Mervyn and Linda Sacher
Mervyn and Linda were both born in South Africa. Mervyn's parents came from Russia, while Linda's father came from Lithuania and her mother was born in South Africa. Mervyn's father worked in the furniture business for an uncle, and as a boy Mervyn spent time in the factory learning about wood and furniture, developing skills he carried with him. He grew up playing every sport he could and helping his family with expenses because times were hard. The couple first met in 1958, when Mervyn was thirteen and Linda eleven, and they have now known each other for some sixty years. Linda's family later learned they were related to a well-known figure at Brandeis University.
As concerns grew that Jewish people might face trouble in South Africa, Linda's father urged the family to make plans to leave. After looking at several possible destinations, Mervyn felt strongly drawn to America and its lifestyle. The family chose Dallas in part because relatives had already settled there, following a doctor who had joined a dermatology practice. Getting into the United States as a businessman took two to three years of careful paperwork, and Mervyn assembled a complete file to make it happen. He interviewed at Neiman Marcus and was hired thanks to his worldwide travel and buying experience. Arriving was still a shock, since they knew no one, but they gradually found the community warm and friendly.
Mervyn had dreamed of a small chocolate shop back in Cape Town, and after being advised to build a business in America rather than rely on imports, he entered the gourmet chocolate trade through a Neiman Marcus contact who introduced him to a Belgian importer. He opened his first store on the day Ronald Reagan became president, November 4, 1980, later adding locations including the Galleria. He ran several stores over the years and eventually sold part of the business while keeping others. The Sachers return to South Africa often, missing the ocean and lifelong friends, and made repeated long trips to care for aging parents. Their three children, Karen, Amy, and a son, and their grandchildren remain a source of pride, with family now helping in the store as Mervyn approaches his seventies.
Full Transcript
okay on Melvin sacker a wife Linda second always been a second because she was s ACH they are and I'm an SI CH ER and we got married she changed her name the one lit in a night but she's always people in the second from the time she was born the interesting thing before we even came to America we found out that Linda had family in the United States dr. Abrams eka from Brandeis University president is actually family of his family and so quite famous and well-known he wrote that book what was the the diaspora was written by it by him anyway we understand him a big big business in South Africa similar to Walmart yeah I was director of the public company and humanist partners cousin saw the writing on the wall as we would say that the Jews might be in trouble in South Africa and that's why most of us say yeah well the white is will correct the white but Jewish people's particularly gathered our shoulder and they said make plans to get out
of here things are not gonna go they're going to go wrong actually they didn't really go there on the country's a little bit of trouble now but it's not a parent but it's in the in the background there's a lot of financial problems there and so you were happy to be to make this move because because of that later in the conversation he asked me a question which I can also now am I glad I moved I think or rather spent on a life made with all my friends my family as it was growing up when we had cousins and everything together all my friends
are still there I'll go back we go back every year and we have a fantastic time from the second we arrived it's as if ignorantly tell me a little bit about your background prior to you growing up there where if you remember where your grandparents and your parents from originally born in South Africa the parents came from Russia or some way Linda's dead comes from kucik in Vania and her mom was born in South Africa and then his dad started off with nothing and meant that it was a very very successful businessman for the company in this village has a big stock exchange and your
parents if my my dad worked for an uncle of mine in the furniture business I used to spend my time as a kid playing in the factory and learnt quite a lot about wood and furniture from my dad my dad was very handy and he taught me a lot I'm also pretty handy to fix and do stuff and then I went through school and play a lot of sport everything I could think of and which need to at the end of to start to was very hard growing up my parents didn't have anything I'd leave school to help them at the garden work so I
could help them in the house with the expenses and cause everything and but I was a New Yorker due to Milan and work for lenders dad for 14 years in the business and maybe told us to leave he said you need to make plans wait before that though when did you first meet Linda and how long were you going together in 1958 I was 13 she was 11 and she came over to the site didn't you kept to having to visit them with a cousin of mine who was one of Melinda's friends and kind of so right away I actually spotted her right away it
was quite unbelievable so now we've known each other for 60 years what age did you get married and so you were still in South Africa so your father-in-law basically prompted you and said you need to be thinking about so tell us about that journey what happened we decided that this kind of look at America Merritt is very it was very hard to give you install very difficult to get in if you're a refugee or surrounding away from somebody giving you easily but if you've got over the money and you're a good businessman you can't get into America it's quite unbelievable so we sort of started
