A brass monument dedicated to the immigrants who slaved in the Garment District.
From Racks to Tracks
The Bronx 1948
I first met my high school guidance counselor in 1948, my senior year. “You’re passing all your subjects”, he said and congratulated me for having varsity football on my permanent record card. Without the foresight or intelligence, I did not ask whether I qualified for any of the city colleges. As for input from my parents, they were as green as the day they trotted down the gangplank and into the New World. They were happy I didn’t fail any subjects and I had a high school diploma.
There weren’t many opportunities for a high school graduate with an academic diploma with no employable skills. The year was 1948. World War II veterans were also looking for work. Employment agencies demanded the first week’s pay for a job that began and ended as a messenger boy. I pictured myself at the age of fifty running with a message in hand to a young lady at a reception desk then standing and pathetically waiting for a reply.
I had no rich uncle. The employment agencies should have been called unemployment agencies. It was demoralizing to conscientiously seek employment only to find I was neither needed nor qualified. What was I going to do? Live with my parents for the rest of my life? A job counselor at the New York State Employment Agency reviewed my underwhelming credentials and my uncle’s oversized sport jacket wrapped around me. He sent me to the Loma Dress Corporation; the industry my father slaved in, and the one I swore I would never be employed. But, at this point I was desperate.
The firm occupied the seventh floor of 501 Seventh Avenue on Broadway and Thirty-Seventh Street in Manhattan. The girl at the switchboard directed me to the office of the personnel manager, Mr. Friedman. His bushy jet-black eyebrows set below a mass of wavy pearl-white hair was a threatening sight. Between his thick curly lips skidded a cigar the size of my mother’s rolling pin.
“Name?”
“Address?”
“Phone?”
“None. Call the candy store, Dayton 9-5729.”
“Social Security Number?”
“Okay,” he growled. “Follow me.”
I chased a trail of dense cigar smoke as we walked into the blue-collar area. Through his exhaled exhaust my teary eyes saw countless racks of dresses waiting to be picked up and delivered by truckers. The floor area was the size of three football fields.
By now I was sharing the cigar on which Mr. Friedman was exhaling. He led me to Patricia Fair, one of the two subsidiaries of the Loma Dress Corporation. With the charm he exhibited while performing his inquisition, he approached Mr. Margolis, the head of the department.
“Here’s your new man. Put him to work.”
Mr. Margolis appeared to be a contemporary of Mr. Friedman. He greeted me with a No. 2 pencil then showed me how to bill a customer for the dresses he had ordered. He picked the dresses then hooked them onto a rack. When the rack was full, he rolled it to me. With a card looped onto a dress hanger identifying the buyer, the style number and the amount of dresses and their destination, I billed the customer from a cost sheet next to my billing machine. Once completed, I sent the rack to the navy-blue area, the packers.
Frequent visits from the female office personnel broke the tedium of the job. One aggressive female asked me what I was doing this Sunday. Totally unaware that she wanted a date, I replied,
“I’m playing softball.”
“What are you doing after softball?”
I was about to answer when Mr. Margolis’ bulging, red-veined eyeballs accelerated my pencil to atone for the lost time. Leering at the half-dressed models rushing from the showroom to their changing rooms behind me was the meager compensation for a paltry salary of seventy-five cents an hour.
Four months into my job, I thought it was time for a raise. I entered Mr. Friedman’s office. The rumor that this man was an ex-member of the Lepke mob did not bolster my confidence. With trepidation, I said,
“Mr. Friedman, I think I deserve a raise.”
“It’s the middle of the season,” he snarled. “You’ll get your raise at the end of the season.”
I left wondering what was this season and when did it end. Meanwhile, I was getting an unwanted education. I learned to distinguish between the various dress styles and their fabrics. Faille, tissue faille, moiré, organdy and satin composed the dating or party wear. Peplum and Dolman sleeves left as soon as it entered my vocabulary. Cotton was an informal summer fabric, rayon a synthetic fabric. The dresses were manufactured somewhere in Pennsylvania then transported to our examining room where the garments were inspected for workmanship, stains, or defects. The floor was constantly swarming with incoming and outgoing racks of hanging dresses.
After six months on the job, I had an appendicitis attack. Following a few weeks recuperation, I returned to Loma Dress. The old, chipped cement floor was now painted a shiny battleship gray. It was easier on the eyes but I knew walking on it all day would still send me home with aching feet. I tried my Davega’s sneakers once, but Mr. Friedman threatened to fire me if I wore them again.
