years later I went- CS: You went to Muhlenberg. IS: I went to Muhlenberg. He said finish your education. GE: Did you finish it at Muhlenberg? IS: No, I went two years to Muhlenberg. I had business, you know, which was general. And Claire suddenly discovered- CS: Yeah, Muhlenberg was very hard to get into. SC: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. IS: That was before girls even. And we had to pull strings to get me in because I applied late. You know, I went home over Christmas, and I wanted to start that September. CS: Morris Senderowitz was a great benefactor of Muhlenberg. GE: Oh, was he? CS: And he was a very good friend of the families. He lived at 18th and Hamilton Street, and Morris got the boys into Muhlenberg and Cedar Crest was the same story. Because my trunk went to Rhode Island, I was going to Pembroke, which is part of Brown and I decided I didn't want to leave my mother. And my mother told me to be honest, if it was that I was Irwin's, say it. So she- I said well, I'd rather stay in Allentown. So Lena Senderowitz, we got a phone call, and she was on the board at Cedar Crest, and I went to Cedar Crest. SC: Well that's a good segue. CS: But yeah, there's a great deal of anti-Semitism, there was. When Irene went to Northwestern- GE: And Irene is? CS: -- That was 1960. That's our daughter, our middle daughter. She was rushed for sororities, you know, that's a very- sorority school. And the Halperin girl was out there, Marion Halperin's older daughter. And you know, she kind of took Irene. Irene had been a cherub there and she loved the school. She had a Muhlenberg boyfriend when she went there though. At any rate, she was rushed by these different sororities, and I got a phone call from Bill Hacker's wife. Oh my daughter! She wants- All these wonderful things you know she's heard about her. She's top- one of the top students and- and all this junk. And then, her finally- She hopes that, you know, she's going to join this sorority. And I don't say anything, you know, I say that's going to be up to her. I know that I- I'm not going to interfere with what she wants to do. She said, oh by the way, who is your minister? I said, "My rabbi is William Greenburg. I belong to Temple Beth El." And I called my daughter and I said don't you dare join that sorority. I was livid. SC: Let me turn this off-- ________________ Interview with Claire Salistky, May 26th, 2011 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: So Claire, I'd like to ask you what your full name is and more about your family background, a little bit more about your family background. But let's- let's talk a little bit about where your family came from. CLAIRE SALISTSKY: Oh, I have that inside. Irwin, on the table there's that paper from Anne, you know, our oldest daughter. I mean, from Alison, our oldest granddaughter, is very interested in genealogy, so I gave her all the records I had and she- she gave me where they came from. SC: Well, let me just ask you, what is your full name, when were you born, and where were you born? CS: My full name is Claire Joy Wiener Salitsky. IRWIN SALISTSKY: W-I-E-N-E-R. CS: And I was born in Paterson, New Jersey, July 16th, 1929. My mother's name was Mary Mendelson Wiener and my father was Louis Wiener. My mother was born in Paterson ; she was one of nine children who grew up ; there were fifteen originally. IS: That was before television. CS: And she came from a- a very religious, orthodox family, and she was second from the end. I have a picture of them hanging on the wall. My father was born in Poland in a shtetl [Yiddish for small Jewish village in Eastern Europe] called- Ojikauf is the name of the burial society, but he was born in 1907. No, 1903, and he came to this country in 1907. He was the third child in the family. Now, my grand- My father's family they were- they were silk weavers. They lived in the shtetl near "Lodz" [Claire pronounces it LODZ]. Lodz was a silk weaving- GAIL EISENBERG: Lodz [pronounced LUDJ]? I think that's Lodz. CS: Yes, and they lived in- According to what was found, they lived in- they called it D-O-L-Y-S-Z-I-N. But they called it Russia. Now Lodz was Lodz at that point, you know the boundaries were constantly changing. You didn't know. My grandmother's maiden name was Warshawsky. Now I did get a copy of the marriage thing. And her husband, my grandfather's name was Joel Robilinsky. Okay. In order to get out of the country, he- his- my- took his brother-in-law's army papers. He was out of the army already. And he came to the United States with his brother-in-law's army pass. His brother-in-law's name was Joel--"Yo'el", Yo'el, whatever--something like Wiener. Okay? GE: So he took on the name. CS: And my grand- My grandmother's- He- He was my grandmother's brother. Her- Her mother had remarried, her father had died. And they came to- He came to the United States alone in 1904. And he went to Connecticut. And I'm trying to think what city it was where they made felt hats. And he couldn't take the inhaling of the felt, and so he had- they shipped him down to Paterson, where he had more relatives, and he was able to do his- Paterson was the silk center of this country at that time. Anyhow, that was that. My mother's family, my grandfather, came from a shtetl named Barstitzti, B-A-R-S-T-I-T-Z-T-I, near--I knew it as Lithuania. GE: Right, right now, Vilna, Vilna. CS: Vilna. It was right near Vilna, because when I went to Russia the first time, I went on to Lithuania, and all I could- there I heard- I found anti-Semitism. Terrible. The bus driver wouldn't take us. There was a group of Jewish girls on the trip. GE: When was this around? CS: The first time I went to Russia was 19- When did I open my travel agency? 1980? Your 60th birthday, how old are- how- When was that? 1929-- 1989. IS: [19]87. CS: Eighty- 1987, it was around then. And they wouldn't take us, and we got a cab, and I took my sister-in-law who had never been out of the country with me to Russia. My father almost had a bird that the two of us were going where they had struggled to get out. I found it fascinating. SCB: And that was right before the fall of the Soviet Union, too. CS: Oh, it was- It was unbelievable. I- I felt it was one of the best trips I ever took. But, at any rate, he lived near- They lived near Vilna and he was a farmer there. When he came to the United States, he came first in '04 and she- and he came over in 1896 and she followed in 19- 1897 with one, two, let's see-- The three sons, the one daughter, four of the kids, and every year she had another- another child. But he started out as a huckster guy, and then he got involved in the building business. And he became--as I never found this out, I mean, I knew he owned tenement buildings, because every Friday at three o'clock when we got out of school, we got in the car and we went to Slatington, where my father's factory was, to pick up my father and he'd drive to Paterson because we had to get there before Shabbos [Yiddish for Sabbath]. And we would come home Sunday night. So on Sundays I would go with my cousin and we would collect the rent. To me it was fun! We went in and out of these buildings on- And there were blocks of them. I- I didn't know from anything. And- But years later, in Florida, I met somebody and he happened to admire what I was wearing. It was a Valentine's Day party and I was wearing something red. And he said to me, where are you from? And I said from Allentown, Pennsylvania. And I said where are you from? He said Paterson, New Jersey. I said, oh, I was born there. Oh! Well what did you, you know, what is your name? We go through this whole thing and it ended up he had bought my aunt's house. And, you know, he said, your grandfather was William Mendelson. I said, yes. He said he gave a lot of money to charity but he was a slum landlord. I came home, I was shocked. I mean I never knew what he did, but he was a very religious man. But at any rate, my parents met--my mother was sixteen when she met my father, he was older. Can I think how much older my father was than my mother? Maybe four- four years older. Anyhow, he took her on a May Walk. Don't ask me what a May Walk is, but anyhow, they were engaged for two years, because he said he would not get married until he could buy a house. My grandfather had apartment houses, too, on this street where he lived. And his children were all on this one street. My father said, "That's not for me. We are going to move out, a full place," so that's what they did after they were married. And they were married in '29- in '27 in the- in Paterson. And it was funny, yesterday I was at a Friendship Circle luncheon that one of our friends sponsored and had invited us to come, and the director of the Jewish Community Center was from Paterson. And we were talking about all the places we went when we were little, because as I said, I went there every weekend until I was in junior high. And it was- well- well- Of course I was too young to know, but I was born in 1929, and my father was in business with his father. He had- My father left school at the age of thirteen, when he graduated from eighth grade, or fourteen. And he went to work on the railroads. And he earned, whatever money he earned, he turned over to his mother. And at the time when you know the war, they got bonuses, the First World War and all that, and he was able to buy his parents a house and put his father in business. And so, he- My father was a remarkable man. He was self-educated--after eighth grade, he never went to school. My mother, on the other hand, was educated, finished high school, and then went to Katharine Gibbs, or one of those kinds of schools. And her brothers- GE: What is that, like a finishing school or? CS: No, a secretarial school. IS: It's like a business college. CS: And she- she went to- The youngest sister went to Columbia. The two brothers were lawyers, and one brother was in the hosiery business. And my mother worked for her older brother who was a lawyer. She was his secretary. And so, anyhow, I was born and she- Well they were all stay-at-homers. You know, they cooked, they- they did everything together, though. The sisters, there were six sisters. And, I mean, when they made a Seder, [Jewish ritual service and ceremonial dinner to celebrate Passover] you would think an interior designer came in and fixed the table and everything else. They- they were- My mother had golden hands. She could knit, crochet, sew, she arranged flowers, she- and she was a marvelous hostess and a wonderful cook. But- And she was a wonderful mother. I was very blessed, I had a mother and father that were like no other. That's how I feel. They were very giving, they were very loving, and they believed in their kids, and they spent a lot of time with us, they put a lot into us. And I can remember when my brother graduated law school, my father stood and cried like a baby. He had put his brother through law school, he had put another brother through to become a- an accountant, and he had a third brother that was in medical school when he died. So, to them, education was important and service to the community, that was one thing I learned growing up in Allentown. You- You can't just take, you must give back, you must be a part of your community and if you are more fortunate, you are to help others. But we came- My father was in business with his father in Paterson when the Depression hit. SCB: What kind of business was that? CS: He was in the silk weaving business. SCB: He was in the silk weaving business, yeah. CS: And he had- He- He couldn't make it and so he knew he was going to have to go bankrupt. And he went to his father-in-law and he explained the situation. And his father-in-law and his two brothers, two of the three brothers-in-laws agreed he should go through bankruptcy, it wouldn't hurt. My father went to a stranger who gave- lent him the money to pay all his bills. And he had this opportunity, I don't know how he heard about it, but there was an empty factory in Slatington. And he- He went- He came here and he was able to make a deal with the city of Slatington, and he was just very fortunate. He- he had- He had when he came here a partner from Paterson, an older man, whose last name was also Wiener, but was spelled W-E-I-N-E-R. And he had a son named Jack who he had- He wanted his son to learn the business so my father- He came along and he was married. He wanted to live in Slatington, my father would not allow my mother- My mother- He thought my mother would want to stay in Paterson and he'd come home weekends. Well, my mother was told by her mother, you go with your husband. And so she came, and she- they lived in Allentown at 2445 Union Street. And I was three, that was- GE: Claire, did that become- I'm sorry. Did that become a rift in the family that-? CS: Pardon me? GE: Was there a rift in the family with that the father-in-law- CS: No. My grandmother was one of the wisest women in the world. My father was very bitter about it, but it taught him a lesson, because later on when my father was doing very well and he had gotten involved with dyeing plants and throwing plants and machinery and everything else, and he had a blouse business on the side, and- It- He was just very lucky and very bright, and he worked very hard to get where he was. And he made fur coat linings, which was the main thing and fabrics for the Catholic Church, because he once gave me a spool of gold thread to have. The vestments and everything else, you know, that was the kind- the kind of fabric that he made. But- GE: I- I had- No, I had asked in regards to, you said that your father was bitter, that his- that his father-in-law and brother- CS: Yes, but he learned that- He had an accountant, Frank Berg. It was Berg, Schultz, Green, you know. Frank Berg was a senior partner. They were the first people my father met, and my mother met when they moved to Allentown, Frank and Molly Berg. And as my father did well, Frank would always find- there were people who needed help, and he would come to my father, and my father always- would never, never say no to anyone, and that's what he taught us. SCB: So when- When you moved- When they moved from Paterson, the factory was in Slatington but the family was in Allentown? CS: Yes. And he drove to Slatington. IS: Well they set up the factory in Slatington, it wasn't a case of moving the factory. SCB: No, no, right. But they set up- IS: They have a building, found a building, and started the business. SCB: Right. And was it an extension of the silk industry in Paterson because they were making silk linings? CS: Well it was but it was weaving the fabrics for the- He wove fine fabrics for fur coat linings, jacquards [fabrics]. I can still remember him sitting and he used to look through a- a thing and they'd see the designs that go into a fur coat lining. And the fabrics for the- the church were beautiful. SCB: Were they mostly silk? CS: Pardon? SCB: Were they mostly silk? CS: Oh, all silk. Yeah. IS: They had a good position with DuPont. CS: DuPont, Eastman Kodak SC: Oh, wow, so also synthetic fabrics. Yeah. CS: And he, as I said, he- he prospered. He bought a lot of real estate, not in Allentown, but in Paterson and Newark. His brother would hear of something and tell him. And he got involved in a lot of things. And he got very much involved in Temple Beth El. Harry Neff- GE: I don't know the name Louis Wiener.. CS: Harry Neff, that's Jerry Neff's father- GE: I don't know if I know Jerry Neff. CS: Jerry and Norman. Well, if you go to Trivet on Friday at noon time, you'll find a group of old men who sit and talk about their youth, and Jerry Neff is one of them. But Harry Neff came calling on my father and mother, they were new in town, you know, and he told them where the Kosher butcher was. My mother used to have her meat brought in from Paterson on our carrier, which was used to deliver yarn to my father's factory, you know. And I used to say that I hated liver, and I used to say that it smelled like the silk, bails of silk that used to come in. So my father joined Temple Beth El and- GE: Claire, did your father- Did the partnership- CS: That- That partnership stayed until- when the father- This man had a son in Slatington and he had a son-in-law in the New York sales office. But when he died, the sons and the son-in-law were bought out. GE: By your father? CS: Yeah. GE: Okay, so- so- so during that older man's lifetime- IS: He was active in Slatington. Her father ran the whole show in Paterson- in Slatington. GE: Right, right. But the relationship- the partnership was maintained while the man was alive, and then when he died they bought out- CS: Yes. GE: They bought out the two sons. IS: He was just content that his son had a job. GE: Right, right. CS: And the sons, they both retired to Florida. But my mother was not--how can I say it?--she was not involved like I am. You know? That generation--she was there to see you got off to school in the morning and she came- she was there when we came home from school. She had a mahjong group, they played at night, not in the afternoons. A mother's place was home with her kids, and she instilled that in my sister and me. But I- See, I'm getting ahead of myself, but there was what I used to call a Triumvirate, which Dr. Katz- SCB: -- Triumvirate again, because that turned off. CS: Oh, it was a Triumvirate. Mitchell Katz, he was the family doctor, Rabbi William Greenburg, and Nettie Klass, Mrs. Aaron Klass. And they would find these people who needed help. GE: Now is this like the 1950s? CS: Oh this is- I'm married 63 years. IS: [19]49 or '48. Early '50s. CS: And it was- All I know is, when she went to Florida, she [my mother] said to me, "I'm leaving you signed checks for Freeman's dairy." I said for what? She said, "Well," she says, "I pay for milk for people, and so I want you, you know, to pay the bill." I said all right. But you know, this went on year after year after year. And one day, I walked- I was then already involved with the Federation, and I asked George Feldman--well then it was called UJA--I asked him, the executive director of the Center and the UJA, I said, "I- I have to ask you something, Mr. Feldman. My mother is buying milk for all these people." I said, "Do you know--do they still have little children?" And he looked at me and he said, "No." He said, "Really I should tell Mary to stop." So I said, "Well, I'm going to tell Mary, I'm not-" Do you know she got mad at me? And she said you will continue and I will continue while I'm alive. If they don't need it, maybe their children need it. SCB: And the U-U- GE: And this is not your mother, this was- CS: Pardon? SCB: The UJA is the United Jewish Appeal? CS: Yeah. SCB: Yeah, I just wanted to put that on the- Yeah, I wanted to put that on the tape. GE: You- You said- Was this your mother? Or this was that woman- CS: They would find these, they would find people- IS: Nettie was the local nurse. CS: They- they- they used to find other women who used to do this. GE: And who were- Who were the different women? What were their names? "Nettie"... CS: Nettie Klass- IS: K-L-A-S-A CS: -- Rabbi Greenburg, and Doctor Katz. And they lived right across the street from the center, the new center. And then- When I would go by and see the three of them sitting outside, I knew somebody was in trouble. SC: Well then was it your mother that was involved in telling you, "No, you keep doing it?" CS: That's right. SCB: And then what about Nettie at that point? CS: Huh? SCB: What about Nettie at that point? CS: Well after Nettie died, she didn't get any new names, so. SCB: Oh, but your mother was involved too? CS: My mother- Just- If Nettie said so and so needs, then I'll order it and they'll bill you. That's it. My mother probably didn't even know who they were. GE: Isn't that beautiful? CS: But that's how she was. My father was very involved- I mean, she would hostess for my father. Oh, I remember she used to have Oneg Shabbats [desserts and beverages served after Friday evening Sabbath services] growing up. GE: Which is- Which is Friday night after services. CS: It's a- It's a Saturday thing with family. She used to have- GE: Kiddush [food served after Saturday morning Sabbath services]? CS: No, Oneg Shabbat, like a study session. And she used to do it- She used to have stuff from Hadassah [popular women's Zionist organization]. And of course, every time they were raising money for the Temple or the Center because my father was co-chairman of the building fund of the Center on 22nd Street and he was chairman of the Temple. GE: And that was what, in the 1950s was that built? IS: Yeah. GE: 1950s. SCB: So if she was- If she having a study group after Shabbat, was this men and women or just women? CS: Just women. That was the women. Just the women. GE: And that would be like a Saturday afternoon after services? CS: Yes. We used to have a- a Sisterhood. I'm trying to think what it was, what we called it, but we used to have it on- occasionally on- I remember Adrienne Warshawsky was chairman of it. That's when I was Sisterhood President, I can't remember though what we called it. Well anyway, we grew up ; I walked- I used to walk to school from 25th and Union to the Raub School. I mean when I think about it today, that our parents could let us walk that distance, and it was a- and our neighborhood was gentile. Across the street was a Rumberger family and they were wonderful. I grew up with Janet Rumberger. And we had an empty lot next to the house, my father got permission from the city to clear it. And he put toys out there, you know, kids' things. But unfortunately, older kids would come and trash it, so my father took it down, took down the toys and that was it. But that's where we lived. And- Well the Samuels family lived a block away and they were very nice to my parents when they moved here. And then when I was in third grade, I remember it was my parents' fifteenth wedding anniversary, we moved to the house 2710 Greenleaf Street. And I used to go to school with Ruthie Rappaport, there were very few Jewish kids in the Muhlenberg School. GE: Very few? CS: Very few. And- But I guess- My- My childhood memories of Allentown were wonderful. I think this is a wonderful place for kids to grow up. I was happy here, I mean- and then I went to Raub Junior High, and then I went to Allen- It was Allentown High School in those days. IS: She used to ride with Harry Neff and he used to take us in his car. And she couldn't stand Irwin. So she would get out a block before I did so she didn't have to come with me. CS: And Harry Neff said they are going to end up married. SCB: And he was prophetic. CS: But I went to Allen- Allentown High just for one year. My father could not figure out how anybody who went to school every day and never did homework, or rarely did homework, came home with all 100s on her report card. And- Because I could figure out, the classes were so big, when I'm going to get called on and that's when I would do- I- I wasn't a good student, but I became a better student at Moravian. GE: Oh okay, so you went to Moravian after Allen. CS: I- I- I was- There was a family in town, one Marilyn Levine, she lived down South 16th Street. GE: Now is that part of the Levine's, the fabric store? CS: No, no. This was a Mr. Levine who had the cotton shop, right? IS: Yeah. His- Her father had a merchant shop- CS: On Hamilton Street. In fact, they used the second floor of his building when they had services in the beginning when Temple Beth El- you know before they got the building at 12th and Walnut. IS: The attitude of the Jews at that time was a lot different than it is today. They were all one hundred percent behind the Temple. They were all in the same economic group. Claire missed out on a lot because she- her family was fortunate to live and buy a house in the deep west end. She didn't grow up like I did in the working-class Jews of around 16th and Fairview, in that area. So it was a lot different. We weren't aware of it at the time, but when you think back now, you know, you realize the difference. And it made a- CS: This you know was after the war. And there were a lot of girls that were pregnant in high school and my father just thought that was a- So he decided- GE: Just curious, you're not talking about Jewish girls in the neighborhood? CS: No. GE: You're just talking about