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Title
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SC229 Garment Industry Oral History Collection Finding Aid
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Description
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This collection contains DVDs and transcripts that were created as part of a Kansas City Garment Industry History Project. The collection consists of oral history interviews and supplemental audiovisual materials related to the Garment Industry.
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Date
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1938/2020
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Object Type
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Finding Aid
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Title
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Interview with Mel Mallin
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Description
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Interview with Mel Mallin about his experience with the Kansas City garment industry. He discusses his start in New York, his work with Maurice Coat Company in Kansas City in the 1950s, and his later purchase of the All Packaging Company box business and the Manhattan Sponging Works in the late 1960s, a fabric processing company. He shares stories about changing size labels on clothing to flatter customers, the majority Jewish ownership of local garment companies, and recounts other local garment manufacturers and designers, their specialties, and their owners and operations. He also discusses the later conversion of the Garment District buildings into offices and apartments, including including his own 1983 conversion of his box and packaging plant into the first residential loft building in Kansas City.
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Date
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2004-10-19
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Bill Kort
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Description
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Interview with Bill Kort about his life and his experience in the Kansas City garment industry working as a "bundle boy" as a teenager at Brand and Puritz in the early 1960s. He discusses asking his neighbor and friend's father Arthur Brand for a summer job, and being hired as a bundle boy who would take piece goods from station to station to have buttons added, collars sewn, or other discrete parts of the manufacturing process. He discusses the diversity of the workforce, his memories of the Garment District and Downtown Kansas City, and his later career in investments at H. O. Peet.
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Date
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2011-01-12
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Bill Kaiser
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Description
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Interview with Bill Kaiser about his life and his company, the Bill Kaiser Company, which was a supplier to the Midwestern garment industry. He discusses his family's business importing sewing machine parts in New York, and starting his company in Kansas City after moving from New York in 1971 supplying local manufacturers with sewing machines and parts, pressing equipment, and other supplies. He notes that by 1971 manufacturing had largely moved out of the city into smaller regional towns, and says that he believes a resistance to new, faster technology and automation was a factor in the decline of the local industry. He also discusses the assembly line process of clothing manufacturing and the variety of machines and other equipment required for production, and the American garment industry's shift to overseas manufacturing.
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Date
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2010-11-30
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Betty Brand
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Description
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Interview with Betty Brand about her family's history in and her experience with the Kansas City garment industry. Betty was married to Arthur Brand, whose family started the Brand and Puritz factory in 1928, and describes the family's experience in the garment business, the different suit and coat lines they manufactured, and the large number of immigrants among their staff. She also describes their experience in Kansas City's Jewish community, the retail and restaurant landscape of downtown Kansas City, and shares her paintings and photographs of her family and travels.
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Date
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2010-11-15
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Seymour Weiner
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Description
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Interview with Seymour Weiner about his life and experience working in Kansas City's garment industry. Weiner recalls his Polish immigrant parents owning an alterations and pressing business, going to work for garment industry "trimmings" supplier Hammer Brothers as a young man, starting a company called Krest Originals, and discusses the business model of an "item house," which manufactured a limited number of items. He discusses the shift in the marketplace from locally owned specialty stores to department stores and national chains, the change in the labor pool in the 1960s, the role of labor unions in the industry, and changes in the relationships between businesses and banks over the decades. After closing his factory, Weiner went to work in sales for Betty Rose Coats, and recounts financial and fashion reasons for the decline in the local and domestic garment industries.
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Date
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2005-05-20
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Margie Sackin
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Description
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Interview with Margie Sackin about her family's hardware and tool company, Harry Epstein Company, located in Kansas City's historic Garment District. Her father, Harry Epstein, started the business in 1930 and it served largely as a distributor to regional hardware stores, and continues to sell American-made tools primarily through its website. After Harry Epstein died in 1992, the business was run by her husband, Gene, and their sons, and a grandson. She discusses the social milieu of the garment district, local restaurants, the decline of the garment industry, and describes the operations of Harry Epstein Company, and their specialization in American-made tools, at the time of the interview.
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Date
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2011-01-27
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Steve Hammer
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Description
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Interview with Steve Hammer about his family's history in Kansas City garment industry. He discusses his family's company, Hammer Brothers, and how it adapted to industry changes by moving from suppliers and manufacturers for the coat and dress business, to promotional clothing and hats, to supplying the patch and athletic wear embroidery industry. He also discusses his Jewish identity, his relationship with the local Jewish community, and also discusses his maternal family's Cake Box Bakeries.
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Date
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2008-10-14
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Mary Lou Chalmers
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Description
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Interview with Mary Lou Chalmers about her experience working in Kansas City's garment industry from the late 1950s through late 1970s.. She discusses enrolling in the fashion design program at Kansas City Art Institute, as well as taking courses at Fanny Fern Fitzwater School of Fashion Illustration and the Isabelle Boldin School of Fashion, and then working in design and pattern-making at area garment companies such as Nelly Don and Gay Gibson. She describes the process of designing and making clothing, her experiences at numerous companies, the perks of working at Nelly Don, and times that her designs were featured in national magazines. She also discusses the decline of the garment fashion industry in the 1970s, the homogenization of shopping, and the shift to manufacturing in Asia.
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Date
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2010-05-07
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Eugene Salvay
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Description
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Interview with Eugene Salvay about his life and his family's experience with the Kansas City garment industry, with additional information provided by his nephew, Craig Salvay. He discusses his childhood in the 1920s, and his education in aircraft engineering which lead to job in World War II working on B-25s at the assembly plant in the Fairfax District in spite of antisemitism in the hiring process. He recalls his father's work as designer at Fashionbilt before moving on to mail-order company National Bellas Hess, and operating his own business designing custom coats. He also shares stories about his family roots in Lithuania, his Jewish identity and ancestry, and meeting Harry Truman in the 1930s. Salvay also mentions his participation in developing Israeli aviation and his relationship with Moshe Arens.