Upon my return, the company’s comptroller said he had temporary work for me. He brought me to a small, isolated room on the floor above us. It was furnished with a billing machine, a comfortable chair and billing ledgers from the present year. Blank bills whose numbers corresponded to the numbers of the present year’s ledgers were stacked alongside of them. My job was to duplicate the original bill on a corresponding numbered blank bill except for the prices of the dresses. A price code for the dresses varied from $2.00 to $4.00 less per dress than on the original bill. Ultimately, my work would indicate a smaller gross for the year. Consequently, Loma Dress made a smaller profit resulting in a smaller tax debt.
No longer did I receive visits from the female office personnel, no longer were the models trotting by partially dressed, but there was no pressure on the job. For the first time, since I worked at Loma Dress I sat on a comfortable chair and relaxed as I worked. The false receipts saved the company tens of thousands of dollars while I was still waiting for ”the end of the season”. After three months, my job as head chef expired. I finished cooking the books.
Carol Craig Fashions, another department needed an all-around utility man. Dan Stein, the department head greeted me.
“This is a completely different operation from Patricia Fair, he said. “It functions like the Book-Of-The-Month-Club. We have salesmen calling on dress shops in small Southern and Midwestern towns. They offer the proprietor a plan that would send them a minimum of nine dresses per month in a variety of styles and sizes. You will pick the dresses and bill the stores.”
Dresses that sold well were reordered, unsuitable dresses were returned for credit. I picked the dresses based upon the sense of style inculcated in me by my mother, whose concept of high fashion was a faded cotton housedress covered by a stained apron and blue flannel slippers. In spite of this handicap, we had very few returns.
Saturday was open house. I was assigned to usher owners of small stores to select dresses from our reduced price racks. They argued with me as if I determined the style and price. It was a fun day in spite of it. As a result of these skirmishes I was offered a job as a traveling salesman for Carol Craig Fashions. This required a car. At the rate I was being paid, I couldn’t afford a used tricycle. I was still waiting for “the end of the season”.
Essie Reid, a forty-year old black woman was the other billing clerk for the department. With her sense of humor she dissolved the dark shadows Mr. Friedman cast as he stalked the floor daily. Essie was a short, mirror image of Hattie McDaniel, the maid in Gone With The Wind. On Mondays, she usually arrived late and exhausted followed by a detailed recital of the sexual gymnastics she had engaged in over the weekend. Unaware that such antics existed, I was awed by every incredible detail. She stepped in late as usual one Monday. I asked her why the left side of her hair appeared as if it had just seen a ghost.
“That’s the side I lay on when Lehman play with me,” she said.
“Play? Plays what?” I asked innocently. “I’d ‘splain it to you but I could see you have no ‘sperience.”
She called me a mouse because I would bring a cheese sandwich every day. One day, while nibbling on a cheese sandwich, Essie said,
“I’m going to put some cheese in a trap then I’ll bring you home.”
“What are you going to do with me?
“Lehman will show you.”
Thank you.
I didn’t know what to call the foul-smelling fried bits and pieces she brought for lunch.
“What is that?” I asked. “It smells like someone just opened the door to an outhouse.”
“The closest thing to your nose is your upper lip,” she replied. It’s chitlins, that’s what you smell!”
Another gourmet morsel she introduced me to were mountain oysters.
“Okay. What’s on the menu for today?”
“Nothing your big mouth would get near to. Did you ever hear of mountain oysters?”
“Oysters? Oysters aren’t kosher, that’s all I know about oysters.”
“Mountain oysters are calf’s balls and if you don’t shut up I’ll slice, boil, bread, and fry yours.”
Well, two things that will never appear on my menu will be chittlins and mountain oysters.
One day, Amalee came floating into my blue-collar territory. She was an attractive and a very well dressed new employee.
“I’m going to be the new liaison between you and the front office.”
Thank God I thought, no more heel clicking and repulsive perfume from Muriel who had a rear like the trunk of a 1949 Buick and, on the flip side, a pair of breasts to balance her upright. I knew Muriel was on her way as soon as she left the front office. Her spike heels drilling into the concrete floor played out a tune like The Syncopated Clock. On the other hand, Amalee’s heels floated quietly. Always conscious of her weight, a bare sandwich and black coffee was her lunch. One day, while I was munching on my bialy and cheese, she came running. Flustered, she sobbed,
“I just stained my new dress. It’s from the coffee.”
I looked at the stain located at the epicenter of her left breast.
“Come with me to the examining room,” I lustfully replied.
On a shelf in a closet, there were solvents that would eliminate any stain encountered by the ladies in the examining room. She sat on a chair while my eager hands searched for a solvent. I returned with a white cotton rag soaked in a liquid and slowly began to rub. I couldn’t believe she just sat there while I was fantasizing what was behind that stain and the damn bra behind that. Happy, yet unhappy to get over with it, I said,
“Amalee, I think we got it.” She cheerfully returned to her desk.