kids. CS: Just kids pregnant. And he just- He just didn't think it was the right place for me. He heard about different private schools, so he- The first school I thought about was--I read about different schools--the Emma Willard School in Troy, New York. And Marilyn Levine also heard about it and she applied, and they wouldn't take two Jewish girls from the same town yet. So I then- the Mary Baldwin School in Bryn Mawr, okay? Well, I applied and we went down for an interview, and I can still see that lady ; I know her name. And we sat there and she said to us, "Well, we will take your daughter. We have never had a Jewish boarding student. She will have to room alone." My father said, "Stop." He said, "You can take your damn school and shove it." And he told me to get up. Her name was Rosamond Cross. Today, Beverly Bloch's grandchildren go there, and I told them the story. She said, "Claire, the school is all Jewish now." I said that lady is turning over. SCB: And that wasn't a Quaker school? That was a Episcopal maybe, an Episcopal? CS: No, right, the Quaker schools are called the Friends Schools. SCB: Right, Friend Schools, and there are a lot of them in the area. CS: Right, in Philly. SCB: Was this, was it Episcopal perhaps? CS: Probably. I- I don't know. I mean, that ended it. My father said you are going to Moravian. So I went to Moravian and I learned how to study and I- I had a very- I was very happy there. And I went to look at colleges and I fell in love with Pembroke. I loved Brown, I loved the city of Providence, and that's where I was going. The trunk went, and I stayed home. I went to Cedar Crest and then got married. SCB: Because you already knew Irwin by that time? CS: Oh, yes. Well when he came home from St. Louis, his mother must have told him that that nice little girl around the corner- IS: No, no, you're getting ahead of yourself. After the first year, 1942, early part of the war, my father accumulated enough money to move out of South West Street. And he thought- We bought a house at 2709 Washington. CS: So Washington is here and Greenleaf is here. IS: She lived a block away. CS: And there was a service alley. IS: Yeah, I used to go up and down the alley to see her all the time. And of course her parents were- went to Florida for the whole winter and we had the run of the house. They had an excellent housekeeper all those years. CS: And I had- I had the biggest television set in the city of Allentown. Max Hess called my father up, he said, "I have two of them, I'm taking one, I think you should have the other one." The whole Phi Ep house used to come to watch the television. IS: They had a finished basement and they had this projection model TV, which was about three feet by four feet. At that time, the television screens- We used to have parties and galore over there. SCB: So you stayed, did you- Did your other brothers- Your other siblings stay in Allentown when your parents went to Florida? IS: Oh yeah. CS: My sister- My brother went to Blair Academy and my sister went to Emma Willard. IS: With Jane Fonda. CS: Jane Fonda was her roommate, in her suite, one of her suitemates. Margie went to Emma Willard. GE: Blair Academy is where? IS: Blairstown, New Jersey. SCB: Hackettstown in that area? IS: Blairstown, New Jersey. SCB: Yeah, but it's near Hackettstown. GE: And where is that, Emma Willard? IS: In Troy, New York. GE: Oh that's the one you were saying, okay. CS: Yeah, Margie went to- Well, I mean, I went to camp in the summer. I loved camp. I went to camp until I was seventeen. SCB: Which camp was that? CS: Camp Akiba. It was a Jewish camp in the Poconos. Bartonsville? Yeah, the village was Appenzell, the mailing address was Bartonsville. IS: Outside of Stroudsburg. CS: It was near Stroudsburg. And I loved my summers at camp. My brother hated camp because he said they have brother and sister meetings, but she never talks to me, she talks to the boys. My sister and I loved camp. He didn't. So my father said well if you don't want to go to camp, you can come home, and I'll take you to the mill and you'll work in the mill. That was like- He stayed in camp. But I loved camp. And- And at the Center, you know, we had a high school sorority, a Jewish high school sorority. And they had sororities at Allen High, Allentown, and I get such a kick out of it--whenever Charlie Dent runs for office, his mother, Marjorie Wieder Dent, calls to remind me of the wonderful times we had at Allen High. And I tell her, I only stayed there one year and that's it. SCB: So, were your parents good friends of the Hesses? CS: Pardon me? SCB: Were your parents good friends of the Hesses? IS: Nobody really was good friends with the Hesses. CS: Well Max Hess lived on Livingston Street at- at 27th. And he- Richard was his- You see, there was a table in Hess's patio in the back. A big round table where local businessmen used to eat, the Jewish men. And Max Hess would always join them. And he- I remember once they were working on a thing for the Center, counting Jewish families, and he says you count me, but not my wife and my children. He was married to a gentile woman, Betty Douglass. IS: He was not community-minded as such. He was involved only in his- the store. And- CS: And from the day- Even after I was married, when I would see him in the street, he'd said, "Miss Wiener! Miss Wiener!" He'd never call me Claire. And I'm so used to everybody calling me Claire I don't even know when they- I don't turn around. IS: He used to have the greatest Christmas parties. He would have Hollywood celebrities come to- CS: Oh and I thought your Christmas party- The first time you took me to a Christmas party at the factory, I had the best time of my life. All they did was polka dance. It was in a- Where was it? It was in a- IS: Saint Joe's. CS: Saint Joe's in Northampton. It was wonderful. But I loved growing up in Allentown. I was very happy. SCB: And one of the women who I interviewed, now I'm- Was it Joanne Spencer whose mother worked for the Hesses? IS: Could be, yeah. SCB: And I'm trying to think of her maiden name. Oh... I'll think of it, I'll let you know. She worked, and- and actually- Now maybe I'm wrong, maybe it was someone else. Maybe it was Hazel Aisley. CS: Hazel? SCB: Hazel Aisley, yeah. IS: He didn't have that many Jewish employees. SCB: No, they were African American. IS: That's why Max- he chose Irwin Greenburg. His son wasn't interested and Irwin was the most amazed person when he was selected because he only had only worked there a few- CS: What about Jerry Mandel? IS: And Jerry Mandel. He had a couple- And Roy Hertz was there for a while. CS: Yes, Roy Hertz was there. IS: They were controllers so, not- CS: And what about my father's friend, Mitch Kauffman and- IS: Well he was a bigshot. He was a widower or a bachelor. He was never married, Mitch Kauffman. Was he? CS: He's married- Yeah! To a girl named- to a woman named Nancy. She's a very good friend of Anna Frankel. IS: Well that's only a couple of executives, a handful, and at the time they had ten stores. That's when they branched out. SCB: And this was a woman who worked for his family, I guess cooking and- CS: Yes, Hazelman. Because he had a swimming pool and you could look in and it was unbelievable. You know he invited us up because he lived up the hill from us. And he used to ride a motorcycle down 27th Street and Richard would follow in the Cadillac. Richard was the- IS: And they had two Great Dane dogs that were chasing after all of them. CS: And then the house next to us was bought by Mr. Becker, who was one of the- one of his big managers there. He used to come down and park in Mr. Becker's driveway, visit him, then come over and visit my father. And he was a very nice man. He was a brilliant- IS: He respected those who had money. CS: He respected those who had brains, too. IS: Well yeah. CS: He was a very bright man in merchandising. GE: Right, right, right. He was one of the best. Going back with your father, Louis Wiener, do you want to tell us a little bit? Because I know he was a major pillar in the community, the Jewish community with the institutions. What were some of the- Was he a president of the synagogue? CS: No, he would never be the president. But he was the chairman of the board for umpteen years. And when he gave it up, he felt that it was time for the younger people to take over, he believed strongly in that. And they made him the honorary chairman of the board, which he has- had... IS: He was the driving force for the new building of the new Temple. GE: On 17th and Hamilton? IS: Yeah. At that time, Claire and I were just married, and we were living with them until- We didn't have our own house then. CS: No, first we were living in the apartment. IS: Well, we had the apartment. Then we moved- We lived in the Schnitzer's apartment on 18th and Hamilton. CS: But I had to move- When we had a baby, I had to leave. IS: No. But I remember he had the big shots at the Temple come and make all of the pledges and the groundwork for the building fund and all, were all held in Claire's father's house. Major planning, including bringing in the architect from New York, who designed the building and not only after they had the money, but the initial planning of the building, and who would do it, and how they were going to do it. And there were fights and yells and screams--I remember Abe Benioff and the architect got into an argument, almost socked each other. CS: And that architect, do you- You know Max Stetner? GE: I know who he is, yeah. CS: Okay, Mr. Stetner was a past president of the Temple, his father. He was a quiet, gentlemanly little man. And when he came to this country, he was an architect from Europe. And he got a job with this Mr. Courland, who was the architect. SCB: Courland? IS: Courland. K-O-U-R-L-A-N-D.[the correct spelling is with a "C."] SCB: Okay. CS: He was from New York, I think. And when Mr. Stetner met him for the first time, Max told me, he said to him, "Thank you very much," you know, he said, "for giving me a job." And then I think he let him out, and Mr. Stetner got into the laundry business and did very, very well. So you see, these- These men were a different generation. They aren't like the men of today. Bobby Hammel is like these men. Bobby Hammel is a good- he's- he's wonderful. GE: You're right. Very philanthropic and very community-minded. CS: Yes. These men believed in Rabbi Greenburg. He just drew them in. And he- he felt we needed a bigger synagogue, we had more members, the Hebrew school. I went to Hebrew school at the Lincoln School and confirmation- confirmation class at Greenburg's house. I was in his first confirmation class and we had up on the Temple of- on 12th and Walnut, I swear the mice used to be running in the cotton. We had one big room. It was awful. So they wanted this. We had the Center, and we needed our synagogue. And these men, they gave from the heart. IS: They were all like Bobby Hammel, but in different stages, it was what they could afford. They had the same ideas like Bobby of being generous and what they could afford and that's the way most of the men were and that's the way the Temple was really built. CS: And it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. Well we lived at 18th and Hamilton. My father's first stop in the morning was to pick- to come to the apartment, I'd be outside, and he'd park the car in front of the apartment and we'd walk up to the Temple, a block. And he'd walk through and I'd walk through with him. And he's looking at this and telling them that. And then at 4:30 in the afternoon we'd go through this again on his way home. So that Temple was a part of my life from the beginning. When Anne was born, Rabbi Greenburg didn't let kids in the sanctuary ; that was a no-no. But I would- We wheeled her up, the first Rosh Hashanah, in the service and he stayed outside and I went in. And then he went in and I stayed outside with her. But it- It was different. It was just different growing up. We were a very close-knit community and the friends are still. The boys he grew up with are the boys he eats lunch with and- and they're- it's- SC: It was a community. Can you say something about Bobby Hammel for the future? Just, you know, to have that on tape. GE: He is a current leader in the community and I would say also- actually, he grew up in Pottsville and he had- He is an exterminator. But- but again, where he became a very- The family became a very successful business, and he is really a major- But he's not just a philanthropist in terms of money, he is a philanthropist in the whole way, where he has been a leader in the Boy Scouts, a leader in the Federation, a leader at the synagogue. CS: He's just- GE: Right, right, right. Yes, no, I would also say, when you were saying with Bob Hammel, Rance Block might not be in a financial position to give- CS: But Rance Block is another- GE: He's also completely committed. CS: He- He was- Rabbi Greenburg used to say it was a pleasure for him because he watched- you know saw him right through, like me. Rance Block once introduced me, at Rabbi--was it Rabbi Greenburg's 80th birthday? It was the Center, it was at the Center. We were all sold out, we had to take it all out of the Temple and go to the Center. And he introduced me and he said, "When I was in grade school, she was in college. And when I was in high school, she got married. And when I was in college, she became a sisterhood president. Now she's the synagogue president!" But he- Well, Rance is a good boy. GE: Oh yeah. Very committed. CS: Bobby and Rance are great. I- I think they're wonderful, both of them. But you know, we had our center, we had our synagogues, and we had our community. IS: We didn't have to bother with Gentiles, actually. CS: When we- You know, years and years ago we had that terrible bus accident. GE: I heard about that, I heard. CS: That was a terrible, terrible thing. GE: This was a bus accident on Route 22, is that the one that you're saying? CS: It was yeah, out past- GE: It was where it was slippery out by Lafayette. CS: It was a terrible bus accident and I know it was a Thursday afternoon. And it was my birthday weekend and my daughter, Joanie was coming home, she was at- went for a summer in Richmond. And she was flying home that weekend. And my- Everything Thursday I was working then for Sandy Zales and Nina. I would- But every Thursday afternoon, the girls knew my mother was in the beauty shop around the corner and I would take her home and make a- Get lost for an hour or so with her if she had to go to the Farmers' Market or something. And my father used to play golf on Thursdays with his foursome. Anyhow, I go and I hear these sirens. Sirens after sirens. And I turn on the radio and they are talking about a bus accident and a Jewish day school. And I was- I was then an officer in the temple. I don't know what I was, but Milt Berman was the president, I remember, and he was playing golf. And I said to my mother, "I have to take you home. I- I have to go right down to the Temple, we've got to open up the Temple for these people," and that's what we did. And it was horrible. Seven children died. That night, where we used to buy gas at 17th and Liberty, Mike Tizzio, Irwin called Mike, and he said, "Could you open up the gas station? There are seven hearses that have to be filled up." The parents came, United Airlines flew in- They were extremely religious. They flew in Glatt Kosher food. You can't imagine what went on. It was- It was the most horrible thing and kids were in the hospital for weeks here. Parents and people opened up their homes and their hearts to them. GE: When- when- was that in the-? I did hear of it. I don't know if that was the '70s? IS: It was a long time ago. CS: I think it's in the archives, but- I was president from '64 through '67. It was probably the late '60s or early '70s. Wait, Joanie graduated from high school, wait a minute. Anne was class of '67, Irene was '69, Joanie in '71. So this was 1970 because it was the- she went between her junior and senior year. GE: I knew it was before I came to town. CS: That's when it happened. It was terrible. GE: Yeah, I heard of that. CS: And when I saw my daughter get off that plane, I want to tell you- How- How many parents look at a bus's tires when kids go away? You know, when I saw that red and white laundry bag come in front of her, I broke into tears. I wasn't- I couldn't see, I couldn't stop. SCB: Was she on that bus? CS: No, no. She was at school coming- She was at a summer in Richmond program. SCB: Right, right, I just wanted to clarify that. IS: It was from a Jewish day school from Lawrence, Long Island. CS: Five points, five points in New York. SCB: Were the students on a class trip or did they board there? CS: They were on a field trip. They were taking them up to Lancaster County. GE: I think it was raining. Was it raining or something? CS: I don't know, I don't think it was, no. SCB: Those curves are horrible. GE: Do you know how now it's like ridged. That's why. That's when it was put in. CS: It was just terrible. I mean- That's what I mean. The community, our community, came together so fast ; I couldn't believe it. I called Betty Griff. Do you know Betty? GE: No. CS: Well she used to be great in the kitchen. She came down and she was like a general. She caught him eating a roll and she told him, "You were told to set the table!" You know, we served food for these people constantly. And the rabbis all came together. SCB: They came in from Long Island. CS: Yeah. SCB: The families came from Long Island. IS: They didn't know which kids were killed. Nobody knew. All they heard was that seven kids killed on the bus and the parents didn't know if it was their child or not. CS: They were finding out when they got here. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
Duration
Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.)
02:08:02
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Irwin and Claire Salitsky, May 26th, 2011
Description
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Irwin Salitsky talks about how his father (Barney Salitsky) and his partner (Izzy Weinstein) moved the business from New York to Allentown in 1932 to escape the unions. Irwin was four years old. Irwin’s father and his partner started Clyde Shirt and later Highland Sportswear. Irwin loved growing up in Allentown and living in the heart of the Jewish neighborhood [around West and Walnut St.]. Barney Salitsky and Izzy Weinstein were partners for about 40 years. Eventually, when the sons were in the business, the partnership was dissolved.
Claire Salitsky affectionately talks about the wonderful role models her parents were. Her father was a silk weaver in Paterson, NJ with his father. But when the depression hit, things quickly soured. There was an available factory in Slatington, PA for Claire’s father to purchase but he needed a loan to do so. A veritable stranger gave him the loan and Claire’s father and new partner became very successful. Due to that generosity, Claire’s parents actively helped others in the community who were less fortunate and needed financial assistance.
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LVTNT-02
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2011-05-26
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Copyright remains with the interview subject and their heirs.
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5a95b6e809a6f6c91f412f8b77ef3acf
Dublin Core
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Title
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Irwin Schneider
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https://trexlerworks.muhlenberg.edu/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=LVTNT-11.xml
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5.4 August 10, 2011 Irwin and Ellen Schneider, August 10, 2011 LVTNT-11 1:46:00 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Irwin Schneider Ellen Schneider Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 SchneiderIrwin_Ellen_20110810.mp4 1.0:|27(10)|42(18)|63(8)|86(4)|127(2)|158(9)|185(5)|216(6)|241(9)|268(2)|307(7)|328(14)|367(2)|396(6)|415(3)|446(8)|469(17)|492(13)|513(14)|532(16)|557(6)|590(18)|613(11)|636(11)|661(10)|688(2)|717(2)|742(13)|777(15)|804(11)|829(13)|852(3)|879(13)|908(3)|927(9)|952(3)|975(9)|996(6)|1021(8)|1050(11)|1083(2)|1102(16)|1125(7)|1146(12)|1171(12)|1198(5)|1229(12)|1260(9)|1289(11)|1316(11)|1345(8)|1368(5)|1393(8)|1416(3)|1449(5)|1478(5)|1505(14)|1538(3)|1561(6)|1582(12)|1607(2)|1632(6)|1651(12)|1668(16)|1697(14)|1718(12)|1753(17)|1780(2)|1799(13)|1826(3)|1853(16)|1880(5)|1903(8)|1938(5)|1963(2)|1994(2)|2017(17)|2046(16)|2069(12)|2090(8)|2111(6)|2132(10)|2159(8)|2182(8)|2209(13)|2232(2)|2263(4)|2286(13)|2313(14)|2340(8)|2363(12)|2404(2)|2431(4)|2464(4)|2497(7)|2518(8)|2545(10)|2566(5)|2595(4)|2614(15)|2629(7)|2654(3)|2689(4)|2706(3)|2727(2)|2744(17) 0 https://youtu.be/OEE5o7n_Wfc YouTube video 0 Introduction—Irwin Schneider SCB: Today is August 10th, 2011, an interview with Irwin Schneider. And we’ll start, if you will, with all of your information, your name, where you live currently, and your birthdate.
 ; 
 ; IS: My name is Irwin Schneider. I live in Macungie, PA, during the summer months, and I live in Florida for seven months during the winter months.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Where were you born?
 ; 
 ; IS: I was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1931. 0 36 Irwin's Family History SCB: Can we talk a little about your family background, and then we will get back to you again. Where, what do you know about your parents, your grandparents, great-grandparents, where they came from, where they lived, and their education?
 ; 
 ; IS: Alright, my family, everyone came from Poland. My parents were born in Poland and my parents came to the United States in the early 1920s. Both came from Poland, and my parents immigrated to the United States, and they moved to Brooklyn. They met in Brooklyn, and they married in January of 1930. And they met and lived in Brooklyn and worked very, very hard. And my father decided to get into the garment business. He worked in NY as a foreman in a sewing factory. And in 1931, the factory that he was working for decided to move to Allentown, Pennsylvania, to get away from the union. And he was working as a foreman, and he was making $35 a week, which was a very nice salary at that time. He decided to come to Allentown to test it out, and he came to Allentown, and he didn’t know where to go so, he went to Friday night services at Sons of Israel which was located at 6th and Tilghman Street. And he met a man with a beard, and my father was only 28 years old at the time, and I was six months old. And he introduced himself, said my name is Sam Schneider. The Factory I am working for is moving to Allentown, Pennsylvania, and I am thinking of coming to Allentown. I do not know a single soul. I do not know where to go. I am thinking of coming to Allentown, and I am at a loss at what to do and where to go. The man said you look like a nice young Jewish man. What I am going to do for you is I’ll let you stay at my place. I will give you room and board. I will give you breakfast and dinner and a clean bed for five dollars a week. 0 693 Irwin's Education SCB: So can you talk a little bit more about your childhood? What you did? Maybe where you worked? Where you went to school?
 ; 
 ; IS: I went to Penn State University. I got a degree in commerce and finance. And during the summer years, I worked at the factory at Schneider Manufacturing. And after the graduation, I went into the Army. I was in the medical corps, and after I graduated from the Army, I went into the business.
 ; 
 ; GE: And that’s already the ’50s?
 ; 
 ; IS: I graduated from Penn State University in 1953. And then I went into the Army for two years. I got out in 1955. And then I went into the business.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Did you go to Allentown High School?
 ; 
 ; IS: I went to Allentown High School.
 ; 
 ; SCB: How about Elementary School?
 ; 
 ; IS: I went to Raub. I went to Raub for nine years. 0 768 Growing up in Allentown, PA GE: And where did you live? Where did you grow up? Where in Allentown? What neighborhood?
 ; 
 ; IS: We lived in, we grew up in the West End of Allentown.
 ; 
 ; GE: What street?
