While You Were Here

Today I learned that the tuxedo Obama will be wearing on inauguration day was made by Hart, Schaffner & Marx, a company co-founded by my great, great, great (great?) uncle, Marcus Marx, in Chicago.

www.thestar.com/living/article/551498

My grandmother, Gretel (Marx) Roos (1916 – 2003), saved these photographs, which show the factory ca. 1912.  There is a calendar in the background of one of the photos showing the first week of January 1912.  Given the massive labor strikes brought by Chicago’s garment workers ca. 1910/1911 perhaps these photographs were intended to document improved conditions?

Another item I would like to research now is the fact that Marcus was not the only Marx in the business.  In fact, I never heard much if anything about him from my grandmother. But rather I heard stories about his brothers Alexander and Morris Marx.  Morris Marx is in the photograph on the top left of this post.  (For you Marx family members reading this, he is an uncle to the Moritz Marx you are probably thinking of).  Because of Marcus’ absence from these stories I thought Alexander and Morris had more to do with HS&M than Marcus, which obviously isn’t the case.

The back of another photograph says “A. Marks & Sons”.  (The dual spellings of the family name appears throughout my grandmother’s papers, though Marx is used most of the time, and that’s the spelling on the gravestones as far back as they exist).  I would like to find out more about the relationship of A. Marks & Sons to Hart, Schaffner & Marx. If my grandmother’s stories were accurate, they made the front pieces (coat lapels and such) for HS&M.  Perhaps the alternate spelling was for business purposes.

My uncle, James Roos (1944- 2004), knew a lot about these brothers – he had apparently done some of this research, but I don’t remember the details of his stories, and to my knowledge they were never recorded.  I have a vague memory though, of there being some conflict between the brothers or somewhere inside the family about these bothers.  This may not be true, although if it is it might explain something about the omission of Marcus from the family histories I was told.

I will plan to do some research on this.  And I invite anyone reading this who may know differently or better than I do, to post a comment here.  In the meantime I will watch tomorrow’s inauguration with a little extra attention to the tuxedo.

Thanks to my Canadian cousins and to Gerhard Holzer for bringing the Toronto Star item to my attention.