The following week I was invited to Amalee’s birthday party in the office. I created a birthday card that I thought to be extremely clever. I wrote:
To a girl who doesn’t know where her mouth is, but certainly knows where her personality is, with personality in the shape of a breast.
It flew right over her head and breast.
Murray, one of the packers was a pathetic weasel. His beady eyes certainly classified him as a rodent. He was nominally at Loma Dress as a packer, but he eavesdropped on all conversations concerning the possible formation of a union and ran to Mr. Friedman with any news. Everyone was wise to him.
Mrs. Rubin, about seventy-five years old was the matriarch of the royal family. Her sons ran the business. She would make her Friday visits to Loma Dress accompanied by her latest acquisition, a jewel, a fur, a pocketbook or a hat. Sporting her bauble, pelt or chapeau, she would first visit the office, and then parade before the girls who were earning no more than eighty cents an hour. Then she ambled into Blue-Collarland where she would lurk behind the hanging dresses to spy on the employees. I asked the girl at the switchboard to call me whenever she arrived.
The phone rang.
“Danny, Mrs. Rubin just came in.”
When I saw her approaching, with my arms akimbo, I stood at my billing machine and stared out of the window.
“Look ett heem stendink dere mit hissz hendz on his heeps doink nahtink!” she stage whispered from her blind.
She knew, that at seventy-five cents per hour I could stand there all year and the company would still turn a huge profit. With a tug on my sleeve she emerged from her cover and asked,
“Say, no vun tuld you vatt to do?”
I told her I was thinking. She immediately ran to Mr. Friedman to report on my behavior. No response from Mr. Friedman.
The end of my career at Loma came on a beautiful Saturday autumn day. The sunlight greeted me as I reluctantly crawled up the subway steps. Upon reaching the street, instead of going towards Loma, I turned to Broadway where my favorite singer, Billy Eckstein was on stage at the Paramount Theater. His rendition of Roses brought ear-splitting applause. When the movie ended, doormen opened all the exit doors leading to Broadway. Of the seven million people living in New York City, there was Dan Stein, the head of Carol Craig Fashions walking directly towards me. I couldn’t avoid him. We confronted one another. Was it serendipity or just good luck?
“Why aren’t you at work?” he asked.
“It’s a nice day. I didn’t feel like coming in.”
Without saying a word, he continued to wherever he was going.
The following Monday, my time card was not in the rack. I asked Jack, the supervisor at the door whether he saw my time card.
“Friedman told me to put it over there, at the end of the rack. He said you’re not to punch in.”
When I went to get my time card, a trucker, with his fly wide open passed through pushing a rack of dresses. Jack told him to button his fly or his pecker would catch a cold.
“What the hell,” he said. “I work like a horse. I might as well look like one.”
The omnipresent Mrs. Rubin from behind a dress rack called out,“Feh, dots terrible,”
After a chuckle I grabbed my card and punched in. Dan Stein didn’t say a word as I passed him to pick orders, but I saw him slink out to the Patricia Fair department and use the phone.
“Friedman wants to see you” said Dan.
I entered his office while he was trying to ignite a fresh cigar.
“Do you like it here?”
“Your office is OK.”
“Not this office God damn it. Working here. All you do is fuck around with the girls in the office.”
“If that’s all I do, you know what you can do about it.”
He knew.
“Get the hell out of here.”
I “got the hell out of here” and then went to a New York State Unemployment Office to file claim. Within a week I received a letter stating that my employer challenged my claim. A hearing was necessary before I could receive payment. When I related my story, the referee said my reply to Friedman left him with no alternative but to fire me. He ruled I was not to receive unemployment checks for a month. Where does a guy get a job around here?
It was the winter of 1949. Without a resume, without as skill, without an unemployment check I walked the empty streets with empty pockets looking forward to and empty future. I had to get a job.
Back to the Garment District? Never! As a messenger boy for fifty cents an hour, my jingling coins would barely cover the seam in my pocket. Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?
Within a few weeks, my unemployed friend Al came rushing to my apartment.
“New York Central is hiring shape-up workers for $25 a day. The New York Central Railroad was hiring switch tenders and brakemen, no experience necessary.”
For $25 dollars a day this salary was higher than my father’s who slaved for 30 years in the Garment District.
A letter directed us to report for a physical to an office in Grand Central Station. We met at the E. 174 Street station for a subway ride to prosperity. Upon entering Grand Central Station, we made our way to the top of wide marble steps and turned left where an aging Dr. Stevens was to give us the required physical.
Between raling inhales and hacking coughs, Dr. Stevens, who resembled a Civil War veteran told Alvin to strip.
“You sit here,” he said to me. “You,” he rasped to Alvin, “get up on the table.”
Naked as the day we were in a Turkish bath, Al stood up on the table resembling Brussel’s Mannequin Pis.