 ; 
 ; IS: We first lived on South St. Cloud Street.
 ; 
 ; GE: OK. That is between the 17th and 18th.
 ; 
 ; IS: Between 17th and 18th, and then we moved to South West Street.
 ; 
 ; GE: Ok, and South West Street, that is off of Walnut.
 ; 
 ; IS: South West Street is between 16th and 17th Street.
 ; 
 ; GE: OK, right by Temple Beth El.
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes.
 ; 
 ; GE: And what do you remember as a child, maybe some of your friends you want to name for us or? At that time, your father was still working. While you were a small child, he was still working.
 ; 
 ; IS: No, he was in business already because he went into business in 1941. 0 934 Family's Involvement in the Jewish and Allentown Communities SCB: As far as being connected with the Jewish community, were you connected with the synagogue, was your family connected?
 ; 
 ; IS: Oh, yes. We have been members of Beth El since we moved into Allentown.
 ; 
 ; GE: So all the way back since 1931?
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes. I think the Temple Beth El was started around 1928, sometime around there.
 ; 
 ; GE: Probably.
 ; 
 ; IS: And we have been members since 1931, since we moved into Allentown. So we are long-time members of Beth El.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Was your father involved in the community at all? Did he have any connection to community organizations? Or was he mostly working in the business?
 ; 
 ; IS: He was an active member of Beth El. He was on the Board of Directors of Beth El. And he was an active member of the Locust Valley Country Club. He was one of the original charter members. 0 1039 Irwin's Work Experiences SCB: So can you talk about the jobs you’ve had in your life? From the very first place that you made a little bit of money all the way through to the business?
 ; 
 ; IS: The only job I had prior was one year as a counselor in a camp, and then being in the Army and then going right to Schneider Manufacturing.
 ; 
 ; SCB: And what camp was that?
 ; 
 ; IS: It was a camp in, it was Blue Mountain Camp, one summer.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Was that specifically connected to the synagogue, or was it a general camp?
 ; 
 ; IS: No, it was a summer camp in the Pocono Mountains. So basically, I have had no other employers besides the U.S. Army and Schneider Manufacturing. 0 1098 1941: The Origins of Schneider Manufacturing GE: Do you want to share with us a little bit about how the business got started?
 ; 
 ; IS: Alright. How the business got started. My father, my father, actually in 1941 borrowed five hundred dollars to start the business and buy six sewing machines. And he started it in Pearl Harbor week. He started with six employees, and he took one of the employees from the business that he had been working for, a teenager named Valeria Lukish, who was a very promising girl, who had a lot of potential. She was a combination sewing machine operator and a floor girl, and she eventually rose to the position of plant manager. And this woman today is 97 years old. She is still alive. And I visit her occasionally, she’s sort of in dementia and is very feeble, and she barely recognizes me, and I still get to see her once in a while. But anyway, the business started in 1941 during Pearl Harbor week, and my father started with six sewing machines. He borrowed the five hundred dollars to start the business. 0 1273 Early Business Practices Under Samuel Schneider SCB: And what kind of clothing did they make when your dad owned it?
 ; 
 ; IS: They were making knitwear.
 ; 
 ; SCB: So knitwear for women?
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes, for women.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Were there certain labels they were making the knitwear for? Specifically, or was it more general?
 ; 
 ; IS: More general.
 ; 
 ; SCB: And so they would be shipped up to New York.
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Could you talk a little bit about the process that your dad had. Do you know anything about the processes that he used, the way he organized the business and the manufacturing?
 ; 
 ; IS: In what respect?
 ; 
 ; SCB: So how did he go about it, did he have certain people as cutters? Did he have people, women, probably. Did he hire men? What was the factory like under him?
 ; 
 ; IS: In the beginning, he just had sewers and sewing equipment. As he got a little larger, he opened up a cutting room, and he hired cutters and spreaders. And he would get piece goods in and get a cutting department in. 0 1418 1955: Expansion Under Irwin Schneider SCB: How did it change when, or did it change when you took over the business?
 ; 
 ; IS: When I came into the business, he already had a full-fledged operation going on, a full-fledged from cutting, shipping, and packing, the full operation going.
 ; 
 ; SCB: So it did not expand at all after you took over?
 ; 
 ; IS: It expanded in volume, the number of people, the number of employees. When I came into the organization, we expanded, and we gradually built it up, and when I came into the business in 1955 we kept expanding and getting larger and larger. 0 1465 1957: Samuel Schneider's Retirement IS: And a couple years later in 1957 my father said, “Irwin, you are doing such a great job in here, in two year you already know everything, I do not even have to be here anymore,” he said. “I am going to retire to Florida. I am going to move to Florida. I will remain the president of the corporation, and you are going to take over the everyday duties of running the factory. What I’m going to do is, I am going to call you every Friday afternoon, you are going to tell me everything you shipped, how many dozens went out, what the volume was and what you are going to do is send me my paycheck for the week. And I will speak to you every week. Once a quarter I will come up for a couple days and walk around the factory, check and see what you are doing. Then I will fly back to Florida, and that is the way we will do it.”
 ; 
 ; SCB: Sounds like a nice business relationship, too. 0 1622 Learning the Business—Summer Work at Schneider Manufacturing SCB: And during those summers then, did you work at specific machines or did you just learn - and I shouldn’t say “just” - learn the management of the business without being involved in the various processes to understand what people were doing?
 ; 
 ; IS: Actually I spent a little time in the office, a little time on the sewing floor, a little time in the cutting room, a little time in every area of the business. Trying to pick up a little bit.
 ; 
 ; SCB: So you were managing mostly?
 ; 
 ; IS: Not actually management, my father had me in every single department trying to pick up.
 ; 
 ; SCB: So did you actually operate, go through the process in the department? And the reason I am asking this is because in some of the textile industries in Philadelphia in the 19th century the son would be brought in and would have to go through every process and learn every process so he would learn how to do everything.
 ; 
 ; GE: So he would actually work on a press.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Right, do everything, and learn all the skills.
 ; 
 ; IS: I did not. Actually, I did not actually sit on a sewing machine, I did not actually go to the cutting room and use any of the cutting equipment. 0 1713 Employees of Schneider Manufacturing IS: I had a very good relationship with the employees. They loved me. I worked very good with them. I had a nice relationship with them. I treated them very, very well.
 ; 
 ; ES: Can I interject something?
 ; 
 ; SCB: Certainly!
 ; 
 ; ES: He still does to this day. There is a group, now these are elderly ladies by now, but there is a group of them who still meet once a month for lunch, they go to the City View Diner.
 ; 
 ; IS: On Seventh Street.
 ; 
 ; ES: And in the summertime when Irwin is home, he comes there and joins them once or twice.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Wonderful.
 ; 
 ; ES: They love it. 0 1944 Letter from Rance Block, President of Temple Beth El, to Employees of Schneider Manufacturing, 1988 IS: This is something from Rance Block who was President of Beth El in March of 1988:
 ; 
 ; Dear Employees of Irwin Schneider,
 ; 
 ; The officers and Congregation at Temple Beth El acknowledges with gratitude your generous donation made in honor of Irwin Schneider. The funds will be placed in the Samuel Schneider Philanthropic fund. This contribution shows the esteem in which Irwin Schneider is held by all his former employees. I am sure that Mr. Schneider is deeply touched and appreciative of this gesture. Once again, thanks for your generosity.
 ; 
 ; Sincerely,
 ; 
 ; Rance Block
 ; 
 ; President 0 2024 Letter from Irwin Schneider to Schneider Manufacturing Retirees, 1977 IS: This is something I did February 1, 1977. I wrote this letter, and each and every one of the girls who retired got a letter like this. I will read the letter that I wrote:
 ; 
 ; Dear So and So,
 ; 
 ; The bicentennial year of 1976 was a very important milestone in our nation’s history, it was the 200th birthday celebration of the United States. The year 1976 was also a very important one for the Schneider Manufacturing Corporation, as this marked the 35th anniversary of our being in business. These 35 years of continued growth would not have been possible without the loyal and dedicated support of our many hundreds of employees throughout the years. In tribute to the service of our most recent retirees, we are backtracking to our celebration year of 1976 and to this year of 1977 and presenting each of you with a fifty dollar retirement savings bond which will set a precedent for all union employees retiring in the future. This savings bond is in addition to the monthly retirement check you are presently receiving from the ILGWU. These checks are the result of retirement contributions that we have sent to ILGWU throughout the years based upon your payroll earnings. Our very best wishes for your continued good health, and please feel free to visit us at any time.
 ; 
 ; Very Truly Yours,
 ; 
 ; Schneider Manufacturing Corporation
 ; 
 ; Irwin J. Schneider
 ; 0 2146 Press Release Covering the Selling of Schneider Manufacturing to Robert Marzano, 1988 IS: I also want to read the press release. This is the press release sent out by Chambers Association Advertising Public Relations Company on Linden Street in Allentown. The press release that was going to be sent out to the Allentown Morning Call.
 ; 
 ; A 47-year-old Allentown apparel manufacturing firm has a new name and a new owner, assuring the continued employment of more than a hundred and twenty-five men and women. Schneider Manufacturing Company, 315 Linden Street, has been purchased from Irwin J. Schneider by Robert Marzano of Whitehall, and is now Linden Apparel Company. Marzano, who is also President of JoMar Manufacturing in Alburtis, stated that ownership of the Schneider Firm increases his ability to continue to make a better line of ladies knits sportswear, and to expand both the Linden and JoeMar operations. JoeMar, with its 50 employees, is too small to compete alone in the better knits field, he said, so Linden will reinforce our Alburtis plant’s production. Schneider pointed out that the sale of his firm involved two second-generation apparel makers. 0 2449 Long-time Contractor for Beeline Fashions GE: Can you tell us both about that business, Beeline Business, as well as were you their sole supplier?
 ; 
 ; IS: No, I was not their sole supplier.
 ; 
 ; GE: But they were your sole customer.
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes.
 ; 
 ; GE: But if you could share with us if you could tell us about the Beeline Business and then also what were the years you were saying you had that contract for 25 years and how that really helped your whole business?
 ; 
 ; IS: Well, we were starting to do some business with Beeline starting in the late 1950s, and the relationship started to work out very, very nicely. They started growing very, very fast, very, very quickly and we got a nice relationship with them, and we saw that they were increasing their business so fast and so quickly. It was the era of stay-at-home moms. 0 2856 Samuel Schneider's Contributions to the War Industry SCB: Can we go back and could you talk for a minute about what your dad produced during World War II for the war effort? What kind of garments did he produce, the t-shirts?
 ; 
 ; IS: I know he made a lot of t-shirts for one company that had a contract with the army, plus he made work for other jobbers too, but I am not sure too much because I was only a youngster. I was not really familiar. But he had other contracts.
 ; 
 ; SCB: But he was a war industry then.
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes. And it is sad to say that he had to have the war to expand his business.
 ; 
 ; GE: That is the reality.
 ; 
 ; IS: But he got in at the right time and for a man who did not have any education.
 ; 
 ; GE: He was obviously business savvy. 0 2920 Unions SCB: Can you talk a little bit about how the union came into your business, so going back to women how as you mentioned off-camera, were happy with the business and they were getting union wages, but the truckers pushed that, pushed the union, the International Ladies Garment Workers Union?
 ; 
 ; GE: Were really aggressive. Do you want to just share that with us again? We just didn’t capture it. 
 ; 
 ; IS: From what I understand, the union was actually going to the girls' houses at night and saying that the Schneider Manufacturing should go union because a very large majority of the factories in Allentown are all unionized, and you would be better off with the union. A lot of the girls were saying we do not need the union because Sam and Irwin Schneider are good employers, they are paying us basically the same wages as union shops are paying, and they are also paying us vacations, they’re also paying us holidays, so there is no need for us to join the union. So you ought to leave. We don’t have to join the union. 0 3064 Beeline (cont'd)—How the Relationship was Formed GE: I was wondering, excuse me, were you finished? I was wondering with Beeline, how was that original association formed? How was that developed?
 ; 
 ; IS: Okay, we were working with a jobber in New York under the name of the Golder Company, Golder Company and Climax Specialties. This jobber had two names, Golder and Climax Specialties, and they had the contact with Beeline Fashions, and we got the initial contact with this Golder Climax Company, and they were involved with Beeline, and they got the work for us.
 ; 
 ; GE: Beeline did well?
 ; 
 ; IS: And when Beeline got busy, and we were given the opportunity to work for them full time, we gave up the other two accounts we had. It was the start, the best thing that ever happened to us. 0 3148 Creating a Positive Work Environment for Employees SCB: So did the women ever ask for flex time, for instance if they had families? Did they ever ask to have time off during their workday? Was there flexibility about the hours that the women worked?
 ; 
 ; IS: Oh yes, we would give, we worked along with them. Our regular hours were from seven to two-thirty, and overtime was usually from two-thirty to four-thirty. If they had problems we let them come in at eight or eight-thirty. We worked with them. And another thing, we were like a savings and loan association, in other words we, my bookkeeper was not too happy about it, it made extra work for her, but we would lend the employees money with no interest and have a payroll deduction plan of five dollars a week for fifty weeks or. . . it was unbelievable I was so good to the employees. 0 3290 Modernized Machinery at Schneider Manufacturing SCB: Did the technology change over the years when you were the sole owner of the business? So did you get more sophisticated machinery?
 ; 
 ; IS: Yes, newer equipment, newer equipment, faster equipment, new different types of equipment.
 ; 
 ; GE: Were you constantly updating?
 ; 
 ; IS: Oh, yes, sure. I always had top-notch mechanics on my payroll. I was always buying new equipment, new machinery that came out. I was always on top of everything.
 ; 
 ; SCB: So the mechanics would fix the machinery…
 ; 
 ; IS: Oh yeah.
 ; 
 ; SCB: But then if they knew something or you knew something was going to speed up the production and make it more…
 ; 
 ; IS: We always went to trade shows. My mechanics went to trade shows. We had good equipment, the best equipment. We always had modern equipment too. 0 3340 Membership in Trade Organizations SCB: And you were a member, you were an officer in the Needle Trades Workers Organization…
 ; 
 ; IS: The Lehigh Valley, I was a member of the Lehigh Valley Needle Trades, which was formed in the late 1950s. This was an association that was strictly for public relations, and I was also a member of the Atlantic Apparel Contractors Association, with Arnold Delin. You interview Arnold Delin?
 ; 
 ; GE: Yes.
 ; 
 ; IS: By the way, he is very sick.
 ; 
 ; SCB: Oh, no.
 ; 
 ; IS: Arnold Delin, he looked very thin when you saw him?
 ; 
 ; SCB: Yes, he did.
 ; 
 ; IS: He’s had a lot of health problems, a lot of health issues. Arnold Delin, when I joined the association in our peak years the association had about 450 members. And we had a headquarters in Wind Gap, a regular building and Arnold Delin would do the negotiations for the contracts for our association. It was a powerful association, and we had wonderful conventions overseas, in Italy, in Hawaii. 0 3468 1988: The Manufacturing Business in China ES: And after the business was sold, we were taking a trip to the Orient for a number of weeks, and we went through the state department.
 ; 
 ; IS: In Washington.
 ; 
 ; ES: Yes, this was in 1988.
 ; 
 ; IS: And Arnold Delin worked for us.
 ; 
 ; ES: And got us permission to visit a Chinese garment factory, and we did.
 ; 
 ; IS: Arnold Delin had to ask permission from the State Department in Washington because, in 1988, China was not so liberal.
 ; 
 ; ES: And we went in, and there was a whole delegation there that was meeting us. They took us around to their factory, and we were immediately struck by the youth of their employees. They were women, and they were all young. And then they took us downstairs and they showed us their daycare center, right on the premises. Infants, they had them all lined up, all bundled up, it was nap time when we were there. But we were immediately struck by the differences between the Oriental manufacturing and the United States.
 ; 
 ; GE: Tell us, describe to us some of the differences.
 ; 
 ; ES: Well, first of all, the age of the employees was far younger than ours. Ours were middle-aged and-
 ; 
 ; IS: Older. 0 3780 Irwin and Ellen's Involvement in the Jewish Community SCB: If we could go back and if you could talk a little bit about your involvement with the community and with the synagogue and the Jewish community and the greater Allentown community, are there organizations other than what you showed us here that you belonged to and connected you to the community?
 ; 
 ; IS: Ok as far as the organizations, I have been on the board of directors of the Temple Beth El. I have also served on the endowment foundation of the Temple Beth El. I have been on the six-man investment committee of the Endowment Foundation of the Temple Beth El. Now those are all in the past already. And also I have been on the committee . . . Board of Directors of the Jewish Family Service. I was also the Treasurer of the Jewish Family Service. I was also on the Russian Resettlement committee and I was very active with Jewish Family Services. This goes back a number of years ago. Also, I was on the Board of Directors of the Jewish Federation of Allentown. And also a solicitor for many, many years. So I was very involved with those three organizations. 0 4096 Evolution of Allentown and Its Communities SCB: How has the wider community of Allentown changed over the years? And how has the Jewish Community changed over the years in Allentown?
 ; 
 ; IS: How has it changed over the years, well definitely it has, the Jewish community over the years, it was more…
 ; 
 ; ES: Cohesive.
 ; 
 ; IS: Cohesive. One section was actually down in the 6th Street area, 6th Street, 5th Street, 4th Street, 3rd Street, and another section was strictly down 6th Street and Fulton Street, and that was called the ghetto, and basically nobody was out in the West End area. And then, after the war years the Jewish community started to filter out towards the West End of Allentown, toward 24th Street, 25th Street, 26th [and] 27th Street. Of course all of the Jewish community were living inside the city limits of Allentown. It wasn’t until I would say until the last 15 to 20 years that they started to move outside of the city limits of Allentown. And during the early years all of the Jewish kids went to Allentown High School, now you do not see a single Jewish student going to Allentown High School. 0 4324 Irwin and Ellen's Values SCB: So, what do you value the most in life?
 ; 
 ; IS: Value most in life, my family, the fact that I have a nice family that I am proud of how we raised our children. I mean we have wonderful children. They are well-educated. We have grandchildren, they’ve been raised so wonderful. They do not have tattoos, rings in their ears. They are well-educated. They are loving children. They call us often, they are just so wonderful. Our kids are just such great kids. We have good family values with our children, we raised them well, and our grandchildren are just super kids in general.
 ; 
 ; ES: I would say one of the nicest things I can see is, you spoke of the family values, watching our children passing those same family values on to their children. 0 4409 Irwin's Inspiration SCB: And what has made you feel the most creative in life, the most artistic in life and this can be more metaphoric, it doesn’t have to be concrete but giving you a sense of connectedness in life?
 ; 
 ; GE: Have you felt you have been artistic or made a difference, productive?
 ; 
 ; IS: I do not know how to answer that.
 ; 
 ; ES: Artistic talent kinda doesn’t run in our family.
 ; 
 ; GE: Doesn’t have to be literally.
 ; 
 ; SCB: But a sense of completion is another way to say it. It doesn’t have to be art, but just a sense of completion. 
 ; 
 ; IS: The fact that I have done well in life, that I have had a successful life.
 ; 
 ; ES: That you have been respected. 0 4519 Introduction—Ellen Schneider nee Ross SCB: So could you tell your full name, including your maiden name, when you were born, and where you were born?
 ; 
 ; ES: Alright. My name is Ellen Schneider, Ellen Ross Schneider.
 ; 
 ; GE: I’m sorry, was that Ross, R-O-S-S?
 ; 
 ; ES: R-O-S-S. Yes, Ross was my maiden name. I was born in New York, and at the age of ten, my family moved to Williamsport, Pennsylvania, which is a very small town in the middle of Pennsylvania.
 ; 
 ; GE: I am sorry, when were you born?
 ; 
 ; ES: In 1936, I am 75 years old. I will help you out with your math. And I was raised in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
 ; 
 ; GE: Why did the family move there?
 ; 
 ; ES: My father opened a business in Williamsport. 0 4631 Meeting Irwin Schneider ES: When I was at Penn State, my mother and my brother moved back to New York. And then I met Irwin.
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 ; SCB: At Penn State?
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 ; ES: No, we both went to Penn State but did not meet there was no overlap.
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 ; IS: She graduated, no I graduated in June of ‘53, she started in September of ‘53.
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 ; ES: We never were there at the same time.
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 ; IS: And when she started in ‘53, I was already going into the Army.
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 ; ES: We met on a blind date here in Allentown, actually.
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 ; GE: Who fixed you up?
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 ; IS: Irwin Greenberg.
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 ; ES: Irwin Greenberg. My Aunt lived across the street. 0 4690 Seeking Family History in Poland SCB: So can you talk a little bit about your family as much as you know about your family, work, education, where they came from?
