Relly Seeman was born in Vienna, Austria, on
March 15, 1917. Relly’s parents, Max and Yetta Seeman, were married in Czernowitz,
Rumania on November 11, 1912. Their first child, James, was born on August 11, 1914 and
World War I had already started. Since there was fear that Russia might invade Rumania and
bring along the same pogroms which were going on all over Russia, it was decided to leave
Czernowitz. Leaving most of their possessions and taking along only what they could carry
in their hands, the family traveled to Vienna to seek a better future. The only items of
value taken along were the two silver Sabbath candlesticks which at this time we have in
our home.
Their daughter Relly was born on March 15th,
1917 in Vienna, Austria. We assume that her first name Relly was derived from the paternal
grandmother’s first name, Rachel. Their youngest son, Fred, was also born in Vienna
on March 7th, 1924.
Not much is known about Relly’s
forefathers. Max Seeman’s parents were Jacob Seeman and Rachel Last. They had ten
children, 6 girls and 4 boys. We don’t know how they made a living or even their
dates of birth and death. They died at a very young age, and by the time Max Seeman was 10
years old, the children were orphans already and Max Seeman had to help support his
brothers and sisters. All were born in Stry, Poland, and later on moved to Lemberg, also
in Poland.
Of Max Seeman’s siblings, two brothers
and two sisters stayed in Poland and with their families perished in the Holocaust. Four
of the sisters came to the United States, and in the early 1920s, another brother also
came to Vienna and later on went to Israel. We were in touch here mainly with Clara and
Adolf Rosenberg, Max Seeman’s sister and brother-in-law. They were instrumental in
sponsoring and getting the affidavits for the family to come to the U.S. I have tried to
reconstruct the Seeman family tree as well as possible from the very sparse information
available.
Yetta Seeman was an only child, her parents
were Harum Fruchtman and Rosa Kinzbrunner, who lived in Rumania where her father earned
his livelihood as an administrator of a large estate. When Relly’s grandmother, Rosa
Fruchtman, became pregnant, they moved to Czernowitz, which at that time was part of the
Austrian Empire. They wanted to be sure that the baby, in case it was a boy, would not be
drafted into the Rumanian army which was very anti-Semitic. As their daughter Yetta was
growing up, her parents were very poor. Harum Fruchtman tried to earn his living as a
peddler but had a very difficult time trying to make ends meet. Relly’s mother Yetta
had to help support her parents from an early age by taking in sewing.
Max Seeman made his living in Vienna as a
storekeeper. Economic conditions in Austria were very bad, the country was in a continuous
depression. Relly's brother, Fred Seeman, was born in Vienna in 1924. Since Yetta Seeman
was helping her husband in the store most of the time, Relly had to take care of her baby
brother, even taking him to the country for vacations by herself. While she was a very
good student and loved school, she had to quit when she was only 14 years old to help her
parents in the store. At times she even had to run one of the two stores by herself. At
night she went to secretarial school; and after completing her courses, worked as a legal
secretary in a law office until coming to this country on May 23, 1938.
Relly was the first one of her family to
leave Vienna; a few months later her parents followed with Fred,, and then finally Jim. He
had been born in Rumania and therefore had to wait for an opening in the very small
Rumanian quota for immigration into the U. S. In these days,, each country had a quota for
the very limited number of people who were permitted to permanently settle here. This
quota for the East European countries was very small. It was very fortunate that Max
Seeman had applied for visas quite a while before Hitler took over Austria. Had he waited
any longer, it would have been hopeless, and the family would have perished as so many
others did. No exceptions from the quota system were ever permitted, regardless of the
danger the applicants were in.
The Seeman family had a beautiful apartment
at Hamburger Strasse 20 overlooking the river Wien. When the time came to leave, all they
could do was to walk out of the apartment, lock the door, and go to the train station. All
furniture and other possessions had to be left behind. Can you imagine how painful this
must have been? Especially since this was the second time in their lives this decision had
to be made, again facing an uncertain future. Yet, they were very fortunate indeed - so
many others could not do so and were deported to the concentration camps in the East.
After arriving in the U.S. and after staying
for a few weeks with the cousins in New York, the family went to work to support
themselves. They rented a tiny apartment in Woodsider Queens, a one bedroom apartment with
one bathroom for five adults. Max Seeman took a job as night watchman at a construction
site. Grandma, in addition to keeping house, took in sewing and alterations. Jim worked as
a house painter, and Relly in a factory manufacturing stockings. Even Fred, who was still
going to school, helped supplement the family income by delivering packages for a nearby
grocery store. All incomes were pooled, and thus the family was able to get along.
It was a matter of course that everyone went
to school at night to improve their English, and within a short while all were fluent and
literate in this language. In these days there were no welfare or public assistance
programs, one either worked or went hungry.
After a few years, things began to improve.