“What the hell are you doing up there?” growled the doctor.
“You told me to get up on the table,” replied Alvin.
“Not like that goddamn it! Get down and sit on your ass!”
I could hardly contain my laughter but this was merely a precursor of things to come.
We left Dr. Stevens and followed an employee to a darkened room. A mole, shaped like a human sat behind a large table awaiting the next applicant. From a leather satchel resembling a doctor’s medical bag, he proceeded to throw woolen yarn dolls of various colors into a spotlight on the table. We were to tell him the color of the doll. Aside from the physical, this was the most challenging task in qualifying for the job.
An oral reading of The Book of Rules was our final exam. We were directed to a room occupied by a large conference table with matching chairs. A black, gold-stamped, The Book of Rules was on the table in front of each chair. Seated around the table was a cast of characters who appeared as if they had just been resuscitated by the Salvation Army after sipping Thunderbird throughout the night. Their pale green, ashen complexions had been scrubbed clean, their eyes appeared as if they were eager to hide behind their lids. My suspicion of their scholarship was confirmed once the recitation began. We were to read two paragraphs from The Book of Rules. The readings began. As the first candidate read, I was transported to third grade where Ernie Gitlitz, placed a yellow slip under each line he had butchered. Another candidate had difficulty with any word consisting of more than six letters. In preparation for my performance, I noted I was to read a rule that extended through two pages, while the others had read two short paragraphs. I started to read, but when I looked up I found Alvin staring directly at me. We burst into laughter. The class was dismissed. We went home thinking missed out on a great opportunity.
In two weeks, we received a letter telling us to report to 72nd Street freight yard. This was a shape-up job. Names of the employees were called from a list. If an employee didn’t respond, yardmaster Brophy continued down the line of names until he had a full crew. Approximately ten to twelve men were called for each shift.
On the first day, we arrived at the 72nd Street freight yard, adjacent to the Hudson River. A large, red, neon Ripley Clothes sign towered over me. Across the Hudson River, in New Jersey, the Palisades amusement park, the green neon Spry sign and a red ALCOA aluminum sign stared directly sty me.
Brophy introduced us to our co-workers. I wondered how I was going to team up with these men. This was not a profession that required a three-piece suit, but being well- groomed was not in their repertoire. Their bloodshot eyes danced everywhere but into my face. They didn’t offer their hand for a welcome. The pay was good. I was not about to find new friends. I had my own. I was ready to earn my salary.
There were three means of generating power for the freight yard engine, diesel fuel, a battery in the engine or electricity from a third rail. A week before Alvin and I came to the freight yard, a brakeman carrying a kerosene lantern in a tunnel brushed it against the third rail.
“He fried like a frankfurter,” one of the men told us.
“When his shoes and socks were removed you could see an outline on his soles where the nails were fastened to his boots. By the way, if no one told you, wear bicycle clips at night. Frightened rats have run up a switchtender’s leg aa few times.”
At the end of the day, I bought a pair of bicycle clips. I always made sure to keep my distance from those seemingly harmless wood-covered third rails.
In general, we worked about 4-5 days a week as switchtenders. At times our names were repeated on the shape-up when some of the men did not report. This resulted in a double-shift making a substantial to our paychecks.
Tending switches was easy. Each track had a name or a number. At our square, spare seven-foot wooden shack plastered with nudes, a phone call would come from yardmaster Brophy.
“A train is approaching the yard,” he would say and then tell us which switch to throw. Empty freight cars were dispatched to eighteen different tracks appearing like a delta on a river at the south end of the yard. Each track would be composed of automobile cars, utility cars and so on. Usually coal trains were exclusively composed of coal cars and cattle trains only cattle cars.
In the evening, gray/brown rats the size of cats would creep into the switchtender’s shack. At night or in the tunnel I sat outside the shack with bicycle clips fastened to the bottom of my dungarees. When I was in a shack, it was with a club in hand waiting for one of these visitors to arrive. I couldn’t concentrate on anything but those ugly rodents. When one came in, my bat went flying towards it. No matter how determined, no matter how I tried, I never scored a hit, but fortunately, they scooted out of the shack.
One day Pat Riley was my partner at a group of very active switches. We had a pleasant evening reminiscing about our families and their struggle during The Great Depression.
“Maybe we’ll work together tomorrow, Danny.”
“I won’t be in tomorrow. It’s Yom Kippur.”
Startled, he drew back, as if I had just returned from the hardware store with hammer and nails to impale his savior.
“You’re not a Jewish lad are you?”
“Yes, I am,” I replied.
From that day, until the day I quit, an iron curtain was drawn between Reilly and myself.
For the complete story read, Seabury Place: A Bronx memoir.
danielwolfebooks@aol.com