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 ; ES: Alright. Both my mother and father were born in the United States. My grandparents came from Poland. And the area of Poland that they came from was in- had been Austria. And as I mentioned, we took a trip back to Poland. We took my mother for her 80th birthday. And we went to visit the small village where her parents came from which was outside of Krakow and then we went to the area which was outside of Warsaw where Irwin’s father came from. And in the area where my grandparents came from we found evidence of our family being there. We went into the hall of records, and I had said to my mother, “What do you think you are going to find, my grandparents came out of there in 1899, what do you think you are going to find?”, “Maybe I can find my parent’s marriage certificate.” So we went into the hall of records with the guide, and the women asked could we find a marriage certificate, and she said, “Yes,” and my mother gave her a date, and she turned to the shelf behind her and pulled a raggedy old book and she was going through the pages, and she stopped, said something in Polish and it was translated to there was had been a fire there in 1910 and everything burned down. 0 5193 Ellen's Family History IS: Tell them the rest of your history. Ask her more questions.
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 ; SCB: Let me ask you one question, do you know if any extended family, is there any extended family left?
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 ; ES: In Poland?
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 ; SCB: Yes?
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 ; ES: If there are, we have no contact, we do not know. As I said my grandparents came here with-
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 ; SCB: Which is a long time ago.
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 ; ES: Yes, 1899. And my grandmother came here with four children, one of whom was an infant, and had four more children including my mother here. My father, his parents, were from Hungary. They met in the United States and married in the United States. So all of their children were born in the United States. If my father were alive today he would be a hundred and something years old, so they went back a very long time. 0 5364 Ellen's College Education SCB: So can you talk a little bit about your college years and also after you met Irwin, how you came here?
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 ; ES: Well, actually my college years actually came in two parts. I had two years of college when I met Irwin and we’re talking the ‘50s, and it was very common to leave school.
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 ; IS: And get married.
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 ; ES: And get married, it was called getting an MRS degree, which I got. After my children were grown, and they were in high school and had started college themselves, I went back to college here, and I went to Cedar Crest and finished, and I got a degree in social work, and I worked for the Jewish Community Center. 0 5446 Children and Grandchildren SCB: Can you talk about your family, your children, and your life?
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 ; ES: You want me to talk about my grandchildren, you will have to put another one of those things in there. We have two children. Our daughter, Janet, our children both live in the New York area.
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 ; IS: Wonderful children, we raised them wonderfully, and they have great values.
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 ; ES: She is married to a very, very lovely man who is on television, he is a sports broadcaster, and you can see him here.
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 ; SCB: Is he Allentown?
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 ; ES: No, no, no, he is in New York.
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 ; SCB: He is on a New York station?
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 ; IS: Do you get Service Electric?
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 ; SCB: Yes.
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 ; GE: Yes.
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 ; ES: You can see him, Channel 7- Channel 17.
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 ; GE: What is his name?
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 ; ES: Bruce Beck. 0 5693 Ellen's Admiration for Samuel Schneider SCB: So you were talking about that your father-in-law was just 11 years out of Poland when he came here.
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 ; ES: 1931-1932, he was 11 years out of Poland, and he had ambition, he did not have an education, he could not read and write English, but his job was as a foreman, and it was a good job. Thirty-five dollars a week in 1931 at the depths of the depression was a good job. He had a wife and a very young child, and he had the courage to leave the familiar, which was his whole family, whatever family he had, which came out of Poland, were all living in the same area of Brooklyn. And against his parent’s wishes. “Please, Sam, don’t go, don’t go.” You know they were shtetl [small Eastern European villages where Jews lived] people.
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 ; IS: They begged him to stay in Brooklyn.
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 ; ES: To go out into the wide world, it took courage.
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 ; IS: “Sam, you’re going to get lost in Allentown, don’t go, don’t go.”
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 ; ES: Right, but he had the courage, he had the ambition. And thank God he did because all of us have had a wonderful life from the beginnings that he gave us. And we are very grateful to him. He was a wonderful man. I loved him, I did. 0 5786 Ellen's Dedication to the Jewish Community Center SCB: Can you talk about your role in the Synagogue and the community, the wider Allentown community and the Jewish community.
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 ; ES: My role was not much in the synagogue, that was Irwin’s area. I devoted my energies to the Jewish Community Center. I devoted a lot of time and a lot of effort and I served in many capacities.
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 ; SCB: Can you talk about that?
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 ; ES: Yes, I was President of the Women’s Auxiliary of the Jewish Community Center, which in the days that I was there had a membership of 600 and it had a Board of 60 ladies. And after I got finished with that, after having been President of…
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 ; GE: And you were President, this is about what decade?
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 ; ES: Late ‘60s, early ‘70s. And I served on the Board of the Jewish Community Center for 15 years. 0 5927 Ellen's Perspective on the Changes in Allentown and Its Communities SCB: And can you talk a little bit about how you think that the community has changed, and the Jewish community has changed? You talked some about that, but is there more?
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 ; ES: The community of Allentown, the wider community, has changed vastly as I think all of us realize. The ethnicity has changed completely. We were just driving through the old neighborhoods a week or two ago, and we were saying that this Allentown traditionally had been pretty much a blue-collar community.
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 ; IS: All white.
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 ; ES: White and the factory owners who employed the blue-collar people. That has changed a great deal. It was a lot of Pennsylvania Dutch. I do not think there are even too many Pennsylvania Dutch even around anymore. Very, very mixed ethnicities here, for the good, for the bad, I don’t really know, but it has changed. The Jewish community, as I mentioned before, I think one of the biggest changes has been the death of the family-run businesses. 0 6174 Ties to the Jewish Community Center GE: You mentioned with the JCC that Irwin was more involved with Beth El, what do you think attracted you? In other words, what from the JCC or about the JCC?
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 ; ES: What attracted me to the JCC was growing up without a JCC and realizing what this did for my peers who are still here and they grew up in Allentown, they went to the JCC. That is why I gave my time and talents to that organization. Irwin grew up at Temple Beth El, he has never belonged to another synagogue in his life. Never. People have asked, “Are you going to go to children’s for the holidays?” And I say, “No we go to the Temple Beth El.” I think even when you were in college, I think you used to come home to go to Temple Beth El for the holidays. No, that is what we do. 0 6276 Ellen's Values and Inspirations SCB: What do you value in life?
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 ; ES: I value my family, whom I love. I value good health. I value my husband.
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 ; GE: What has made you feel creative?
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 ; ES: What has made me feel creative? My goodness. I would have to say that the years I spent working with the elderly. I discovered I had a rapport with the elderly that I never knew that I had. When I started taking social work and intended to work in the field, I thought I would work with children. And just happenstance got me working with the elderly and discovered that I liked them. Now I am one of them. 0 MovingImage Irwin Schneider talks about his father’s journey from being a sixteen year old immigrant textile factory worker, to foreman, to owner of a contract sewing factory. The Schneider business prospered due to hard work and good timing. Irwin joined the family business in the 1950s and further grew the business by producing for Beeline Fashions through the early 1980s. 
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 ; Ellen Schneider talks about meeting Irwin, leaving college to get married and start a family, and then returning to college many years later after her children grow up. With her degree in social work, Ellen enjoyed a fulfilling career working with the local Jewish senior population.
 ; Interview with Irwin Schneider, August 10, 2011 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Today is August 10th, 2011, an interview with Irwin Schneider. And we'll start, if you will, with all of your information, your name, where you live currently, and your birthdate. IRWIN SCHNEIDER: My name is Irwin Schneider. I live in Macungie, PA, during the summer months, and I live in Florida for seven months during the winter months. SCB: Where were you born? IS: I was born in Brooklyn, NY, in 1931. SCB: Can we talk a little about your family background, and then we will get back to you again. Where, what do you know about your parents, your grandparents, great-grandparents, where they came from, where they lived, and their education? IS: Alright, my family, everyone came from Poland. My parents were born in Poland and my parents came to the United States in the early 1920s. Both came from Poland, and my parents immigrated to the United States, and they moved to Brooklyn. They met in Brooklyn, and they married in January of 1930. And they met and lived in Brooklyn and worked very, very hard. And my father decided to get into the garment business. He worked in NY as a foreman in a sewing factory. And in 1931, the factory that he was working for decided to move to Allentown, Pennsylvania, to get away from the union. And he was working as a foreman, and he was making $35 a week, which was a very nice salary at that time. He decided to come to Allentown to test it out, and he came to Allentown, and he didn't know where to go so, he went to Friday night services at Sons of Israel which was located at 6th and Tilghman Street. And he met a man with a beard, and my father was only 28 years old at the time, and I was six months old. And he introduced himself, said my name is Sam Schneider. The Factory I am working for is moving to Allentown, Pennsylvania, and I am thinking of coming to Allentown. I do not know a single soul. I do not know where to go. I am thinking of coming to Allentown, and I am at a loss at what to do and where to go. The man said you look like a nice young Jewish man. What I am going to do for you is I'll let you stay at my place. I will give you room and board. I will give you breakfast and dinner and a clean bed for five dollars a week. My father said, "Thank you so much." Then he took that opportunity, and that is what he did. And he stayed at this place, and he stayed there, and he worked for six days a week, and he took the train back to Brooklyn. He spent Saturday night and Sunday in New York, and then he came back to Allentown and worked six days a week. And then went back to New York for the weekends and after two months he decided this is what he is going to do. He is going to move my mother and me to Allentown. And this he did against his family's wishes. His parents and all of his relatives still were in Brooklyn, and they said, "Sam, Sam," his Jewish name was Shimon, "Shimon, Shimon, do not do this. All of your family members are in New York and Brooklyn. You are going to Allentown, and there are probably no Jewish people. There is nothing but goyim, goyim [Yiddish word for gentile]." My father said there is a synagogue there, and there are Jewish people there. I got to do this, I got to start, and I got to try and go there and make a living for myself. And that is what he did. And we, and he moved my mother and me down to Allentown. That is how we came to Allentown. SCB: Do you know what his mother and father's full names were? IS: My mother's name? ELLEN SCHNEIDER: Your father's family. SCB: Your father's family. What your father's mother and father's full names. GAIL EISENBERG: Your grandparents. ES: Your grandparents. SCB: Yes, that would be another way to say it. IS: My father's father's name was Avram. ES: Or Abe. IS: Abraham and mother's name was Lottie. GE: And how about your parents' name? IS: Samuel and Florence. GE: And you said they were from Poland, do you know where in Poland? Ellen Schneider: Not only do we know, but we visited. GE: Oh, OK. Where? ES: Lomza. They pronounce it womja. IS: He was Lomza, Poland. And what town was she from, Ellen? ES: That I don't know. IS: That we don't know. SCB: And you visited it? ES: Yes, we did. We visited it. GE: And I am also wondering, you said that "their parents were here", is that correct? In other words, when your father came here and your mother came, do you know what their experience was? Did they come by themselves or with their parents? IS: No, when my father came here his- ES: His sister and your grandfather were already here. IS: That's right. ES: They came first. GE: Do you want to tell us a little bit about that? Do you know anything about that, when your grandfather came and your aunt? IS: My father's father came first, and his one sister came also, and they worked to save some money up, so that they could later send money over so my father and his mother could come over later after the war years. SCB: So they came before WWI. IS: Yes, so my father's father and my father's sister came over ahead of time and then after the war. ES: And then the war intervened, which is why there was a number of years that they did not come. SCB: What part of Poland is that ; where is that located in Poland? Was it passed between Russia and Poland, Germany, or is it in an area that was pretty much the territory of Poland, do you know? GE: Because the borders keep changing, that's why we are wondering where that is. ES: It was an hour outside of Warsaw. An hour east of Warsaw. GE: OK. That is probably Poland. ES: Oh, yes, it was definitely Poland. GE: The reason we were asking this is because the border changed so some areas. . . GE: My father was part of an area of Poland that before WWI was part of Russia and then after WWI is Poland and now is part of Lithuania. ES: My mother's family, it was Austria, and then it became Poland. IS: And when my father came over, he was a sixteen-year-old boy. Within three days, he was already working in a pocketbook factory. And there were tough days. SCB: Did he meet, did your father's father meet his wife here in the United States? GE: His father did but not his grandfather. SCB: But not his grandfather. So was married when he came to the United States, your grandfather? IS: Yes, he was. GE: Right, right, they brought the mother right. SCB: So, as far as your mother's family? Do you know more about your mother's family? IS: My mother came over as a fourteen-year-old girl. My mother's family, her oldest sister, came over first and all of her sisters, her other sisters, she was one of eight sisters and all of her other sisters except for her oldest remained in Europe and they all were killed by the Germans. SCB: Do you know your mother's maiden name? Your grandmother's maiden name, excuse me? And your mother's maiden name? ES: I do not think you know your grandmother's maiden name. Your mother's maiden name was Schillis. IS: Schillis. SCB: How do you spell that, just for the future. IS: S-C-H-I-L-L-I-S. SCB: Do you know any stories about your family in Poland or in the United States? Any anecdotes that you think would help to make them come alive more? GE: For your children and their children. And what kind of work did they do in Poland? IS: I have no idea what kind of work they did in Poland. But when my grandfather came here, he was a presser in a garment factory. GE: Did they leave, do you know what prompted them to leave Poland, specifically? IS: To come over here and get a better life. GE: OK. IS: That was the main reason that most of the Jewish refugees came over here. SCB: So if you can talk a little bit more about, do you have any more questions about the family's past? GE: Do you know what kind of education your father had? IS: He did not have any education at all. GE: Not even a couple years in Cheder [basic Jewish education in Hebrew and prayer] to learn to pray. IS: I guess he went to Hebrew School. SCB: Any of the other people in your family, do you know what their education level was? GE: The generation above you. IS: They did not have any education at all, none. My mother came here as a fourteen-year-old child, she went to a couple years of grade school, and then after that, she went to work as a sewing machine operator. GE: So your father was- IS: My father came here at age sixteen, he didn't go to school at all, he went to work immediately. GE: So your father was a presser, and your mom was- IS: No, my grandfather was a presser. GE: I'm sorry, your Grandfather was a presser, right, right. Your father- SCB: In a pocketbook factory. IS: My father when he eventually went into the garment industry, he worked his way up to become a foreman. GE: What did he start out as? IS: He started out work as a laborer in the garment factory and in 1931 when the factory left Brooklyn to come to Allentown he had gotten up to the position of a foreman making $35 dollar a week, and that was very good money, and he did not want to give that up, so he decided to try it out. GE: Come to the Netherlands. SCB: Cause that was in the real depths of the depression. IS: Absolutely. SCB: So can you talk a little bit more about your childhood? What you did? Maybe where you worked? Where you went to school? IS: I went to Penn State University. I got a degree in commerce and finance. And during the summer years, I worked at the factory at Schneider Manufacturing. And after the graduation, I went into the Army. I was in the medical corps, and after I graduated from the Army, I went into the business. GE: And that's already the '50s? IS: I graduated from Penn State University in 1953. And then I went into the Army for two years. I got out in 1955. And then I went into the business. SCB: Did you go to Allentown High School? IS: I went to Allentown High School. SCB: How about Elementary School? IS: I went to Raub. I went to Raub for nine years. ES: Oh, at that time, it was K to eight. IS: Yes. GE: Ok. IS: It was nine years. GE: Right, right, right. IS: Nine years at Raub and then the tenth, eleventh and twelfth at Allentown High School. GE: And where did you live? Where did you grow up? Where in Allentown? What neighborhood? IS: We lived in, we grew up in the West End of Allentown. GE: What street? IS: We first lived on South St. Cloud Street. GE: OK. That is between the 17th and 18th. IS: Between 17th and 18th, and then we moved to South West Street. GE: Ok, and South West Street, that is off of Walnut. IS: South West Street is between 16th and 17th Street. GE: OK, right by Temple Beth El. IS: Yes. GE: And what do you remember as a child, maybe some of your friends you want to name for us or? At that time, your father was still working. While you were a small child, he was still working. IS: No, he was in business already because he went into business in 1941. GE: In 1941, okay. So from 31 to 41, up until that time, then what was he doing, was he just a foreman? IS: Yes. GE: So for ten years, during those ten years, your first ten years of life. Do you want to share anything? Do you have any friends from that time that are still people we would know in Allentown? For example. Did you go to the JCC? IS: During those years, I spent time, spent time. Actually, we started going to the JCC in the early, in the early 1940s at 6th and Chew Street. GE: Is that when that was built, the 1940s? IS: Yeah, well, it was built way before the 1940s, but the JCC then were at 6th and Chew. And some of the friends that are still around-- Irwin Greenberg. GE: And tell me Irwin Greenberg, who was his wife? ES: He was the President of Hess's. IS: The President of Hess's. GE: Okay, alright. So he grew up here. IS: He grew up here. GE: Ok, ok. Interesting. IS: And another one of my closest friends was Sherwood Zilinsky, who passed away. He was the other brother of Irwin Zilinsky. GE: Okay. SCB: And Mr. Greenberg was on the documentary about Hess's. He spoke on Hess's. As far as being connected with the Jewish community, were you connected with the synagogue, was your family connected? IS: Oh, yes. We have been members of Beth El since we moved into Allentown. GE: So all the way back since 1931? IS: Yes. I think the Temple Beth El was started around 1928, sometime around there. GE: Probably. IS: And we have been members since 1931, since we moved into Allentown. So we are long-time members of Beth El. SCB: Was your father involved in the community at all? Did he have any connection to community organizations? Or was he mostly working in the business? IS: He was an active member of Beth El. He was on the Board of Directors of Beth El. And he was an active member of the Locust Valley Country Club. He was one of the original charter members. GE: Where is that? I am not familiar with that. IS: It is not in existence anymore. It was a country club that was formed in the early 1950s, in Coopersburg, Pennsylvania. GE: I am just wondering because this came up in another community where we spoke to people. Was there, I don't know if he was interested in becoming a member of any other country clubs, but were there any issues, did he find any social discrimination because he was Jewish in trying to join any country club? IS: Not that I know. He did not try to join any other country clubs. He was very involved in the business. GE: Okay. SCB: So can you talk about the jobs you've had in your life? From the very first place that you made a little bit of money all the way through to the business? IS: The only job I had prior was one year as a counselor in a camp, and then being in the Army and then going right to Schneider Manufacturing. SCB: And what camp was that? IS: It was a camp in, it was Blue Mountain Camp, one summer. SCB: Was that specifically connected to the synagogue, or was it a general camp? IS: No, it was a summer camp in the Pocono Mountains. So basically, I have had no other employers besides the U.S. Army and Schneider Manufacturing. GE: Schneider Manufacturing began when you were like ten years old. IS: Yes. GE: Do you want to share with us a little bit about how the business got started? IS: Alright. How the business got started. My father, my father, actually in 1941 borrowed five hundred dollars to start the business and buy six sewing machines. And he started it in Pearl Harbor week. He started with six employees, and he took one of the employees from the business that he had been working for, a teenager named Valeria Lukish, who was a very promising girl, who had a lot of potential. She was a combination sewing machine operator and a floor girl, and she eventually rose to the position of plant manager. And this woman today is 97 years old. She is still alive. And I visit her occasionally, she's sort of in dementia and is very feeble, and she barely recognizes me, and I still get to see her once in a while. But anyway, the business started in 1941 during Pearl Harbor week, and my father started with six sewing machines. He borrowed the five hundred dollars to start the business. And the first manufacturer that gave him work was Bob Sussman. His son is Fred Sussman, who lives here in Allentown. He is a member of Temple Beth El, Fred and Barbara Sussman. And my father started with Bob Sussman and luckily he got started at the right time. He prospered, and each year, he got more and more work in with various manufacturers, and each year got more and more equipment, machinery. And did very, very well. And by the time I came into the business in 1955, he had about a hundred and ten machines already. He was doing quite well. And my father was a hustler and a pusher, and this girl, Valeria Lukish, wound up as a plant manager. SCB: The Sussmans, were they manufacturers? IS: They were manufacturers. SCB: And were they out of Allentown or New York? IS: Their main office was in New York, but they were giving work to contractors in Allentown. SCB: And they lived in Allentown? IS: Yes, the Sussmans lived in Allentown. SCB: Wow. That