Discussion in 'Vintage' started by 33-1729, Apr 14, 2019.
I was curious what influence, if any, Aero Clothing and Tanning Co. of Brooklyn, NY had on the other company, Aero Leather Clothing Co., Inc. of Beacon, NY and to what extent. I wasn't surprised to find that one enabled the other, but was surprised to find out how.
In Sept. 1936 Louis Kramer, Abe Wolkowitz, and John E. Liebmann had a purely verbal agreement to enter the business of manufacturing leather clothing but didn't have the means to do so. Beginning Dec. 1936 enter Emily Kramer, the wife of Louis Kramer, who carried Aero Clothing and Tanning Co. under her name. She alone had the means to provide a performance bond to enable obtaining government contracts, obtained the contract from the government, and outright purchased the machines, bought leather and trimmings and paid for the rent and payroll. In the operation of that business Louis Kramer acted as salesman, Abe Wolkowitz was in charge of production and John E. Liebmann had charge of the office activities, including purchasing and shipping. From the money she made from the government contract she gave her husband, Louis Kramer, $4,000 and loans to Abe Wolkowitz, and John E. Liebmann to start off their business. On May 18, 1937, the Aero Leather Clothing Co., Inc. was legally incorporated under the laws of the State of New York and Aero Clothing and Tanning Co. was no more. Who'd of thought?
i think that the name was no more. aero clothing and tanning became aero leather co, and moved their operation from brooklyn ny to beacon ny.
The key point is that Emily Kramer owned and led Aero Clothing and Tanning Co. and from that business endeavor provided the money so her husband and two associates could legally start up their own company call Aero Leather Clothing Co., Inc. They are not the same company run by the same person, but one was created to fund the start of the other. Quite a story.
The contract (the one we know about anyway) was 37-3061P, for an unknown quantity of A-2s.
Does anyone have photographs of either of the two jackets mentioned in this thread?
theres a pic in the eastman a-2 book. a first contract aero is on my list, and since originals are rarer then hens teeth, i would most certainly consider a reproduction that was made as originals were.
Yes. Gary Eastman owns (has owned?) two of them, so Eastman Leather Clothing would be a natural choice for making a re-manufactured version.
Sadly ELC no longer has an operator capable of making prewar A-2s. There was only ever one, who has left the company.
Don't you find that a bit strange. How much different can a pre war A2 be from a war time A2 in terms of sewing it together . I would think that the skills necessary sew an A2 together would pretty much be the same for most A2's. Now cutting the patterns is a different story .
Not necessarily I found these early jackets quite tricky when I was developing the style and I'd probably made well over a thousand A-2s by then , one of our best machinists went onto training on these and she has had to put her training on hold till I'm back down in the factory, meanwile Christine is the only machinist we've got on these. Julie would be able to do them standing on her head but she's far to busy on our Premier Range but that's Julie, there's nobody like her!
33-1729 and B-Man2 like this.
I would expect Emily Kramer passed the patterns from her AC&T company onto her husband's ALC company, given she got them started. With ALC in Beacon, or sixty plus miles down the road from AC&T in Brooklyn, I would expect a whole new crew was used to staff it and a lot more differences because of it.
I heard the last AC&T 37-3061P for sale went on eBay a few years ago and sold to Gary Eastman, and contained a number of close-up pictures. I haven't been able to locate them. Does anyone else have them to post?
Ken, what in particular was so tricky about making these, or would you be giving away proprietary knowledge just telling us?