Jay Lorch
Jay Lorch was born in Dallas in 1930 into a family with deep local roots. His paternal grandfather, August Lorch, arrived before the turn of the last century and worked his way up from a one-horse peddler to opening a shop in downtown Dallas and founding the Lorch Manufacturing Company around 1908 or 1909. The company began as a jobber, buying merchandise in New York City and supplying salesmen who served small Texas communities. In the early 1920s, Jay's father expanded the firm into true apparel manufacturing, cutting, sewing, and designing garments. Jay's mother came from New York, where his maternal grandfather had been a banker who lost everything in the Depression.
Jay remembered a Dallas that was still a tiny town, with Lovers Lane surrounded by farmland and his neighborhood bordered by plowed fields well into the 1940s. He attended Vickery Hillcrest High School, then a county school that entered the Dallas Independent School District only in 1946, and graduated in a class of just 27 students. To escape the summer heat, his mother took him to stay with relatives in New York, and during World War Two, when heating oil was scarce, his New York family wintered in Dallas. He recalled wartime rationing and how teenagers pooled cars, gas stamps, and money to go out on dates.
After prep school in Syracuse and college at Vanderbilt and the University of Pennsylvania, Jay served two years in the Navy during the Korean War as a control tower operator at Pensacola, Florida. He then joined the family manufacturing company, where he worked for 21 years before moving into commercial real estate, which remained his career. The business eventually closed after a fire and flooding ruined its inventory. A longtime member of Temple Emanu-El, Jay served on the boards of Jewish Family Service, the Jewish Federation, and the temple, and worked for twelve years on the temple's cemetery committee. He married in 1954, remarried later, and has children and three grandchildren.
Full Transcript
alright Jay before we begin you you were telling us a little bit about your mom coming down from New York City in the 1920s to Dallas what was that story that just in my opinion underscored the willingness or desire for families Jewish families especially reform Jewish families in one corner of the United States to meet an intermingle with others from different corners and she came all the way down here with her sister for a party given by mini Marcus and I thought that was rather unusual to take a train ride for two days and two nights to get down here for a week and then two days and tune up two nights back to New York City now that she ever tell you how that came about or why no just she accepted it as just routine or your grandparents at all vaguely my grandfather on my father's side passed away when I was nine my grandmother on my father's side when I was high teens and I remember her that was mrs.
at August Lorch my grandparents on my mother's side passed away when I was 9 and 10 they lived in New York City actually on Long Island and my memory of them was snow they did for a living my grandfather on my father's side established the large manufacturing company in nineteen eight or nineteen nine depending upon who you talk to he started out as a one-horse peddler before the turn of the last century and then he graduated to a two-horse peddler then to a four-horse peddler then he opened up a little shop in downtown Dallas and the Lord's manufacturing company was a misnomer because they actually
did not do any manufacturing they were jobbers where they went to New York City and bought merchandise and shipped it down to Dallas and then they put salesman out on the road with an additional markup and to supply the small communities and Dallas was certainly not big but places like movie and Albany Texas etc who had no access to New York or New York fashions in 1924 1921 my father who was born in nineteen to hear my grandfather decided to go into true apparel manufacturing and they did the whole thing of cutting and sewing and designing than having their own salesman which was quite remarkable
when you look at the items that go into the manufacturing of apparel namely thread buttons things of that sort which were virtually non-existent in Dallas and I don't know how they managed to assemble the parts that went into an outfit address if you will I mean it was one thing to get fabric from New York but now how do you get the other parts that go into the creation of a dress did you ever find out from them why leave New York the head for Dallas how the reasoning behind that I don't know my father was born in Greenville and his twin sister and his
older sister was born I believe she was born in Germany but came here at a very young age he was born I believe in 1896 now do you remember at all what your grandfather on the other side did for a living he was a banker who had lost everything in the depression there in mind that i was born in nineteen thirty right and the Depression started in 1932 so was he in New Yorker down here in New York he was in New York and lost everything and lived off the income from his son and son in laws who supported my family he and his wife
yeah yeah now when did your mom come down here for good I know shame for the party for did she come down here I believe she and my father were married in 1922 and then when I was in the service in 1952 they got a divorce him down her shortly after they were married then well my father was here oh he was you're ready yeah so how did he know how did he meet your mouth through this party at many marcus's let's go back now to 1930 when you're born right what do you remember from Dallas when you were just a little kid thank you
for your town that was a tiny town Lovers Lane was Lovers Lane I went to victory Hillcrest High School which is where it is now and it was called vickrey hillcrest because it was on the crest of a hill and in the community of victory which was voted in my its inhabitants into the city of Dallas about the time that I attended high school that being said it vicar hillcrest was still a county school and did not go into the Dallas Independent School District until nineteen forty six September of 46 which is when I entered my senior year there and it was a very very
tiny school at that time there only 27 in my graduating class and perhaps 150 in the entire school how so that just shows you how small it was the house that my wife and I live in was built in nineteen eighty we thought that there was perhaps the house was built on top of an old underground spring or swimming pool so we contacted an aerial photography firm who supplied us with pictures back into the early 1940s etc 1980 our house was built and immediately north of our house was a plowed field from our house North it was all farming what part of no was your
house in our house and now is uh on the corner of st. Jude's and mid berry on block north of North Haven yeah now you know when you were little summers are hot here in Dallas there's word that there was no air conditioning what you guys do to keep cool my mother took me from the time that I was an infant in a bath at net and every summer we would go to New York and stay with her sister because it was cooler up there and that was the way she dodged me know to fast forward to World War two when heating oil was very very scarce in New York because of the war her family would come