is unusual. IS: Yes, Bob Sussman lived in Allentown on South 16th Street. SCB: And what kind of clothing did they make when your dad owned it? IS: They were making knitwear. SCB: So knitwear for women? IS: Yes, for women. SCB: Were there certain labels they were making the knitwear for? Specifically, or was it more general? IS: More general. SCB: And so they would be shipped up to New York. IS: Yes. SCB: Could you talk a little bit about the process that your dad had. Do you know anything about the processes that he used, the way he organized the business and the manufacturing? IS: In what respect? SCB: So how did he go about it, did he have certain people as cutters? Did he have people, women, probably. Did he hire men? What was the factory like under him? IS: In the beginning, he just had sewers and sewing equipment. As he got a little larger, he opened up a cutting room, and he hired cutters and spreaders. And he would get piece goods in and get a cutting department in. Then cutting and sewing and then opened up a finishing department with pressers and finishers and shippers and so on. And then, we made the complete product from cutting up to finishing and packing and shipping. GE: Now, I am curious when you said that happened when he got more business. You said initially they just did sewing. IS: Right. GE: If they just did the sewing, did they partner, did they have to then provide, did they then get, whatever has to occur for you to sew, there's something that happens before- IS: The work would come in already cut. SCB: Did the person that provided that, was it a manufacturer? Was it the Sussmans? Another factory or another organization that did the cutting? IS: Yes. SCB: Do you know any of the names of the cutters? That was when you were a kid. IS: I have no idea. SCB: Of course not, but I thought I would ask anyway. How did it change when, or did it change when you took over the business? IS: When I came into the business, he already had a full-fledged operation going on, a full-fledged from cutting, shipping, and packing, the full operation going. SCB: So it did not expand at all after you took over? IS: It expanded in volume, the number of people, the number of employees. When I came into the organization, we expanded, and we gradually built it up, and when I came into the business in 1955 we kept expanding and getting larger and larger. And a couple years later in 1957 my father said, "Irwin, you are doing such a great job in here, in two year you already know everything, I do not even have to be here anymore," he said. "I am going to retire to Florida. I am going to move to Florida. I will remain the president of the corporation, and you are going to take over the everyday duties of running the factory. What I'm going to do is, I am going to call you every Friday afternoon, you are going to tell me everything you shipped, how many dozens went out, what the volume was and what you are going to do is send me my paycheck for the week. And I will speak to you every week. Once a quarter I will come up for a couple days and walk around the factory, check and see what you are doing. Then I will fly back to Florida, and that is the way we will do it." SCB: Sounds like a nice business relationship, too. IS: I ran the factory, and he was very, very pleased. And this woman, Valeria Lukish, who we talked about who was a teenager back in 1941 who he felt would eventually be a plant manager, he saw that she was very talented as a seventeen-year-old teenager. Anyway, so the factory actually grew in size and numbers while I was there, and we eventually grew to about 230 to 240 people at its peak. GE: About when is that - 1960? IS: 1960s and 1970s. SCB: As far as your learning the business, where did you start, and how did you go through that until your father got to the point that you knew everything I am going to retire? IS: Well, when I went in in 1955, I started to grasp everything pretty quickly within the two year period. GE: But you were, tell us about your involvement prior to that. I think you said you worked there during the summers. IS: Yes, during the summers, I would work for him. GE: Actually one thing I was curious, how about the 1930s? I realize your Dad didn't open his own factory until 1941. But during the 1930s how was the garment industry? There was the Depression, but was the garment industry in depression, or was that still a thriving industry? IS: I do not think it was thriving. It was struggling, it was growing, but it was struggling. SCB: And during those summers then, did you work at specific machines or did you just learn - and I shouldn't say "just" - learn the management of the business without being involved in the various processes to understand what people were doing? IS: Actually I spent a little time in the office, a little time on the sewing floor, a little time in the cutting room, a little time in every area of the business. Trying to pick up a little bit. SCB: So you were managing mostly? IS: Not actually management, my father had me in every single department trying to pick up. SCB: So did you actually operate, go through the process in the department? And the reason I am asking this is because in some of the textile industries in Philadelphia in the 19th century the son would be brought in and would have to go through every process and learn every process so he would learn how to do everything. GE: So he would actually work on a press. SCB: Right, do everything, and learn all the skills. IS: I did not. Actually, I did not actually sit on a sewing machine, I did not actually go to the cutting room and use any of the cutting equipment. SCB: So it was more observation and watching. IS: Observation, right. SCB: Watching what worked and what didn't. IS: Right, right. SCB: Do you have any memories of those times and stories? GE: And even the interactions with the employees? IS: I had a very good relationship with the employees. They loved me. I worked very good with them. I had a nice relationship with them. I treated them very, very well. ES: Can I interject something? SCB: Certainly! ES: He still does to this day. There is a group, now these are elderly ladies by now, but there is a group of them who still meet once a month for lunch, they go to the City View Diner. IS: On Seventh Street. ES: And in the summertime when Irwin is home, he comes there and joins them once or twice. SCB: Wonderful. ES: They love it. SCB: Was there a specific ethnic group that were the workers in the factory or was it the diversity of ethnicity in Allentown? IS: Diversity, a lot of Pennsylvania Dutch. And I would say the last several years in business we had quite a few Vietnamese girls, quite a few Vietnamese girls, and they were the best sewing machine operators we've ever had. They were so wonderful. And I was the only one in town that had any Jewish sewing machine operators. There were a total of three Jewish sewing machine operators in Allentown, and I had all three of them. GE: Now this, when you say Jewish sewing machine operators, what that in the '40s? IS: No, No, they were the last 10 years I was in business. GE: Ok, ok. So 60s and 70s, I was just curious. SCB: So the Vietnamese women, when did they come? Did they come after 1973, mostly? IS: The Vietnamese operators were there in the last 15 years I was in business. SCB: When did you actually stop? IS: 1988, I sold the business. The Vietnamese operators I had were the best. They used to beg me for so much overtime. When we were very, very busy, they would work every single hour that I would give them, and they would say they would call me "Mr. Bossman." "Mr. Bossman, give me more overtime, more overtime, more overtime." Sometimes when we very busy, I would have to beg the American girls to work overtime, and the Vietnamese girls they would work all the overtime and then some. They would beg me and beg me. GE: That is why this industry exists so well in China. SCB: So, in those years with managing and owning the business or managing for your Dad, how long did your Dad live by the way? IS: He lived until 1978. SCB: So those last years that this was your business, you owned the business solely. So do you have any memories of times there were struggles? Or times that were absolutely wonderful where you had lots of contracts and were really thriving? SCB: Today is August 10, 2011, interview with Irwin Schneider. Susan Clemens, and Gail Eisenberg attending. GE: Sue, we did not get this little bit. Is that correct? SCB: Yes. GE: So I am going to let you read the whole thing. So just as you did, you did it so beautifully, if you will go back, so we have the opportunity for your family to have this and for us to have this. Yes, read these same things again because we just did not capture it. IS: This is something from Rance Block who was President of Beth El in March of 1988: Dear Employees of Irwin Schneider, The officers and Congregation at Temple Beth El acknowledges with gratitude your generous donation made in honor of Irwin Schneider. The funds will be placed in the Samuel Schneider Philanthropic fund. This contribution shows the esteem in which Irwin Schneider is held by all his former employees. I am sure that Mr. Schneider is deeply touched and appreciative of this gesture. Once again, thanks for your generosity. Sincerely, Rance Block President Here's also in the Temple Beth El bulletin of March of 1988: Donation made to the Samuel Schneider Philanthropic fund of Temple Beth El in honor of Irwin Schneider for all the years of love and understanding he has given to us, his employees, Mr. and Mrs. Anthony Geiger, bookkeeper, Mr. and Mrs. Anthony Kein, production manager, the girls in his office, Mr. and Mrs. Michael Lukish, general manager. This is something I did February 1, 1977. I wrote this letter, and each and every one of the girls who retired got a letter like this. I will read the letter that I wrote: Dear So and So, The bicentennial year of 1976 was a very important milestone in our nation's history, it was the 200th birthday celebration of the United States. The year 1976 was also a very important one for the Schneider Manufacturing Corporation, as this marked the 35th anniversary of our being in business. These 35 years of continued growth would not have been possible without the loyal and dedicated support of our many hundreds of employees throughout the years. In tribute to the service of our most recent retirees, we are backtracking to our celebration year of 1976 and to this year of 1977 and presenting each of you with a fifty dollar retirement savings bond which will set a precedent for all union employees retiring in the future. This savings bond is in addition to the monthly retirement check you are presently receiving from the ILGWU. These checks are the result of retirement contributions that we have sent to ILGWU throughout the years based upon your payroll earnings. Our very best wishes for your continued good health, and please feel free to visit us at any time. Very Truly Yours, Schneider Manufacturing Corporation Irwin J. Schneider SCB: That is very nice. IS: I also want to read the press release. This is the press release sent out by Chambers Association Advertising Public Relations Company on Linden Street in Allentown. The press release that was going to be sent out to the Allentown Morning Call. A 47-year-old Allentown apparel manufacturing firm has a new name and a new owner, assuring the continued employment of more than a hundred and twenty-five men and women. Schneider Manufacturing Company, 315 Linden Street, has been purchased from Irwin J. Schneider by Robert Marzano of Whitehall, and is now Linden Apparel Company. Marzano, who is also President of JoMar Manufacturing in Alburtis, stated that ownership of the Schneider Firm increases his ability to continue to make a better line of ladies knits sportswear, and to expand both the Linden and JoeMar operations. JoeMar, with its 50 employees, is too small to compete alone in the better knits field, he said, so Linden will reinforce our Alburtis plant's production. Schneider pointed out that the sale of his firm involved two second-generation apparel makers. His father, the late Sam Schneider, founded the company at 8th and Pittston Streets in Allentown in 1941, with six employees. Marzano's father, Joseph, who is now retired, founded JoMar in 1957 on North 8th Street in Allentown. Schneider Manufacturing moved to 315 Linden Street in 1942 and grew to 230 employees at its peak in the late 1970s, making it Lehigh Valley's largest contract manufacturing. Irwin Schneider joined his father in 1955 after serving with the US Army medical corp. A native of New York City, he earned a bachelor's degree in commerce and finance at Penn State University. He is a former vice-president and treasurer of the Lehigh Valley Needle Trades Association and served on the Executive Committee of the Allentown Lehigh County Chamber of Commerce Manufacturing Division. JoMar moved to North Wall Street Allentown, a location that was closed when the Alburtis plant was opened in 1974. Marzano is a native of New York City and graduate of Parkland High School. He served in the US Navy for two years before joining his father in 1960. Past president of the Lehigh Valley Needle Trades Association in Allentown, also the Optimist's District Lieutenant Governor. Schneider stated that he decided to sell his company, which makes ladies knit and woven sportswear, because he wanted to pursue other business interests. "I wanted to make sure the company would be a going concern that would preserve the jobs of our people. I searched for a buyer who was experienced in the industry and who shared with me a commitment to the needle trades." Schneider added that it was through working together as board members of Needle Trades Association that he developed a rapport with Bob Marzano. A mutual respect for each other's business abilities followed. He stated, "It was fortuitous that my search for a buyer coincided with Bob's desire to expand his operations." Schneider emphasized that, in his opinion, tighter quotas and shorter cycle times have given the domestic apparel industry a new lease on life. He know that smaller lots is a definite advantage over plants in the Orient and other offshore areas. SCB: Because you were more flexible? IS: Yes. GE: Or willing to do a niche. SCB: Right. IS: So I had a successful run in the garment industry. I was very happy with the years I was in the industry. I did very, very well, and I feel that it was time to move on to other areas, so I was happy I had a good run, and I moved on. GE: What did happen? Do you know with the company that bought this, how have they fared? I am just wondering that... IS: Well he was able to keep the company going for ten years. I was happy that my employees had jobs for a while, but he struggled for a while. It was not that he was not a good businessman, it was a condition of the times. A lot of work was being funneled overseas. He did struggle a bit, and he did have to keep on shrinking the company, keep on making it smaller and smaller, as I had to do the last couple years that I was in business. I also had to shrink the business down, this was just a condition of the times. There was not enough work that was available, the company that I worked for exclusively for a number of years, Beeline Fashions, on the house party plan. I'd worked for them exclusively for well over 25 years, and they kept me busy going day and night time, full time. And they kept me as busy as I could be. GE: Can you tell us both about that business, Beeline Business, as well as were you their sole supplier? IS: No, I was not their sole supplier. GE: But they were your sole customer. IS: Yes. GE: But if you could share with us if you could tell us about the Beeline Business and then also what were the years you were saying you had that contract for 25 years and how that really helped your whole business? IS: Well, we were starting to do some business with Beeline starting in the late 1950s, and the relationship started to work out very, very nicely. They started growing very, very fast, very, very quickly and we got a nice relationship with them, and we saw that they were increasing their business so fast and so quickly. It was the era of stay-at-home moms. Mothers were not going to work at that time, they were having house party plans. They were selling garments. They would have a house party, coffee clutch. They would invite maybe 15 to 18 women at a house, and they would have catalogs and garments on display, and they would order garments through catalogs and through sample garments on display. And their business was mushrooming like crazy, and Beeline was expanding so quickly. We had about two or three other accounts, and we dropped them because Beeline was after us for our entire production, and they said give us your entire production, and we will keep you busy. We will keep you busy going day and night. We expanded our night shift, we started working our employees full time, overtime, Saturday mornings. We gave our employees as much time as they could handle. And we even went into a real-estate partnership with Beeline, we bought another building in order to expand our operations. We worked exclusively with them for well over 25 years, so we didn't have to go into New York looking for other work, they came to us. They just piled us up with so much work ; it was just mind-boggling. It was an unbelievable setup that we had with them, they were pushing us and pushing us, "Please give us more production, please add more operators, please give." And they were giving us the bulk of the work that they were giving us the most difficult styles because our quality was top notch. It was a nice little gravy train. So it worked out very, very well for us. GE: When did it end? Like how long did that go until? IS: It is hard to end. I would say in the early 1980s when their business started to go downhill, and they eventually went out of business. And then in the early 1980s, after they went out of business, I had to start going into New York looking for other work. At one point in the early 1980s I was probably working for six or seven different manufacturers at one time, and that started to make it a little bit rough at that point. SCB: The organization changes, doesn't it? IS: At that point, business was getting a little bit tougher, and more and more stuff was going overseas, and I found out going to New York, it was tougher finding work. And then when I would get the work, I would find that prices were tougher, and margins were very, very tight, profits were getting smaller and smaller. My organization was getting smaller, and I was not hiring any new people. As my employees were retiring, I was not replacing them, and my organization was shrinking, and my employee base was getting smaller and smaller. By the time I did sell out to Bob Marzano, I did not have the 230 people I did once. I had, I was probably down to 130 people or 120 people at that point. SCB: Did you have to lay anyone off or did you just downsize. IS: Just downsize-- SCB: Downsize by attrition. IS: Yes, by attrition. I saw the handwriting on the wall, but thankfully I had enough good years that I was thankful I was in the garment business, but I did see the handwriting on the wall. You know my son during his college years would spend the summers in the factory learning the business the same way that I did, and he was willing, he wanted to come into the business, but after a couple summers in the business, Ellen and I steered him away. We said you know if you would come into the business, we feel that by the time you were in the business about seven or eight years, you would maybe be 28 or 29 years old, we feel the business would not be a viable business for you, and you will be out in the street looking for something else. And we coaxed him and told him it is not a good idea to come into the business. GE: How lucky he was. IS: Yes. And Ellen and I-- ES: He listened to parents. IS: Ellen and I said we ought to shift your interests elsewhere, and we coaxed him into going on for a Master's Degree in business. He went to George Washington University and got a Master's degree and eventually went into New York and became a stockbroker for several years and then got another job with another organization, and he is doing very well. He is a head trader with a financial institution. That worked out well. GE: Right. SCB: To go back to Beeline, did they like Tupperware and other organizations that were based on a party system, did they give you orders that were based on the orders they got or did they have you producing on projected orders? IS: They were based on orders that they had. They had a large volume. GE: Were they doing this door to door all over the country? Were these house parties all over the country? IS: Pretty much so. GE: And what kind of clothing were they, were they knit? IS: Yes. GE: So they were like women's pants suits? ES: That is exactly right. GE: I remember that type of thing, I just do not remember the house parties. IS: Such volume it was unbelievable. SCB: Can we go back and could you talk for a minute about what your dad produced during World War II for the war effort? What kind of garments did he produce, the t-shirts? IS: I know he made a lot of t-shirts for one company that had a contract with the army, plus he made work for other jobbers too, but I am not sure too much because I was only a youngster. I was not really familiar. But he had other contracts. SCB: But he was a war industry then. IS: Yes. And it is sad to say that he had to have the war to expand his business. GE: That is the reality. IS: But he got in at the right time and for a man who did not have any education. GE: He was obviously business savvy. IS: Business savvy, yes. GE: He was at the right time and he knew how to make an opportunity work. ES: He had street smarts. GE: Yeah. ES: He did. SCB: Can you talk a little bit about how the union came into your business, so going back to women how as you mentioned off-camera, were happy with the business and they were getting union wages, but the truckers pushed that, pushed the union, the International Ladies Garment Workers Union? GE: Were really aggressive. Do you want to just share that with us again? We just didn't capture it. IS: From what I understand, the union was actually going to the girls' houses at night and saying that the Schneider Manufacturing should go union because a very large majority of the factories in Allentown are all unionized, and you would be better off with the union. A lot of the girls were saying we do not need the union because Sam and Irwin Schneider are good employers, they are paying us basically the same wages as union shops are paying, and they are also paying us vacations, they're also paying us holidays, so there is no need for us to join the union. So you ought to leave. We don't have to join the union. And the union was flabbergasted by the employees saying no to them when they were going to the employees' houses. So what the union did they got the whole of the truckers, like Arrow Trucking Company and Silverline Trucking Company company just to name two of the truckers and said look you have to work along with us and just prevent the trucks from coming in to deliver piece goods and prevent the trucks from coming in and delivering the cutwork and stop work from coming in to Schneider Manufacturing factory. If the trucks don't come in, Schneider Manufacturing can't exist, and they will be forced to join the union, and that is what happened. After a week or two or three of this happening we were forced to join the union. And the girls said why are you joining the union, and we said, "we are forced to," we told them. SCB: Did any of them try to infiltrate the factory? That sounds like a very negative terminology. Did any of the union organizers or people interested in the union try to come into the factory and work in the factory? Or was it only at night? IS: They tried to come into the factory too, but it didn't help. GE: I was wondering, excuse me, were you finished? I was wondering with Beeline, how was that original association formed? How was that developed? IS: Okay, we were working with a jobber in New York under the name of the Golder Company, Golder Company and Climax Specialties. This jobber had two names, Golder and Climax Specialties, and they had the contact with Beeline Fashions, and we got the initial contact with this Golder Climax Company, and they were involved with Beeline, and they got the work for us. GE: BeeLine did well? IS: And when Beeline got busy, and we were given the opportunity to work for them full time, we gave up the other two accounts we had. It was the start, the best thing that ever happened to us. As Beeline grew, we grew. The faster Beeline grew, the faster we grew. And Beeline eventually became a public corporation. They went on the NASDAQ. We also bought shares of Beeline, and we made a fortune with the shares that we bought, we got in on the initial public offering too. GE: That is wonderful. SCB: So did the women ever ask for flex time, for instance if they had families? Did they ever ask to have time off during their workday? Was there flexibility about the hours that the women worked? IS: Oh yes, we would give, we worked along with them. Our regular hours were from seven to two-thirty, and overtime was usually from two-thirty to four-thirty. If they had problems we let them come in at eight or eight-thirty. We worked with them. And another thing, we were like a savings and loan association, in other words we, my bookkeeper was not too happy about it, it made extra work for her, but we would lend the employees money with no interest and have a payroll deduction plan of five dollars a week for fifty weeks or. . . it was unbelievable I was so good to the employees. I mean, I had such a good rapport with the employees. In fact as Ellen said to this day there are a number of employees that are in their eighties and nineties, a lot of them, and they have these weekly lunches, excuse me monthly lunches at the City View diner on North 7th Street, the third Thursday of every month and during the summer I go to one or two of these lunches, and needless to say, I pick up the tab for the whole group. They just love me, I come there, and they hug me and kiss me. It is a nice unbelievable situation. GE: Irwin, what