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Date
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2011-06-04
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Rosa Guarino
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Description
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Interview with Rosa Guarino about her life and career in the Kansas City garment industry. She discusses coming to the United States from Sicily by way of France, getting work sewing collars at Coronet in the garment district, accusations from coworkers that she was taking their work, and later working at Betty Rose near 31st and Linwood with a more diverse group of workers. She recalls the factory abruptly closing when the company chose to move manufacturing to China, resulting in 500 people losing jobs.
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Date
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2010-05-24
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Steve Chick
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Description
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Interview with Steve Dvorak about his experience working in the Kansas City garment industry and about his career with Youthcraft. He discusses the history of the company from its founding by Leon Karosen, and its merger with Stern-Slegman-Prins, a company which Chick's father Robert worked for; the manufacturing and sales processes, including traveling with racks of coats to visit stores throughout the country. He recalls the different facilities from which the company operated, including buildings in North Kansas City, the downtown Garment District, and near 31st and Gillham, and discusses the company's national profile and mergers, as well as changes in the garment industry over the ensuing decades, including the shift to department stores and other large chains.
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Date
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2010-05-18
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Bob and Bruce Gershon
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Description
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Interview with Bruce and Bob Gershon about the history of their family company, Arrowhead Fabricare Services. They discuss the building's construction at the corner of 39th and Troost, salvaging furs and leather goods from Plaza stores after the 1977 flood, their garment company clients, a venture into hat-making, and share stories about their lives, families, and the dry-cleaning business.
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Date
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2009-10-24
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Cy and Esther Rudnick
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Description
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Interview with Cy and Esther Rudnick about their lives and their store, Cy Rudnick's Fabrics. Cy recalls coming to Kansas City to manage Kaplan's Fabrics and later operating his own store in Crown Center from 1976 to 2006. They discuss fabric buying, custom clothing, and notable customers, and sewing becoming a creative outlet rather than a necessary task. They also discuss the prevalence of Jewish families in the fabric business and their disinterest in shifting their business online.
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Date
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2010-09-28
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Marshall Gordon
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Description
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Interview with Marshall Gordon about his family's experience in the Kansas City garment industry. His father, Hyman Gordon, operated the Frances Gee Company, manufacturing inexpensive housedresses during the Depression and World War II, later shifting to manufacturing uniforms. Marshall discusses working at the family business from 1960 to 1972, and returning after his father passed away in the early 1990s. He discusses their shift to manufacturing in Puerto Rico and Japan, the decline of the company, their relationship with the garment workers' union, as well as their real estate holdings and development work.
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Date
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2005-08-04
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Sherman Dreiseszun
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Description
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Interview with Sherman Dreiseszun about his life, his work in the Kansas City garment industry, and other ventures. He was the first of his family born in the United States after his parents and siblings migrated to Kansas City from the Polish-Russian border and later served as gunner in the Army Air Corps in World War II. He later owned the Vic-Gene Manufacturing Company with his nephew Frank Morgan, which he described as manufacturing knock-offs of popular garments including Pendleton jackets and corduroy "slick shirts." He and Morgan later opened Metcalf South Shopping Center in Overland Park,
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Date
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2004-10-05
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Nancy Hipsh
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Description
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Interview with Nancy Hipsh about her family's history in the Kansas City garment industry. She discusses her grandfather Harry Hipsh's start in the cap making business before moving on to manufacturing neckties at several factories in northwestern Missouri. Her father, Charles Hipsh, worked for the business and later established Empire State Bank in 1963. She also shares photographs and miscellany from Hipsh Manufacturing and Textile Distributors, Inc., and shares stories about her father's political involvement, her upbringing, and other family members.
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Date
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2005-05-25
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Eileen Garry
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Description
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Interview with Eileen Garry about her life and her experience in the Kansas City garment industry. She discusses her marriage to Marshall Garry, their move from Brooklyn to Kansas City, and Marshall's work for his father's B. Garry and Company. She discusses their work representing suppliers such as the Maimin Company, a producer of cutting machines, and textile manufacturers, the evolution of the company and industry into the 1960s, the couple's involvement in the local Jewish community, and the industry's social milieu.
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Date
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2011-02-03
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Linda Lighton
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Description
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Interview with Linda Lighton about the history of the Woolf Brothers clothing stores, which he father worked at and later owned. She discusses the company's origins in the late 1800s, selling men's clothing and haberdashery at 1020 Walnut, and its expansion over the decades to locations at the Plaza, area malls, and regional cities, as well as expanding to sell women's clothing. She also discusses the life of Herbert Woolf, the Kansas City Jewish community, and says that she heard Herbert Woolf "discovered" actress Jean Harlow. She connects the decline of the business to the 1977 flood that damaged the Plaza store and her father Alfred being shot in a mugging, as well as the ascendance of clothing and department store chains in the 1980s.
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Date
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2011-05-13
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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Title
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Interview with Ralph and Ben Zarr
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Description
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Interview with brothers Ralph and Ben Zarr about their lives and experience working in Kansas City's garment industry. They recount their father's and uncles' backgrounds in the garment business, their father's founding of the Quality Hill Dress Company, which made two-piece dresses for size flexibility, their start in the business as traveling salesmen, and the company's practice of adapting best-selling designs by other companies from previous seasons into two-piece dresses. They also discuss changes in fashion, overseas manufacturing, and labor union demands as factors in the decline of their business and the local industry, and share memories of seeing one of their dresses in a movie, having a racially diverse group of employees, future business dealings, and downtown businesses of the era.
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Date
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2005-01-26
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Object Type
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Video Recording
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