Max Seeman opened a store for household goods and gift ware on Sutter Avenue in East New
York, Brooklyn. Fred Seeman finished high school with honors and went to work as a diamond
polisher; and Jim, who had studied engineering in Vienna, went to work as an engineer at
the Sikorsky helicopter plant.
Jim was married in 1940 to Henny Lachs. They
had two children, Roy, born March 10, 1943; and Gary, born January 25, 1951. After his
divorce in the 1960s,, he married Mina Korn in December of 1979. Jim and Mina lived in
Watermill, in the Hamptons on Long Island and in Miami. Roy, together with his wife Joyce
lived in Miami, where they were in the home decorating business until Roy passed away in
1996. They had two children, Marshal, born May 3rd 1966, who is in business for himself,
and Bonnie, born December 24th, 1969, who seems, to have inherited her grandfather's
talent. She now teaches art at the University of Miami and her work is shown in galleries
in New York.
Gary Seeman lives in San Francisco. He was
married on June 8th, 1997 to Janet Marie Birgenmeier. Gary is a writer and
consultant and also, at the same time, studying to be a psychologist.
When World War II started in 1941, Fred was
drafted into the Army and served in the infantry until he was wounded in 1944 at Luzon, an
island of the Philippines. After recovering from his injuries, he enrolled in City College
under the GI Bill of Rights and after graduation went to Harvard for his Masters Degree in
Business Administration. In 1951 he married Carol Misch, and they had two children,
Charles (Chuck), born July 2, 1953; and Bill, born July 3, 1955.
Fred, for a few years, worked as a salesman
for a furniture company until he started his own manufacturing operation under the name of
"Helikon" furniture. The company specialized in high quality, hand-made
furniture mainly for commercial use, unique in the United States. In 1975 the company took
over a huge factory building in Norwich, Connecticut, and operated there until the company
was sold in 1988 to the Hermann Miller Furniture Company. Carol Seeman was also active in
the operation, together with Chuck and Billy.
Fred now lives in retirement in Mystic,
Connecticut, and part of the time in Naples, Florida. Both Charles and Billy are in
business for themselves.
In the early 1950s, Max and Yetta Seeman
moved from Sutter Avenue, where they had an apartment across the street from their store,
to the Wavecrest Apartments into the same building where we at the time lived, and gave up
the store. Max Seeman passed away on October 30, 1965. Grandma then moved into one of the
JASA buildings nearby, which was for elderly people only, and stayed there until her death
on November 20, 1978 at the age of 86 years. Her last years in the JASA building had been
happy and contented.
Jim Seeman always had an exceptional talent
for painting. In Vienna, when after graduating from engineering school he found it
impossible to get employment in this profession since no one would hire a Jewish engineer,
he put his talent to work painting posters for movie theaters. After the war ended, he
returned to his favorite vocation by hand painting murals to decorate walls. In due
course, he started producing these murals in quantity by putting same on wallpaper, screen
printing the outlines and hand painting in the details.
I joined Jim in January of 1948 as General
Manager. The operation kept growing over the years with all kinds of printing equipment
being added, until we finally moved into a large plant in Garden City Park, near Mineola
on Long Island. We employed, depending upon order volume and season, between 75 and 150
people. The company, James Seeman Studios Inc., had in due time acquired a worldwide
reputation for excellence of design and highest quality and integrity, with distribution
not only throughout the U.S. and Canada, but in most European countries and Australia and
Japan as well. I had to travel to Europe almost every year, in addition to frequent trips
to our distributors in the U.S. For almost 30 years, Jim and I have been working together
very closely, without any friction whatsoever. Jim had a very unique artistic talent, and
our talents complemented each other perfectly since my talents were strictly
administrative. These years of working together were highly satisfying to me. We both
worked very, very hard, but the results were gratifying.
The company was bought by the Masonite
Corporation in 1973. I stayed with them until my retirement in 1980, when I turned 65.
Although they requested me to stay on and even tried to call me back in 1982, I did not
feel that I wanted to continue working in view of the difficult and time consuming commute
to Garden City Park.
During the last week before my retirement,
the Masonite Corporation and the employees of James Seeman Studios gave me some very
touching farewell parties, just about one every day of the last week, even closing down
the factory for a half a day so that I could say good-bye to all the people I had worked
with for so many years.
Jim, after leaving Masonite for good in
1976, returned to his favorite activity - fine art painting. Many of the beautiful
paintings we have in our homes in St. James and Florida are his work. In the last years of
his life he was busier than ever with many commissions for his work, even with all the
problems he had with his health. He passed away on May 10th, 1994.
The company, James Seeman Studios, a
division of Masonite Corporation, which in the meanwhile had been taken over by the U.S.
Gypsum Corporation, ran into difficulties starting in 1982 and was closed up in 1987; and
all employees, some of whom had been working there for as many as 30 years, were fired.
Since my retirement in 1980, I am still as
busy as ever, with various hobbies, golf, and the operation of the Fairfield Condominium,
where I am very much involved. But the constant pressure I was under while working does
not exist anymore.