would you say are the reasons that you offered and provided your employees, tried to have that better working environment for them? In other words, what were the convictions you have that you think brought about that you did treat your employees well? That made sure they had decent wages-- IS: To keep them in tow, to keep them from leaving me. GE: Okay. IS: I mean, I mean-- GE: So you are saying it was a good business decision? IS: Yes, a good business decision-- GE: Happy employees. IS: Happy employees, have a low turnover because if you have a low turnover-- GE: You do not have to keep retraining-- IS: No training expenses. SCB: Did the technology change over the years when you were the sole owner of the business? So did you get more sophisticated machinery? IS: Yes, newer equipment, newer equipment, faster equipment, new different types of equipment. GE: Were you constantly updating? IS: Oh, yes, sure. I always had top-notch mechanics on my payroll. I was always buying new equipment, new machinery that came out. I was always on top of everything. SCB: So the mechanics would fix the machinery-- IS: Oh yeah. SCB: But then if they knew something or you knew something was going to speed up the production and make it more-- IS: We always went to trade shows. My mechanics went to trade shows. We had good equipment, the best equipment. We always had modern equipment too. SCB: And you were a member, you were an officer in the Needle Trades Workers Organization-- IS: The Lehigh Valley, I was a member of the Lehigh Valley Needle Trades, which was formed in the late 1950s. This was an association that was strictly for public relations, and I was also a member of the Atlantic Apparel Contractors Association, with Arnold Delin. You interview Arnold Delin? GE: Yes. IS: By the way, he is very sick. SCB: Oh, no. IS: Arnold Delin, he looked very thin when you saw him? SCB: Yes, he did. IS: He's had a lot of health problems, a lot of health issues. Arnold Delin, when I joined the association in our peak years the association had about 450 members. And we had a headquarters in Wind Gap, a regular building and Arnold Delin would do the negotiations for the contracts for our association. It was a powerful association, and we had wonderful conventions overseas, in Italy, in Hawaii. We had great trips that used to be charged off to the business. Arnold Delin was quite a guy. Also with the Lehigh Valley Needle Trades Association we took some good trips, too. One year we went to, we went to Europe-- ES: It was a trade mission. IS: Describe the trade mission, Ellen. ES: It was a trade mission. And they-- IS: Why don't you come here so you can be televised. ES: I will sit next to you. IS: OK. ES: It was a trade mission where we went to Europe, and they were all from the Lehigh Valley, and we visited, how many? IS: Five countries and seven apparel factories. ES: Right. And it ended up in Basel, Switzerland, which was-- The latest machinery. IS: Tradeshow. ES: Yes, the tradeshow. ES: And after the business was sold, we were taking a trip to the Orient for a number of weeks, and we went through the state department. IS: In Washington. ES: Yes, this was in 1988. IS: And Arnold Delin worked for us. ES: And got us permission to visit a Chinese garment factory, and we did. IS: Arnold Delin had to ask permission from the State Department in Washington because, in 1988, China was not so liberal. ES: And we went in, and there was a whole delegation there that was meeting us. They took us around to their factory, and we were immediately struck by the youth of their employees. They were women, and they were all young. And then they took us downstairs and they showed us their daycare center, right on the premises. Infants, they had them all lined up, all bundled up, it was nap time when we were there. But we were immediately struck by the differences between the Oriental manufacturing and the United States. GE: Tell us, describe to us some of the differences. ES: Well, first of all, the age of the employees was far younger than ours. Ours were middle-aged and- IS: Older. ES: And older workers, these were all young twenty-something, thirty-something women. The quality of the goods was excellent, and they were very speedy, they were working very quickly. We also made note of the fact that the factory floor looked very clean because we also went to an acupuncture place where it was the dirtiest thing I ever saw in my life. And I said the factory was cleaner than the acupuncture place. GE: At that time the women in the factories were already older, but how about when you were a child looking at your father's business or when you first went into the business was it typically young women, or was it more middle-aged? IS: I think it was more middle-aged. ES: It was not a young person's business. While I was listening to him talk about Beeline and the fact that Beeline did eventually go out of business, and you have to wonder if that didn't reflect a change in the workforce of women. When they started that business, he said they were stay-at-home at mothers back in the fifties and the sixties, by the time the seventies and the eighties came around- IS: The mothers were all working. ES: They were all working. IS: The house plan part fell apart. ES: Right. So there was a lot of tenor of the times kind of thing. GE: It had a business model that worked well for the '50s and '60s, but as time went on, less and less. ES: For a while, but it didn't change. Or their business model didn't change with the time, they kept it as it was, and as a result, they went out of business. SCB: And so in the '70s did you have a sense that the sort of stagflation of the '70s, the economic woes of the '70s, did that affect you at all? Or because of the Beeline products, did that keep you going? IS: The Beeline kept me going, but I saw on the outside, I saw that if I ever lost the Beeline account that I would start to be in a little bit of trouble. I saw what other contractors were facing. I saw other contractors in Allentown that were struggling. And I thought if I ever lose the Beeline account would I be in the same position as some of the others. Well Beeline was still fairly busy yet in the '70s, but by the very late seventies Beeline was starting to struggle. They went out of business in the very late seventies. And so by 1980 or '81 or '82, then Beeline was out of business, and I started to have to run to New York looking for work for the first time in twenty-seven or twenty-eight years. Which was something new for me to do. SCB: Today is August 10th, 2011, tape three, interview with Irwin Schneider, and Susan Clemens-Bruder and Gail Eisenberg interviewing and attending. If we could go back and if you could talk a little bit about your involvement with the community and with the synagogue and the Jewish community and the greater Allentown community, are there organizations other than what you showed us here that you belonged to and connected you to the community? IS: Ok as far as the organizations, I have been on the board of directors of the Temple Beth El. I have also served on the endowment foundation of the Temple Beth El. I have been on the six-man investment committee of the Endowment Foundation of the Temple Beth El. Now those are all in the past already. And also I have been on the committee . . . Board of Directors of the Jewish Family Service. I was also the Treasurer of the Jewish Family Service. I was also on the Russian Resettlement committee and I was very active with Jewish Family Services. This goes back a number of years ago. Also, I was on the Board of Directors of the Jewish Federation of Allentown. And also a solicitor for many, many years. So I was very involved with those three organizations. SCB: When you say solicitor, can you explain that a little bit more? ES: Fundraising. SCB: Fundraising. GE: Asking for donations. IS: Yeah. SCB: And that is just because language changes over time. GE: Actually, one thing that might be nice to share is to tell us what you mean about the Russian resettlement. IS: Well back around 20 years ago, at that point we were bringing a lot of Russian families into Allentown, I was on the committee and I was also the treasurer and dispensing money for the Russian resettlement. We were actually paying their expenses for their first four months. Taking care of the Russians and I was helping out with the funds and also helping out placing them, placing them with their various families in Allentown. And so I was on the committee bringing them in. ES: We visited with a family in St. Petersburg who had family here, some of the newly arrived Russians. And we visited with them, and we knew that they were on the list to come to Allentown. And they did come to Allentown, and we met them here, and we took them -- these people were two days out of St. Petersburg, and we took them to the Giant supermarket. GE: And they were shocked. IS: Yes, they were shocked. ES: And we told them now you are going to go and buy things for your home. They absolutely did not know what to do. IS: They were shocked. ES: They thought it was artwork. GE: Something that was not real. ES: Absolutely, that was--. GE: What was the family's name? ES: It's Nellie Gerstein's parents. Margaret. IS: We visited them in Russia. ES: We visited them in Russia, we visited Vladimir's family and Nellie's family. IS: And Nellie's mother, Margaret. ES: And they had us to their home for lunch, and they were toasting us and saying that you are the only link between we and our children, and they were translating. We said that when you come, and you are on the list, and when you come to Allentown, we will host you in our home, and we did. We had them for a Thanksgiving dinner. We were explaining to them what Thanksgiving was. SCB: Was this connected to the synagogue? ES: It was connected to the Jewish Family Service. SCB: Jewish Family Services. IS: We always tried to stay involved with the Jewish activities. In fact, Ellen was also involved with the Jewish Community Center. ES: I was President of the Women's Auxiliary of the Jewish Community Center for four years. I served on the Board of the Jewish Community Center for about 15 years. And I went back to college after my children were grown and got a degree in social work, and then I was asked to join the staff of the Jewish Community Center, and I ran their senior adult program for 15 years. GE: What years were those? About? ES: About-- probably from about 1978 until... IS: Until 1992, when we went to Florida. ES: Yes, until we went to Florida. SCB: How has the wider community of Allentown changed over the years? And how has the Jewish Community changed over the years in Allentown? IS: How has it changed over the years, well definitely it has, the Jewish community over the years, it was more-- ES: Cohesive. IS: Cohesive. One section was actually down in the 6th Street area, 6th Street, 5th Street, 4th Street, 3rd Street, and another section was strictly down 6th Street and Fulton Street, and that was called the ghetto, and basically nobody was out in the West End area. And then, after the war years the Jewish community started to filter out towards the West End of Allentown, toward 24th Street, 25th Street, 26th [and] 27th Street. Of course all of the Jewish community were living inside the city limits of Allentown. It wasn't until I would say until the last 15 to 20 years that they started to move outside of the city limits of Allentown. And during the early years all of the Jewish kids went to Allentown High School, now you do not see a single Jewish student going to Allentown High School. I think in the last issue of Hakol, I saw one Jewish student graduating from Allentown High School. All the rest are in the various area high schools outside of Allentown. SCB: Parkland? IS: Parkland and Emmaus. ES: The other thing that I have noticed is primarily because of the garment industry, which was a family business, a father to son business, and Irwin's story is not unique in that the next generation did not go in. As a result, young people have not stayed in the area. IS: Young people are going to New York and big cities now. ES: Any kind of big cities, but they are not remaining in Allentown. IS: In Allentown, they are leaving. ES: I think that has been the biggest change in the Jewish community. SCB: But some new people have come to it? ES: New people have come in. IS: A lot of professionals are coming, doctors, especially doctors. We have a load of doctors, professionals, lawyers coming in. ES: The high school- the hospital rather is quite a draw. It is the larger employer in the Valley right now. It is. And that has been the draw and that I think has been one of the biggest changes that we have seen in the 50 odd years we have been here. GE: In some ways, it is more transient in terms that they didn't grow up here, they come here-- ES: Yes, they come here. It has been and so many of our friends who remained here, none of their children have. IS: But we've got other cities, we have friends like from Pottsville and Hazleton, those cities are dying with Jewish people. There is nothing left in those cities. GE: You remember them having small but thriving communities like 30 to 40 years ago, is that correct? IS: 30 years ago, they had thriving communities and synagogues, but now they are dying out completely. No Jewish people are there anymore. SCB: So, what do you value the most in life? IS: Value most in life, my family, the fact that I have a nice family that I am proud of how we raised our children. I mean we have wonderful children. They are well-educated. We have grandchildren, they've been raised so wonderful. They do not have tattoos, rings in their ears. They are well-educated. They are loving children. They call us often, they are just so wonderful. Our kids are just such great kids. We have good family values with our children, we raised them well, and our grandchildren are just super kids in general. ES: I would say one of the nicest things I can see is, you spoke of the family values, watching our children passing those same family values on to their children. GE: And what would you say those values are? ES: Honoring your past, staying... IS: Close with parents. ES: Close with parents, staying Jewish. IS: YES! ES: Yes. IS: Staying Jewish, staying close with Temple, staying close with Jewish holidays. ES: They all belong to a synagogue. IS: Yes, they all belong to a synagogue, they all have Jewish traditions at home, and so on. SCB: And what has made you feel the most creative in life, the most artistic in life and this can be more metaphoric, it doesn't have to be concrete but giving you a sense of connectedness in life? GE: Have you felt you have been artistic or made a difference, productive? IS: I do not know how to answer that. ES: Artistic talent kinda doesn't run in our family. GE: Doesn't have to be literally. SCB: But a sense of completion is another way to say it. It doesn't have to be art, but just a sense of completion. IS: The fact that I have done well in life, that I have had a successful life. ES: That you have been respected. IS: That I have been respected by my peers, that people look up to me, my employees look up to me. That I have a wealth of good friends, a load of friends in Allentown who we socialize with who look up to me, and I look up to them. The fact that I do not have a single enemy in town, people respect Irwin Schneider. I have such a good name in town, a good name in the synagogue. GE: So maybe a good name? IS: My good name will live forever. That's what is important to me. Nobody, nobody in town has a bad word for Irwin Schneider, from my employees on down to everybody. That's important to me, very important. SCB: Thank you so much. Ellen, so may we talk to you now? ES: Absolutely. SCB: And we will go back in your history. ES: Goodness. SCB: So could you tell your full name, including your maiden name, when you were born, and where you were born? ES: Alright. My name is Ellen Schneider, Ellen Ross Schneider. GE: I'm sorry, was that Ross, R-O-S-S? ES: R-O-S-S. Yes, Ross was my maiden name. I was born in New York, and at the age of ten, my family moved to Williamsport, Pennsylvania, which is a very small town in the middle of Pennsylvania. GE: I am sorry, when were you born? ES: In 1936, I am 75 years old. I will help you out with your math. And I was raised in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. GE: Why did the family move there? ES: My father opened a business in Williamsport. SCB: Now, were you in Brooklyn? ES: In Brooklyn. SCB: You were in Brooklyn and then moved. ES: Right. Back in the day, Brooklyn was a very lovely middle-class Jewish area, and people were raised very nicely, and they went on to college. It was a very nice place to live. And Williamsport was also a nice place to grow up in, but it certainly was not too nice to stay there after you were grown. It was very limiting. After I graduated high school, my father died when I was 16 years old, and I was halfway through my junior year of high school, and I knew that nothing was going to keep us staying in Williamsport. I had a brother who was 12, and I just asked my mother [to] let me finish high school here because I knew we were not going to stay there. And she did. I went off to Penn State. When I was at Penn State, my mother and my brother moved back to New York. And then I met Irwin. SCB: At Penn State? ES: No, we both went to Penn State but did not meet there was no overlap. IS: She graduated, no I graduated in June of '53, she started in September of '53. ES: We never were there at the same time. IS: And when she started in '53, I was already going into the Army. ES: We met on a blind date here in Allentown, actually. GE: Who fixed you up? IS: Irwin Greenberg. ES: Irwin Greenberg. My Aunt lived across the street. GE: With Sheftel, I think it was Salitsky [who] fixed them up. ES: Right. Back in the day, a blind date was very nice. Try and get your kids to do it today, forget it. SCB: No, they have the Internet. ES: Absolutely. They are not interested in that. And that is where we met. SCB: So can you talk a little bit about your family as much as you know about your family, work, education, where they came from? ES: Alright. Both my mother and father were born in the United States. My grandparents came from Poland. And the area of Poland that they came from was in- had been Austria. And as I mentioned, we took a trip back to Poland. We took my mother for her 80th birthday. And we went to visit the small village where her parents came from which was outside of Krakow and then we went to the area which was outside of Warsaw where Irwin's father came from. And in the area where my grandparents came from we found evidence of our family being there. We went into the hall of records, and I had said to my mother, "What do you think you are going to find, my grandparents came out of there in 1899, what do you think you are going to find?", "Maybe I can find my parent's marriage certificate." So we went into the hall of records with the guide, and the women asked could we find a marriage certificate, and she said, "Yes," and my mother gave her a date, and she turned to the shelf behind her and pulled a raggedy old book and she was going through the pages, and she stopped, said something in Polish and it was translated to there was had been a fire there in 1910 and everything burned down. My mother said she remembered that her mother, my grandmother, went back there to see her mother who never left the village. And she went in 1926, and they got word a few months later that she died. She said, "Could you find a death certificate?" She said, "Yes," and she said to start looking in May of 1926. And she pulled another dusty book out, and she is going like this, and she stopped. My mother had given her a name, and she said Eva Goldblatt, and my mother said, "Yes" that is her name. She said here it is. She lived to be 89 years old, and there was an address, and she died of natural causes in her own home. She died on October something or other, and was buried November 1st. And we figured she must have died on a Friday and was buried on Sunday. Now we had a name and an address. And we asked, "Is there a Jewish cemetery?" First of all, we asked, "Are there any Jewish people still left?" And she said there was one, and he had a shoe store around the corner. She gave us an address, and we went around the corner with the guide, spoke to the young man who owned the shoe store, and we asked if we could go to the cemetery. He said, give me a half an hour. I will get somebody to stay in my store, and I will take you to the cemetery. Well, we went back, and sure enough he took us to the cemetery, and it was a small town, so it was a small cemetery, but it had a neatly painted gate with a Jewish star on it, and he opened it up. Now we had someone we were going to see there, and the stones had all been smashed by the Nazis. You couldn't tell one grave from the other. So you know we knew that would be something we would suspect. Then I said we went to the area where Irwin's family was. IS: Tell why the fellow was still there. ES: Oh, yes. SCB: Oh yea, absolutely. For the future. Why was there one Jewish man still there? IS: Why was there one Jew, listen to this story. ES: He said, do we know a place called Brooklyn? My mother said, "Oh yes we know that place." And he gave us a name and address, and he said would you please call. My mother and my sister live in Brooklyn, would you call them and tell them you met me and that I am okay. We said okay. We left, and then when we came home we did call, and we spoke to his sister, who spoke very good English. She said, "Did he give you a message for me?" We said, "No, he just said he is okay." Did you have a guide and a driver with you? I said, "Yes." That is why he could not give you a message. So she told us why he didn't leave, she said he could have come with us when we left Poland, but he had married a Polish woman, and she would not leave her family there. So he chose to stay. IS: He is the only Jewish person there. ES: Only one Jewish person. But that one Jewish person is maintaining this cemetery. GE: Isn't that interesting. IS: So he is maintaining the cemetery and painting the gate every year. ES: He is mowing the grass. We went to the area where Irwin's family, where Irwin's father came from, which was a larger community. We knew the local mayor here, Joe Daddona. He gave us a key to the city and he gave us a proclamation with a blue ribbon and a gold seal, and he gave us Allentown All-American t-shirts to bring- IS: To give to the mayor. ES: And we had made arrangements to have a meeting with the mayor of that town. We had a private guide and he said what do you think you are going to find there. We said could you find my father-in-law's birth certificate and he gave us, we gave him a date, an approximate date and we got there, and this mayor had a reception for us with Pepsi Cola and pretzels. Irwin read him the proclamation, and it was translated. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out his proclamation. IS: In Polish. ES: In Polish and he is reading his proclamation, so after all those festivities were done, we asked, "Is there a cemetery here?" No, first we asked, "Are there any Jews still left in the town?" And he said, "Regretfully no." "Are there any cemeteries, is there a Jewish cemetery?" He said, "Yes there is," and he gave our guide directions to find it. So we went over there, and we found the cemetery. IS: It was being used as a garbage dump. ES: That is the difference between one Jew and none. GE: My brother-in-law was just there now this past summer for the first time. We are Holocaust survivors, and so is my brother-in-law's family. It was very difficult. He went, actually it was interesting, because in that family, it was him and his sister, a cousin from Israel, a cousin from Sweden and a cousin from Paris. They all met, but they were able to find . . . and he said it was a little heartbreaking because of the conditions but they were able to find their grandfather's stone. ES: They were able to find it? GE: He said at least we were able to light a candle and say Kaddish [Jewish prayer recited for the dead]. ES: One of the things that we did, we took a little stone from the town where my grandparents came from and where his father came from, and when we came back here we went to the cemetery and put the stone there. IS: Tell them the rest of your history. Ask her more questions. SCB: Let me ask you one question, do you know if any extended family, is there any extended family left? ES: In Poland? SCB: Yes? ES: If there are, we have no contact, we do not know. As I said my grandparents came here with- SCB: Which is a long time ago. ES: Yes, 1899. And my grandmother came here with four children, one of whom was an infant, and had four more children including my mother here. My father, his parents, were from Hungary. They met in the United States and married in the United States. So all of their children were born in the United States. If my father were alive today he would be a hundred and something years old, so they went back a very long time. SCB: So you were going to say something more about the family, your history? GE: I was just wondering in Williamsport, you said your father went there to start--. ES: He went there to open up a business. SCB: What kind of business? ES: The kind you can't have anymore, a juvenile furniture and toy store. A retail store, the kind that Toys R Us put out of business. That is the history of retail. GE: Right. SCB: And until he passed away, he had that store? ES: Yes, he had the store until he became ill. And then, you know, we left Williamsport. GE: I assume you left because it was such a tiny Jewish community, and you wanted to go back to Brooklyn? ES: Actually, my mother's whole family was in New York, and there was really nothing to keep her there anymore. I remember her coming up to Penn State one day which was really not far from Williamsport. She came up one day and she said, "Ellen, how would you feel about moving back to New York?" I said you know it really is not going to affect me as much, how about Arthur, who was my brother. And she said Arthur is willing to do it, and he was just going into high school, so it was a good time to make that break. So we did, and it turned out to be a very fine move because all of us went on to make a very nice life for ourselves, and my mother eventually met and married a lovely gentleman, she married again. So everybody you know there is a time to do some things and a time to move on, and that was the time to move on. SCB: So can you talk a little bit about your college years and also after you met Irwin, how you came here? ES: Well, actually my college years actually came in two parts. I had two years of college when I met Irwin and we're talking the '50s, and it was very common to leave school. IS: And get married. ES: And get married, it was called getting an MRS degree, which I got. After my children were grown, and they were in high school and had started college themselves, I went back to college here, and I went to Cedar Crest and finished, and I got a degree in social work, and I worked for the Jewish Community Center. GE: Did you do that around the same time as Beverly Bloch? ES: Yes, we were there just about I think I was there a few years before. GE: It sounded like a similar story. ES: I went there and Diane Silverman went there. We were all going there. They were running a program at the time where they were encouraging women who had dropped an education to go and pick up the threads of their interrupted education because, as I said, it was very, very common to stop school and get married. SCB: Can you talk about your family, your children, and your life? ES: You want me to talk about my grandchildren, you will have to put another one of those things in there. We have two children. Our daughter, Janet, our children both live in the New York area. IS: Wonderful children, we raised them wonderfully, and they have great values. ES: She is married to a very, very lovely man who is on television, he is a sports broadcaster, and you can see him here. SCB: Is he Allentown? ES: No, no, no, he is in New York. SCB: He is on a New York station? IS: Do you get Service Electric? SCB: Yes. GE: Yes. ES: You can see him, Channel 7- Channel 17. GE: What is his name? ES: Bruce Beck. GE: Bruce Beck, I'm going to try that. ES: And he is with NBC in New York. And our son, who we said, "Don't come into our business, honey," he listened to mom and dad, and he is on Wall Street, he is a trader. IS: He is the head trader, a securities business, and has done very, very well. ES: Except this not such a wonderful day to be in the market. IS: He is better off than being in the shmata [Yiddish for rags or garments] business, he listened to us. ES: And we have four grandchildren. We have big grandchildren and little grandchildren. GE: What was it like raising your children here in Allentown? ES: It was a wonderful place to raise children, an excellent place. As I said, I grew up in Williamsport, but I always had family that lived here, and I used to come here as a teenager, and I would go down to the Center on 6th Street. GE: So it was very familiar to you? ES: Yes, very familiar to me, and I felt so jealous of these kids had a place to go, and they could socialize with other Jewish kids, and we had a handful of them in Williamsport. GE: It was just enough to really be a community. ES: Yes, absolutely, and that was it, there were about 50 Jewish families if there were that. Probably less now. GE: In Williamsport. IS: I am sure there are a lot less. SCB: Did your children go through the Allentown School District? ES: Yes, they both did. They graduated from Allen High School and they both went to the same college, they went to Ithaca College. They each came out with business degrees. SCB: What Elementary School and Middle or Junior High School did they go to? ES: They went to Muhlenberg Elementary and Trexler Junior High School, which was the popular one at the time. GE: And this is the '70s I am assuming? ES: Yes, one graduated High School in '75 and the other '78, so it was the '70s. It was a different time. SCB: And where did you live during those times? And you talked about more than one building, where were the buildings? Just to place you in Allentown spatially both in business and personal. ES: We lived on 24th Street, and we built that house primarily because of its school district that it was in but also because of its proximity to the Jewish Community Center. GE: And when did the Jewish Community Center open, about? ES: That building? GE: Yes. ES: That building opened I would say in '57, '56 or '57. GE: And who were the major contributors, was it really the generation before you, like your father's generation? IS: Yes. ES: Yes, they were the builders. IS: It was a joint effort. Interview with Ellen Schneider SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: This is tape four, interview with Irwin and Ellen Schneider, and Gail Eisenberg and Susan Clemens-Bruder interviewing and attending. So you were talking about that your father-in-law was just 11 years out of Poland when he came here. ELLEN SCHNEIDER: 1931-1932, he was 11 years out of Poland, and he had ambition, he did not have an education, he could not read and write English, but his job was as a foreman, and it was a good job. Thirty-five dollars a week in 1931 at the depths of the depression was a good job. He had a wife and a very young child, and he had the courage to leave the familiar, which was his whole family, whatever family he had, which came out of Poland, were all living in the same area of Brooklyn. And against his parent's wishes. "Please, Sam, don't go, don't go." You know they were shtetl [small Eastern European villages where Jews lived] people. IRWIN SCHNEIDER: They begged him to stay in Brooklyn. ES: To go out into the wide world, it took courage. IS: "Sam, you're going to get lost in Allentown, don't go, don't go." ES: Right, but he had the courage, he had the ambition. And thank God he did because all of us have had a wonderful life from the beginnings that he gave us. And we are very grateful to him. He was a wonderful man. I loved him, I did. SCB: Can you talk about your role in the Synagogue and the community, the wider Allentown community and the Jewish community. ES: My role was not much in the synagogue, that was Irwin's area. I devoted my energies to the Jewish Community Center. I devoted a lot of time and a lot of effort and I served in many capacities. SCB: Can you talk about that? ES: Yes, I was President of the Women's Auxiliary of the Jewish Community Center, which in the days that I was there had a membership of 600 and it had a Board of 60 ladies. And after I got finished with that, after having been President of-- GAIL EISENBERG: And you were President, this is about what decade? ES: Late '60s, early '70s. And I served on the Board of the Jewish Community Center for 15 years. And after I had finished my interrupted education and got a degree in social work. Actually I was placed with Jewish Family Services as part of some of my course work. And an opening came up, they said to me go down to the Friendship Circle and interact. I did not know what that was, but I figured I'll figure it out. And I went down there and interacted. And after a few months an opening occurred, and the director of the center came to me and said, "Would you like to come and work here?" I said "Lenny, I haven't finished my course yet." He said, "Take some extra courses finishing up and start work here." I actually started the job while I was still finishing up my coursework. GE: And the Friendship Circle is? ES: The senior adult group. Yes, and I ran that. And the days that I was running that program that was the only organized activity for the Jewish elderly in Allentown. GE: Are there no . . .? ES: I think it has been fragmented. I think there are several other groups, I think some of them are self-run. GE: I see. SCB: And can you talk a little bit about how you think that the community has changed, and the Jewish community has changed? You talked some about that, but is there more? ES: The community of Allentown, the wider community, has changed vastly as I think all of us realize. The ethnicity has changed completely. We were just driving through the old neighborhoods a week or two ago, and we were saying that this Allentown traditionally had been pretty much a blue-collar community. IS: All white. ES: White and the factory owners who employed the blue-collar people. That has changed a great deal. It was a lot of Pennsylvania Dutch. I do not think there are even too many Pennsylvania Dutch even around anymore. Very, very mixed ethnicities here, for the good, for the bad, I don't really know, but it has changed. The Jewish community, as I mentioned before, I think one of the biggest changes has been the death of the family-run businesses. Whether they were retail businesses or garment businesses or other businesses they are not passed down father to son as they had been. Children are being educated, girls too, are being educated in areas that are really pretty foreign to us. And they are seeking their fortunes outside the area. So how that, what that portends for the Jewish community I don't know, but it's changed. SCB: Did you, in your married life, shop in Allentown? Did you actually patronize Allentown in sort of an encapsulated way? ES: Absolutely. Absolutely. Hess's department store was a legend in its time. You could find the finest things there. Up and down Hamilton Street had beautiful ladies' clothing stores. I shopped a lot there. Those days are over and regretfully so. And I do my shopping out of town and I would, very much, if this ever gets shown to people who are in retailing, think about your customer who is still here and would like to shop, and there is not a lot around. SCB: Any specific stores that you remembered where you shopped for clothing? ES: Hess's, mostly Hess's absolutely. SCB: Mostly Hess's, anything smaller? ES: Yes, there were some individually run very nice ladies shops. I cannot even remember the names of them anymore. SCB: Marilyn's, maybe. ES: That store was out of Reading. SCB: Oh okay. And then came here. ES: Yes, and then came here. SCB: Emil Otto? ES: Yes, that had a nice clientele. There was a shop on 8th and Hamilton, I cannot remember the name, but that was gone a long time ago. But it was going downtown when I first came to town, I mean, you got dressed up to go downtown. And going to Hess's was an event. And having dinner-- IS: Back in the late '40s, we used to go downtown, people would wear a sports jacket and a tie on a Thursday night to go shopping. ES: I got dressed up to go shopping. IS: On a Thursday night in the 1940s. ES: Those days are gone. GE: Times have changed. ES: Oh, have they changed. GE: You mentioned with the JCC that Irwin was more involved with Beth El, what do you think attracted you? In other words, what from the JCC or about the JCC? ES: What attracted me to the JCC was growing up without a JCC and realizing what this did for my peers who are still here and they grew up in Allentown, they went to the JCC. That is why I gave my time and talents to that organization. Irwin grew up at Temple Beth El, he has never belonged to another synagogue in his life. Never. People have asked, "Are you going to go to children's for the holidays?" And I say, "No we go to the Temple Beth El." I think even when you were in college, I think you used to come home to go to Temple Beth El for the holidays. No, that is what we do. GE: You said that it was certainly important, valuable in his growing up with the JCC and his peers, you didn't have that. Do you feel your children did? ES: Yes, absolutely, that was why we built that house that we did on North 24th Street, which was within two blocks of the Jewish Community Center. That is how much I felt about the Jewish Community Center because I grew up without it. SCB: So you could walk there? ES: Yes, absolutely. SCB: What do you value in life? ES: I value my family, whom I love. I value good health. I value my husband. GE: What has made you feel creative? ES: What has made me feel creative? My goodness. I would have to say that the years I spent working with the elderly. I discovered I had a rapport with the elderly that I never knew that I had. When I started taking social work and intended to work in the field, I thought I would work with children. And just happenstance got me working with the elderly and discovered that I liked them. Now I am one of them. SCB: Thank you so much. ES: Oh, you are welcome. I would love to see what this turns out to be. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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Irwin and Ellen Schneider, August 10, 2011
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Irwin Schneider talks about his father’s journey from being a sixteen year old immigrant textile factory worker, to foreman, to owner of a contract sewing factory. The Schneider business prospered due to hard work and good timing. Irwin joined the family business in the 1950s and further grew the business by producing for Beeline Fashions through the early 1980s.
Ellen Schneider talks about meeting Irwin, leaving college to get married and start a family, and then returning to college many years later after her children grow up. With her degree in social work, Ellen enjoyed a fulfilling career working with the local Jewish senior population.
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LVTNT-11
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2011-08-10
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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https://textile.digitalarchives.muhlenberg.edu/files/original/e29e89e6104d9dccdc5fe5779bdef956.png
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Lehigh Valley Textile and Needle Trades Oral History Project
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Susan Clemens-Bruder
Interviewee
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Ronnie Sheftel
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5.4 May 11, 2016 Ronnie Sheftel, May 11, 2016 LVTNT-33 38:12 LVTNT Lehigh Valley Textile and Needlework Trades Muhlenberg College: Trexler Library Oral History Repository trexlerlibrarymuhlenberg Ronnie Sheftel Susan Clemens-Bruder Gail Eisenberg video/mp4 SheftelRonnie_20160511.mp4 1.0:|21(9)|38(5)|57(14)|76(17)|93(11)|112(2)|133(4)|156(10)|181(8)|200(15)|221(3)|238(10)|261(2)|278(15)|293(13)|310(9)|331(14)|352(11)|379(7)|396(14)|415(3)|436(5)|455(5)|472(14)|493(9)|512(6)|531(4)|548(17)|569(15)|586(6)|607(8)|628(2)|645(2)|660(9)|679(9)|696(16)|715(8)|732(15)|737(4) 0 https://youtu.be/WF2LCKSnJ5o YouTube video 0 Introduction—Ronnie Sheftel SC: Today is-
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 ; RS: May 11th
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 ; SC: May 11th, thank you, Ronnie. May 11th, 2016, interview with Ronnie Sheftel. Could you state your full name one more time, and where you were born, and where you live right now?
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 ; RS: Ronnie Sheftel. It’s May 11th, 2016. I have lived in Allentown from 1950, and I came from Brooklyn, New York. I was born in- on November 12th, a long time ago. 0 44 Early Volunteer Work for Temple Beth El SC: And really the question today is, could you talk about your role as wife and mother and volunteer and any- any work that you did?
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 ; RS: It's a long time to go back. But when I first came to Allentown as a young bride, I was included in, I think, three or four boards, something I had never done before. And my first experience was being- to collect raffle- to sell raffle tickets to a dinner dance at Temple Beth El. And as time came closer, of course, I had to go away with my husband. When he said let's go, I went. And coming back, I had given it to a friend of mine to collect and I came back to find out how the dinner dance went and how we did with the collection. And I found out that half the people that were there had gotten ptomaine poisoning because whoever had cooked the dinner had left it out too long. And it was very sensitive and nobody was talking about the dinner, so I had never knew if the tickets were ever sold. That was my first experience with being on a board. 0 150 Ronnie's Husband & ; Children RS: I had three children, a boy, Bruce, and two girls, Hildy, and then six years later, Abby. And they are now far distant from here. Hildy lives in Seattle. Abbey lives in South Carolina and has for a long, long time. And I have no grandchildren, but Bruce lives here in Allentown, is taking care of my house. He normally lives in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. And right now I have moved to Haverford, Pennsylvania. My husband, Milton, is in the dementia unit. He has dementia and he's fine. He smiles. He is happy and has had two girlfriends there, unlike me, although I do have two admirers. One is- will be one hundred in October- in August. Delightful old man, but very cute. The other one scares me. He's a friend of mine's husband. Never happened before, but it's fun. 0 235 Volunteering at the Jewish Day School RS: No. I then, when my children became school age, I was on board at the Jewish Day School and was the gift shop’s chairman for many, many years, and would- the kids would have dinner- have lunch and they would have gift shop on Thursday. So I was there and I learned how to say the prayers after lunch.
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 ; GE: Birkat Hamazon. 
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 ; RS: Birkat Hamazon. I learned it by hearing it, I didn't ever learn the words 0 278 Chairman for the Jewish Federation of the Lehigh Valley/President of Hadassah RS: As far as the big deals in my life, I was one year, I was chairman for the Federation — Jewish Federation of Allentown, of the Lehigh Valley. And we raised a lot of money for the Women's Division. It was a lot of money at that time. And then shortly after that, I became president, very proudly, of Hadassah, which at the time I became president in 1980, it was seven hundred members. And it was a wonderful organization, and at that time, I think we raised over fifty thousand dollars, which was enormous. And I sat down and realized I'm now the one head of a fifty thousand dollar business, which I guess in the 1980s was pretty good. And we did very well. And subsequently I was on the board of Jewish Federation and as I said- oh before, before Abby was born, I was a great lady at the Allentown Hospital, which was really very satisfying. 0 372 Milton Sheftel's Business & ; Volunteer Work RS: Milton was always busy. He was either head of the — what was it? B'nai B’rith boy?
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 ; GE: Yes, B'nai B’rith. 
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 ; RS: And that was before we were married. After we were married, he's the head of- he became the chairman of the- of his organization. It had many names at various times, but it was the textile and secondary material, the waste, because his business was collecting the cuttings of all the textile dealers in the Lehigh Valley, South and North. And the- it was a very good business at that time. Of course, it's not an existing, non-existent almost, in these days. Everything has gone overseas. And- but last night I heard on the radio they were talking- this morning, actually, that they were doing recycling and that recycling only collects 16 percent of what’s delivered... 0 513 Impact of Hadassah on Jewish Lives GE: So all those different, you know, organizations of a different leadership that you mentioned, which of those was the most that you felt that you were the most impactful? And if you want to just tell us a little bit about that.
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 ; RS: Hadassah I thought was. 
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 ; GE: So tell us what Hadassah was about then and what it meant to you to be a part of that? And…
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 ; RS: Hadassah is the largest women's Zionist organization. It was started in 1900-something, by Henrietta Szold, with two nurses that she sent to- was able to send to Israel, to Palestine at the time, and I was always very proud of it, being- it's an international organization. At the time that I was very active, they had three hundred thousand women all around the world. And it's, it’s still growing, but it's shifted. There's very little of it in the Lehigh Valley. It's still there. It never has gone away and hopefully never will. But in the Philadelphia area, it's quite active. And in Florida it's very active. But I get the bulletin with the- magazines every year, and boy, they are there all over the world. And it raises money and it has saved children from World War II. And it's- to me it was, you know, something really big. I had wanted to go on the regional board. 0 801 Ronnie's Daughters—Abby & ; Hildy Sheftel RS: And the three kids, I thought they grew up very nicely. And they went to- Abby and Bruce went to the Jewish Day School. And when Abby graduated in sixth grade, she went to what's- what's the school on Walnut Street? Raub — Raub Junior High. And it was very strange for a child her age to say to me, “Mom, I think I learned much more at the Day School.” ‘Cause they were a little bit ahead, considering that they had like twelve, ten kids in class. And when she went to Raub, she was dealing with a whole different group of people, but to her advantage, a whole group of Puerto Rican, Dominican, and Black people had taken a liking to her. And at one point she was thrown into the bramble bushes alongside Raub, and — it was a little anti-Semitic — and all her friends took over and they yeah, she really did, you know, she was really very good with that. I guess she was preparing herself for living in the South, which she did eventually when she was- when she was- graduated from Allen High, she actually moved to Atlanta and was selling apartments, you know, apartment residents. And then she moved to Greenville, South Carolina, where Milton had a- a plant. 0 1074 Diminishing Community Involvement in Hadassah SC: Yeah, I have a question about Hadassah.
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 ; RS: Sure.
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 ; SC: Do you think that Hadassah began to sort of…?
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 ; RS: Diminish?
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 ; RS: Diminish. Yeah, I- I- yeah, I was going to say “go downhill”, diminish is much better. And because the children have moved away and because many people have moved to Florida. So is it that-
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 ; GE: And also the women work.
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 ; SC: What?
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 ; GE: My generation, the women work.
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 ; SC: Yeah, the women work, that’s true. 
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 ; RS: Well actually in 1980, when I became president, I noticed that half of the women were going back to school, another half were starting to go to work, getting teach- people who had been teachers, and getting teachers certificates, were working as teachers. 0 1200 Attending a Berkshire Hathaway Stockholders' Meeting with Bruce Sheftel RS: Now can I talk about Omaha, Nebraska? 
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 ; SC: Sure.
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 ; RS: That was an experience. My son, Bruce has taken over my entertainment, I think, because he has introduced me to things I really had never done before. And he asked me- he's also taken over some of the money problems, and has been dealing in investments and he's doing beautifully. And he- his father never thought it was important, but he did go to a school at Harvard that was called “SOB: Sons of Bosses”. It was a program that they were- they, they're still running it. And they went three weeks from, I guess, 9:00 in the morning till 9:00 at night for three- but three weeks, they went for three years. And at the end of it, they actually got a Master's Degree, which was- they were told, he says to me that they were told that it's beyond a Masters, beyond an MBA, that the things that they were teaching them were way past that. So he’s took- put it to very good use at this point. And a few weeks ago, he said to me, would you like to go to Omaha? And I knew exactly what he was talking about. And we went to Omaha on a Friday afternoon and went to a Berkshire Hathaway stockholders meeting, because I found out we had stock, we are the stockholders, and it was an experience that forty four thousand others shared with me. 0 1739 Ronnie Sheftel's Values SC: What do you value most in life? 
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 ; RS: My kids. I think that was the best thing, and I have you know, it's fun learning to live with your adult children. Right now, my son is taking care of me and his father. And Milton was an interesting character to live with. And even today, he's- even though he's really not in great mental shape, he's the same Milton. Walks over to everybody, says — if it's a woman — “You are the prettiest woman in the room” ; and the men, “You're great.” And they love him, I mean, they think he's wonderful. 0 1832 Creativity—Ronnie Sheftel's Autobiographical Writing SC: So what made you feel the most creative? This is my last question, I promise. 
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 ; RS: Creative?
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 ; SC: Yes. 
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 ; RS: Well right now I'm writing stories for a writer’s group. Most of the people in the group, of course, are residents of the quadrangle. They are all, I mean I feel like I'm uneducated because I only have a B.A. Degree, but they have Master's and two or three PhDs, and they're writing their autobiographies. Just last year, unfortunately, he died shortly after he finished his second book on his life work. And he was 94. He was a psychiatrist. And I'm telling you it's wonderful because I'm thinking, I'm remembering every time somebody tells a story, it sparks something in your head, and you say, “Oh, I remember that!” That's fun. I really find it fun. Physically, I can't do that great because I'm very off-balance. But that I like, I enjoy that. 