down to Dallas spend the winter with us because the winners will watch my other and they didn't have heating because of the oil shortage right right right so hit worked both ways as far as the families were concerned very interesting well when you graduated from high school you know you were too young World War two came and you know was was there did that affect your family in any way it affected all families thought it was never discussed but you know rationing had everybody very very in high school when we wanted to go out on the date crippled dates were not uncommon person would get
the car another one would get the gas ration stamps and the third would come up with the money so six office would pile into car right that's the way it went after high school for you was at college was a work I went to a prep school in Syracuse New York which has since closed and then I went two years to Vanderbilt and two years to the University of Pennsylvania okay then I went into the Navy for two years and then I went work now when you went into the Navy the korean war was going on talk to me about your service i was single
if I'd been married they would have shipped me off to a rock in the Pacific but being single they sent me to control tower operator school in the Navy and I spent the time at a naval air station down in Pensacola Florida as a control tower operator well so kind of never left the central time zone right right now did you guys ever talk about they ever tell you that you might be shipped over to Korea oh yeah you know it just when the otters game you went was that simple yeah no arguing about it those can't say hey I wanted to go here because
it's closer to home now forget it yeah a prime example one of my buddies and boot camp had been a heavy machine operator dump trucks caterpillar tractors etc knew all about them one would figure that he was a real candidate for the cds the Construction Battalion knew they did not send him to the destruction protect after after the war now come sort of you leave the service and what do you get into I went to work for the large manufacturing company okay it was expected not insisted upon but expected as I was the grandson of the founder right through and I worked there for 21
years I burned out on the industry and looked around for a place to go and decided not wanted the involved in commercial real estate and that's where I started and that's where I still AM to this day your family companies doing business no tell me about that shutting down but what was the slider it all started with my leaving the company and my first cousin who ran the business passed away my father was up in considerable age we hard outside managers non-family and then a fire occurred in the building next door to us actually on the fourth of July number of years ago and it
was we had a full basement at a first floor and water completely flooded the full basement and the smoke got on all the fabric both in the dresses as well as in the bolts of fabric and it was complete the entire inventory was completely unusable completely so as a result of that we just shut down well was that a hard day just to close it down uh it was for me not emotionally but because I was the only one in the family even though I had not been in the business for some time right it fell upon my shoulders to get rid of everything yeah
yeah yeahs knows you're dead still alive at all yes was it hard on him yep yeah but it was his life yeah yeah yeah where did you meet your first wife when I was in college we had a few dates when I was on one of my leaves in the Navy I went up to Philadelphia which is where she was from we had some more dates uh then she came down to Miami for a vacation and I drove down from Pensacola to Miami which is about a seven hundred mile drive writing look at the geography of Florida and one thing led to another and we
got married in 1954 we got divorced in 1964 she moved to New York City where she still resides with my son I was single for four and a half years I married in in 1967 j/k 68 okay what's your wife's name me and tell us about your involvement with the Jewish community here i have always been involved in the Jewish community active member of temple emanuel and have been for many many years I've served on the boards of the jewish family service on the Jewish Federation on temple emanuel and many others that just don't immediately spring to my mind have you seen the community the
jewish community grow over the years i grew up in a family who followed the reform movement right my family was not that active in temple emanuel my father did serve on the board we were basically what you would call almost non-observant we never celebrated any of the jewish holidays there were no lighting of the candles on friday night still at all they always went on the High Holidays they were always members of temple emanuel but very inactive supporters yes ask him a question as to whether they were Jewish yes their friends almost exclusively were Jewish adults being such a small town everybody knew everybody whether
they were reformed or Orthodox it didn't make a damn bit of difference because it was such a small nice change over the years as well yeah not only did they know other members of the Jewish community they also know people who were not Jewish now do you still think that something goes on today worked like your mom came from New York to meet with Jewish people in Dallas does that still go on today do you think no my granddaughter is at the Columbia studying for a master's degree in nursing a a Jewish grandmother here has suggested that she meet her grandsons who lived in New
York City and so I said that the granddaughter would you like that Jesus if you want to go out for a cup of coffee sees no I'll look them up on facebook what's their name yeah as a reduce organization that you particularly took interest in one of the things was extremely active in was the cemetery committee of temple emanuel and i worked on that that assiduously four and twelve solid years yeah now in your lifetime there's been so many momentous occasions obviously a lived through a couple of wars you're a little child with a depression that affected your family of course you're endowed the tragedy
of the Kennedy assassination something good the moon landing in 69 the first time of course 911 was there something that really affected you when it happened on a national scale that you remember where you were when it happened of course everybody remembers where they were when Kennedy was assassinated that's a given yes nationwide all who were alive at that time the moon landing yes other than that and none of those things really affected me other than the Kennedy assassination where the city of Dallas closed down and I mean literally closed down for three solid days no movement no business we're open it was just complete
dead silence now you and Betty also had one child so you have two children you have three grandchildren right you told us one that is becoming a nurse what about your other two grandkids problem is interested in a career in music he lives in Connecticut the other is going for a master's in nutrition having suffered a broken leg and being involved in exercise she realizes the importance of nutrition so she's going for masters and nutrition excellent excellent what advice does grandad one the leaves to the next generation Sam Rayburn had a motto which was never to tell a lie because that way you don't have
to remember who he told what do you don't have to remember the lie just remember the truth and so that is one thing that I've always adhered to and one thing I would like to leave for my grandchildren that and be honest to yourself Shakespeare said it that thine own self be true he said that well then to be thanks for doing this today hey it's my pleasure