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 ; GE: Tell us about the stories you’re writing. 0 MovingImage Ronnie Sheftel talks about how when she came from Brooklyn to Allentown as Milt Sheftel’s wife, she was quickly given opportunities to get involved in the small, tight-knit Jewish community. This was foreign to her life growing up in Brooklyn. Later Ronnie proudly describes her stint as president of the local Women’s Hadassah chapter, which was quite dominant at that time in the Lehigh Valley. Interview with Ronnie Sheftel, May 11th, 2016 SUSAN CLEMENS-BRUDER: Today is- RONNIE SHEFTEL: May 11th SC: May 11th, thank you, Ronnie. May 11th, 2016, interview with Ronnie Sheftel. Could you state your full name one more time, and where you were born, and where you live right now? RS: Ronnie Sheftel. It's May 11th, 2016. I have lived in Allentown from 1950, and I came from Brooklyn, New York. I was born in- on November 12th, a long time ago. SC: Okay, thank you. And really the question today is, could you talk about your role as wife and mother and volunteer and any- any work that you did? RS: It's a long time to go back. But when I first came to Allentown as a young bride, I was included in, I think, three or four boards, something I had never done before. And my first experience was being- to collect raffle- to sell raffle tickets to a dinner dance at Temple Beth El. And as time came closer, of course, I had to go away with my husband. When he said let's go, I went. And coming back, I had given it to a friend of mine to collect and I came back to find out how the dinner dance went and how we did with the collection. And I found out that half the people that were there had gotten ptomaine poisoning because whoever had cooked the dinner had left it out too long. And it was very sensitive and nobody was talking about the dinner, so I had never knew if the tickets were ever sold. That was my first experience with being on a board. The rest of them... SC: So if you would talk a little bit more about after that, after you were at that first board meeting. RS: No, things got much better. I had three children, a boy, Bruce, and two girls, Hildy, and then six years later, Abby. And they are now far distant from here. Hildy lives in Seattle. Abbey lives in South Carolina and has for a long, long time. And I have no grandchildren, but Bruce lives here in Allentown, is taking care of my house. He normally lives in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. And right now I have moved to Haverford, Pennsylvania. My husband, Milton, is in the dementia unit. He has dementia and he's fine. He smiles. He is happy and has had two girlfriends there, unlike me, although I do have two admirers. One is- will be one hundred in October- in August. Delightful old man, but very cute. The other one scares me. He's a friend of mine's husband. Never happened before, but it's fun. SC: So could you talk about- Oh, go ahead. RS: No. I then, when my children became school age, I was on board at the Jewish Day School and was the gift shop's chairman for many, many years, and would- the kids would have dinner- have lunch and they would have gift shop on Thursday. So I was there and I learned how to say the prayers after lunch. GAIL EISENBERG: Birkat Hamazon. RS: Birkat Hamazon. I learned it by hearing it, I didn't ever learn the words. But that's okay. As far as the big deals in my life, I was one year, I was chairman for the Federation -- Jewish Federation of Allentown, of the Lehigh Valley. And we raised a lot of money for the Women's Division. It was a lot of money at that time. And then shortly after that, I became president, very proudly, of Hadassah, which at the time I became president in 1980, it was seven hundred members. And it was a wonderful organization, and at that time, I think we raised over fifty thousand dollars, which was enormous. And I sat down and realized I'm now the one head of a fifty thousand dollar business, which I guess in the 1980s was pretty good. And we did very well. And subsequently I was on the board of Jewish Federation and as I said- oh before, before Abby was born, I was a great lady at the Allentown Hospital, which was really very satisfying. But when I became pregnant with her, I decided it's not a good time to be in a hospital. So those are really the main things that I did. Milton was always busy. He was either head of the -- what was it? B'nai B'rith boy? GE: Yes, B'nai B'rith. RS: And that was before we were married. After we were married, he's the head of- he became the chairman of the- of his organization. It had many names at various times, but it was the textile and secondary material, the waste, because his business was collecting the cuttings of all the textile dealers in the Lehigh Valley, South and North. And the- it was a very good business at that time. Of course, it's not an existing, non-existent almost, in these days. Everything has gone overseas. And- but last night I heard on the radio they were talking- this morning, actually, that they were doing recycling and that recycling only collects 16 percent of what's delivered and things that you give to various charities rarely get on, you know, to the- the floors when you give it to the -- what do you call them? Can you cut this out? GE: Yes. RS: Is this- The consignment stores and the various charities that, you know, drop in the box. SB: The Salvation Army. RS: The Salvation Army, the whatever, you know, those barrels. And Milton always used to say that he never recycled anything. And I kept saying you're in the recycling business. How come you don't recycle? We have two bins right in our kitchen, you know, garbage and recycling. And he says it's crazy, don't do it. But I do it. GE: But the interesting part is, in a sense he was the recycler. A reuser. RS: I said that you are a recycler. Absolutely! Yes, he really was. And he never recycled anything but- I think it's becoming, they're becoming aware that it is important. GE: So all those different, you know, organizations of a different leadership that you mentioned, which of those was the most that you felt that you were the most impactful? And if you want to just tell us a little bit about that. RS: Hadassah I thought was. GE: So tell us what Hadassah was about then and what it meant to you to be a part of that? And-- RS: Hadassah is the largest women's Zionist organization. It was started in 1900-something, by Henrietta Szold, with two nurses that she sent to- was able to send to Israel, to Palestine at the time, and I was always very proud of it, being- it's an international organization. At the time that I was very active, they had three hundred thousand women all around the world. And it's, it's still growing, but it's shifted. There's very little of it in the Lehigh Valley. It's still there. It never has gone away and hopefully never will. But in the Philadelphia area, it's quite active. And in Florida it's very active. But I get the bulletin with the- magazines every year, and boy, they are there all over the world. And it raises money and it has saved children from World War II. And it's- to me it was, you know, something really big. I had wanted to go on the regional board. I had many friends on the national board. And as I see their names, it's- I'm very proud of it. But- GE: What were some of the programs that you were, some of the programs that you were involved with here, that you brought here, that you were- RS: Oh what started it was the- we had study groups, and the study groups were wonderful because it taught you a lot about things, like one of the things that I -- I think I was vice-president at the time, but I made a-What happened was you're given a topic and one person will be the leader of it. Once I had I think it was mothers and sons, or why, you know, eating was very important. And I found out a little clue: Eating was very important to the immigrants in the- in the United States in the early years of the 19th, 20th century, because when you got very thin, they thought you had tuberculosis. So people would say, "Eat!" It wasn't the Jewish mother's attitude. It was a necessary thing because tuberculosis was very prevalent in those days and living conditions were quite horrible. But it's- it was really- I was very busy. I was also on the board of the Day School, as I said, and I'm trying to think of what else. God, I was always busy, till I picked up tennis and then I played tennis three times a week until I was past eighty. GE: Wonderful. Well what did, what did these things mean to you? How did you feel in terms of both what you were able to contribute or how they helped you as a person, as-? RS: They did help me very much. I mean, when I started making speeches, I would shake -- and then I realized, you know what? These are my friends. They don't want me to fail. And I hoped I didn't. And it was very important, and as I said, when Milton became very active in his industry organization, I was there, and we would have things to do. You know, they have- which, whatever city we had the convention. And usually there was a guest, not a guest, but a resident host and hostess. And they would set up programs for the ladies because most of the men- there were very few women in the textile waste. There were a few, but very few. I don't know what it would be like now, but, but it's been a long time. But it was- it was an active life. And the three kids, I thought they grew up very nicely. And they went to- Abby and Bruce went to the Jewish Day School. And when Abby graduated in sixth grade, she went to what's- what's the school on Walnut Street? Raub -- Raub Junior High. And it was very strange for a child her age to say to me, "Mom, I think I learned much more at the Day School." 'Cause they were a little bit ahead, considering that they had like twelve, ten kids in class. And when she went to Raub, she was dealing with a whole different group of people, but to her advantage, a whole group of Puerto Rican, Dominican, and Black people had taken a liking to her. And at one point she was thrown into the bramble bushes alongside Raub, and -- it was a little anti-Semitic -- and all her friends took over and they yeah, she really did, you know, she was really very good with that. I guess she was preparing herself for living in the South, which she did eventually when she was- when she was- graduated from Allen High, she actually moved to Atlanta and was selling apartments, you know, apartment residents. And then she moved to Greenville, South Carolina, where Milton had a- a plant. And she had set up- they set up for her a linen, you know, bedding plant- store. She had at one time, she had three stores, and she was doing very nicely until the companies themselves, she would get, you know, seconds and handouts. And when we first moved, when she first moved into the business, the former owner had big baskets and the sheets, you know, were all mixed up together. They came from all the plants, Laura Ashley, Ralph Lauren, and she managed to rearrange it where she got the print, the twins together, and the kings and the queens, and then the- she would package them together. And she did a good job until, as I said, the industry- the manufacturers themselves realized that they were, you know, getting rid of things by the pound when they could get they could get rid- they could make a good profit on selling them in seconds if they just packaged them. So that business went away, too. So she then decided to go into real estate and she's been there for- God, almost 20 years. SC: In Atlanta? RS: No, she's in Greenville. Yeah. She, well she got married and she- six months after she got married, she lost a leg in a motorcycle accident. But in this day and day, I want to tell you that she is number one in the paint horse show ring. So, with a one leg, she has done very well. And my other daughter is in Seattle. She works in a vegan restaurant. My two daughters are vegan, gluten-free vegans, and it's very difficult to listen to them because all they talk about is food. I think it's a loss on their part because I still eat meat and all the bad things that they say I shouldn't eat. And I survived, believe me better than some of the people at the quadrangle because every night they have ice cream. SC: Yeah, I have a question about Hadassah. RS: Sure. SC: Do you think that Hadassah began to sort of--? RS: Diminish? RS: Diminish. Yeah, I- I- yeah, I was going to say "go downhill", diminish is much better. And because the children have moved away and because many people have moved to Florida. So is it that- GE: And also the women work. SC: What? GE: My generation, the women work. SC: Yeah, the women work, that's true. RS: Well actually in 1980, when I became president, I noticed that half of the women were going back to school, another half were starting to go to work, getting teach- people who had been teachers, and getting teachers certificates, were working as teachers. And yes, I had a lot of trouble -- as a matter of fact, my board, which was I think forty strong, had its three top off positions I couldn't even get anybody to do. I finally asked the executive board to help me, and we managed to get everything done pretty well. But, yes, of course, I think all women's organizations are, you know, much less -- I mean, everybody calls it your grandma's business, so we're now into the great-grandmas and past. But listen, I have great, great nieces, I have two great, great nieces, but even the great-nieces and nephews are old! SC: But you don't look it, so it's fine. RS: Thank you. But other than that, no, it was fun. It really was. But it's a different life now. I'm pretty much on my own. Now can I talk about Omaha, Nebraska? SC: Sure. RS: That was an experience. My son, Bruce has taken over my entertainment, I think, because he has introduced me to things I really had never done before. And he asked me- he's also taken over some of the money problems, and has been dealing in investments and he's doing beautifully. And he- his father never thought it was important, but he did go to a school at Harvard that was called "SOB: Sons of Bosses". It was a program that they were- they, they're still running it. And they went three weeks from, I guess, 9:00 in the morning till 9:00 at night for three- but three weeks, they went for three years. And at the end of it, they actually got a Master's Degree, which was- they were told, he says to me that they were told that it's beyond a Masters, beyond an MBA, that the things that they were teaching them were way past that. So he's took- put it to very good use at this point. And a few weeks ago, he said to me, would you like to go to Omaha? And I knew exactly what he was talking about. And we went to Omaha on a Friday afternoon and went to a Berkshire Hathaway stockholders meeting, because I found out we had stock, we are the stockholders, and it was an experience that forty four thousand others shared with me. GE: That's how many people were there? RS: Yes, we don't know exactly, but they- they said that forty four thousand were registered to go, and Bruce said he had dealings with them. He wanted to take his camera and get, you know, a slip for press. And he said they called him, and he said if you- anything he wanted, if you called them, they called you back. And it's like Warren Buffett himself. We got up at five o'clock in the morning to get into the auditorium by 7:00 a.m. Because it was raining, they opened up the auditorium before 7:00 a.m. So there were lines everywhere, but Bruce got us a seat and he was taking pictures of Warren Buffett from 8:30 in the morning until 4 o'clock that afternoon. Warren Buffett is eighty-five years old. He talked and answered questions from- there were six people asking questions, one of which was Andrew Sorkin from The Times. He was there, among others. And there were- oh, Bill Gates was also there with his wife. We have big pictures of him and of Warren Buffett and his- his- I don't know if Charlie Munger is his partner or what, but they were sitting at the table together, munching on their See's Candy, peanut brittle, which is very good. He was talking about he- he was questioned, and then he would answer, and then he would talk a little bit more, and then in the afternoon, there was a break at noon and he came back, we came back at 1 o'clock and there were questions that the audience had submitted, and he would answer, he'd say, "Platform four," and a spotlight would go on and someone would be standing in the spotlight and asking a question, and he would answer the question. I mean, he never- never fumbled, never did anything that was- he just calmly answered every single question. I mean, he was amazing. It really was amazing. And he'd always say, after he spoke for a while, very nicely, he would say, "And Charlie, what do you think about that?" Charlie would say four words. He's 92, but very sharp. I mean, he- some of the answers he gave were very sharp. And it was really a delightful show. It- amazing. He was down on, after the- they had an hour, I think, over half an hour to buy the goods. Friday, I understand, was all buying. You didn't have any meetings or anything, but they did have a dinner and a brunch, and- but they were- he was down, not on the arena floor, but on the selling floor. And I see this big crowd and I saw a guy six foot four or so and I said, "You're tall enough. Who is there? Is it Warren?" And he looks and he says, "Yeah, it's him." And he's surrounded by people who- very, very nice man. And then we had an Uber driver take us around on Sunday. Oh Sunday morning was a brunch at a jewelry store that is the largest in the United States. And I don't think anybody has ever heard the name. It's Borsheims. Gorgeous, sixty-five thousand square foot jewelry store, beautiful and gorgeous stuff. I mean not only jewelry, but dishes and flatware and a Swarovski -- I mean, you name it, it was there. Paintings and tiles, beautiful things, really. Actually, I sent my great nieces, my great, greats, little dishes of you know, like from three to five, nine years old dish sets, cup, plates, fork, and spoon. And on my cell phone, I have one of them saying thank you in taking it apart, and saying, "Oh, a cup for drinking!" And they said it was perfect because she was growing out of her little infant bowls. And she's adorable anyway. But it was, it was really quite an experience. And I said we got an Uber driver to take us around and she took us all around and she says, "Oh, you have to see Warren's house, don't you?" So we said, okay, you want to take us? "Oh," she says, "Everybody goes there!" And if you didn't see the yellow cord around the house because people didn't want them to come in, it's a very nice house in a very wonderful neighborhood. Nothing extravagant. I live on Main Street in Allentown, and I lived, and the houses are very similar and nothing extravagant or elaborate. He is a very simple man, and Bruce was able to take a picture of him getting into his car, going to dinner with the stockholders, and a very simple place, an old fashioned steak house in Omaha. And that was- And then the next day we went to Lauritzen Gardens, I think it was called, the most gorgeous greenhouses you ever want to see, almost bigger than the New York's Botanical Gardens. It was- it was really an eye opener to see this. It was really nice. We missed the tornadoes. There was one last night and one just before we got there. So that's a minus, but we weren't there for. But it was an experience that really- And then we stopped, that week ended by seeing John Williams conduct the Philadelphia Orchestra at the Kimmel Center with Star Wars music. It was an amazing week. Weekend, really. So, and that's my life now. SC: Yes. May I ask a question? RS: But it was very interesting. Go ahead. SC: What do you- I have two more questions. What do you value most in life? RS: My kids. I think that was the best thing, and I have you know, it's fun learning to live with your adult children. Right now, my son is taking care of me and his father. And Milton was an interesting character to live with. And even today, he's- even though he's really not in great mental shape, he's the same Milton. Walks over to everybody, says -- if it's a woman -- "You are the prettiest woman in the room" ; and the men, "You're great." And they love him, I mean, they think he's wonderful. And it was funny, I went to a Cinco de Mayo festival that they had in this unit, and the director of it is about twenty-four years old, very beautiful, and was wearing a very short skirt, and she was dancing around, and every time she would come by us, we were sitting there, he would say, "She's a very pretty lady." But that was fun, it was. Everybody was dancing and laughing and singing. And it was, it was cute. Very good. SC: So what made you feel the most creative? This is my last question, I promise. RS: Creative? SC: Yes. RS: Well right now I'm writing stories for a writer's group. Most of the people in the group, of course, are residents of the quadrangle. They are all, I mean I feel like I'm uneducated because I only have a B.A. Degree, but they have Master's and two or three PhDs, and they're writing their autobiographies. Just last year, unfortunately, he died shortly after he finished his second book on his life work. And he was 94. He was a psychiatrist. And I'm telling you it's wonderful because I'm thinking, I'm remembering every time somebody tells a story, it sparks something in your head, and you say, "Oh, I remember that!" That's fun. I really find it fun. Physically, I can't do that great because I'm very off-balance. But that I like, I enjoy that. GE: Tell us about the stories you're writing. RS: Well, I've written a story about when my father and mother and sister went down to- up- we were going to a convention in my father's- my father's convention in Atlanta. In 1945? No, it couldn't have been, it was '48. My mother was still alive. And we went- we drove down to the- down south and we were meeting a couple who were leaving Greenville, who- he had- he was a shirt manufacturer in Greenville and was moving to Manhattan. And we were going to meet his family, and we went to a place called Tybee Beach in South Carolina. And nobody I know has ever heard of it except my daughter, when I- who lives in South Carolina said, "Oh yeah, it's a nice beach." So we went there and Eugene Talmadge was at the hotel. He was just leaving the hotel. And at that time, he was a famous or infamous politician in South Carolina. And my- How old was I? I don't remember. Maybe 12, 11? Eleven, I guess. It was, I said, "He looked like just a little corn pone." There was nothing very important about him, he didn't look like a hayseed -- that's the word. And I was not impressed, but I was impressed with the going down and seeing the chain gangs on the road. That was impressive- not impressive, but scary. And how we- when we left, when we actually left the hotel to go to Atlanta, we got into an accident and our car was smashed, so we had to take a bus to Atlanta and left the car there to be repaired. And the children- my mother got hysterical because she was wearing pants. It was a beautiful pair of the patio pants, but in 1948 you did not drive a- in a- you know, you didn't get on a bus with a pair of slacks, more or less. And I said today we would think it's formalwear. And then the night drive through rural South Carolina was something because in the middle of nowhere with no lights, no nothing, they would stop and somebody would get off. So it was quite, that was an adventure. And then the next one was when? In 1954 or '52, something like that. We were in a blizzard and we had gone out to dinner at the Gourmet Inn, and we had some visitors from Italy in. And when it was snowing, I kept saying, I'll take a brisket out and I'll put- and have dinner here. We had invited two more couples for dinner and Milton said, "No, we'll go out to the Gourmet Inn." I said, "Can't we stay in town?" "Nah!" And this Italian is saying, "This is no snow!" He comes from the Alps. They had six feet the week before. And we went there on Saturday night. And we left the- at about 10:00 that night, we left the Gourmet Inn and got about half a mile down the road when we had to stop because the car wouldn't move. The wind was blowing and the snow was blowing and it was five degrees, and we stayed four days. We were very lucky when we saw light out in a bleak, dark night. And Milt and his brother got out of the car and the snow was up to their waist, and they opened the hood and snow was packed all the way into the- to the engine. So we had Vera Shiff with us, too. And Morty was in Cincinnati and he kept saying, "What do you mean you're stuck near the Gourmet Inn? Can't you go home? Kids are home," and everybody's kids were home with the babysitters. And we stayed there because we couldn't get out. And we realized Amelio Falco, who is this outside- The Italian kept saying, "We had six feet of snow!" And after I wrote the story, I looked up in the- on the dates at how much snow we had -- we had 15.4 inches. And last winter, we had- you had 32 inches here in Allentown. So I apologize for saying it was a blizzard, but that was- it was an amazing- Listen, we got through that. But I have another one. We were caught in- We went to Acapulco, and we went out fishing and the boat burned underneath us. So that's another one I'm writing but I don't want them to know that I was in catastrophic situations all my life. I had some very happy, calm ones. So that's an interesting- that's what I'm doing now. And meeting a hundred new people. And getting along very nicely. SC: Thank you so much. RS: My pleasure. Copyright for this interview is held by Muhlenberg College. video This oral history is made available with a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). The public can access and share the interview for educational, research, and other noncommercial purposes as long as they identify the original source. 0 /render.php?cachefile=
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00:38:11
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Ronnie Sheftel, May 11, 2016
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Ronnie Sheftel talks about how when she came from Brooklyn to Allentown as Milt Sheftel’s wife, she was quickly given opportunities to get involved in the small, tight-knit Jewish community. This was foreign to her life growing up in Brooklyn. Later Ronnie proudly describes her stint as president of the local Women’s Hadassah chapter, which was quite dominant at that time in the Lehigh Valley.
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LVTNT-33
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2016-05-11
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video
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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Muhlenberg College Special Collections and College Archives
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