to come and look at American most people and I don't know I'm just saying with bluffing most people look at a place to go to but I think America drew me to come to say well should I go to Israel or Australia or England or Canada or America but when I saw America I knew that this was for me this is my type of lifestyle and how did you end up in Dallas of all places well Linda's ludus sister was a gentleman by the name of Malcolm winter and Malcolm mentis older brother had already come here and had joined a dermatology practice and they followed
him and if we wanted that we were going to go to San Diego which most Cape Town people would prefer to go to because James moved to Cape Town is similar to Dallas to San Diego to damages Jana's group to Cape Town is the same analysis to San Diego okay so we were going together me and I'll simple and we need to go and make family we need to keep the family together more than a family unit and we decided to come to Dallas and I went for an interview even Marcus and they gave me a job because I'd worldwide travel and buying experience which
Neiman's downtown original house the buyer with us uh-huh wonderful so you hadn't been here previously you just moved here no no we traveled your number of times to look ok - Lucy as the V South Africans mobile LST you know Tennessee's the town shillings and pence Oh Lucy deposit good so so what were your impressions your honesty elements it was it was quite actually amazing the famous tourists really became young people and new medicine New York and took us to stage deli and another German said what can I do to sponsor you to get you into America and then we flew to Vegas and I
had contacts already set up there and the glass in your stays free and he has two front row seats for the shows and then we went to San Francisco and conventional cash we will be in South Africa that's it up he may need to take us all around and entertain us and then we had friends in LA and they took us alone then we came to Dallas and then the sister was here and the whole place is unbelievable it's a free ride no it was a tourist did you have the story oh yeah anyway I said that Andrew definitely drew us and things worked out
and and two or three years to get the paperwork the pad asserted to have to come NW what other challenges do you feel you guys had besides the paperwork obviously but what else do you feel that that we're here once you arrived here well I must tell you that it's a shock because we speak English inside from the inside of you everything's the same the drive moment but it's a shock when you come some way where you will go to a movie or a restaurant and you'd see a face and say hello to somebody no not one person would you know and that's absolutely a
shockwave and you feel very allowed on you which when you start grabbing onto your own family to do the second or somebody the kitchens are very friendly and now and I'll I'll tell anybody in a friendly way and then respond you didn't know that it could work like that you won't feel you didn't feel like symptom at that time now we do we do into a conversation with anybody but they were scared at that time not realizing you were who you were and how do you think your children felt how do how is their adjustment period to school and make kids at school and there
was so young very young how did Israel fit into your formative years in South Africa and how do you feel about it now wasn't something that was important to us in it we went there well we must have not important but it was never a choice to go to hell we went on vacation once while we went South Africa you see the concentration was to get here find out what you can try and establish yourself meet as many people as you can what business can I do so all of the travel seemed to everything else people was an aside very common in this was the
concentration couldn't do anything else except to come here and make that and I don't know what I was going to do here I had this enormous job in South Africa at a private secretary company car world travel allowance was just empirical critical life was lifes was incredible I must have you cannot imagine how easy it was we closed the business it's lunchtime on Saturdays a three-day weekend I mean no one laughed and weekends and there's an easygoing well protected family Baron Griffith hearings behind you shot back together every all the cousins everything was just hunky-dory did anybody follow you here your family and friends everybody
asks mr. still there anything to what I'm going to do in America now although I had this great job as big position me there was this little chocolate shop called Swiss MMus which is a member whether your coffees chak chak that man was used on this little chopper chopper and everybody would buy the little gift to go out work from there and I just loved that little shop I would have loved to own that shop and not at my job and I woke up one morning in Cape Town and a cylinder I don't know what I'm going to do in America I'm going to open the chocolate
chip just like that and we came here and I spoke to people a message you got you can't come here who don't know the business you think you know the way you think you know the system but you don't you've got to go get a job first and learn the system here and I went to visit successful people that arm you in San Diego and they said to me I said what he said what are you gonna do and brah I'm gonna bring the chocolates from South Africa you gotta you can't you cannot rely on any money or anything from South Africa you've got to
make it yeah he was right two years later there were sanctions nothing was coming to the country about chocolates would have gone flat he said forget about the money there forget about everything it's done you've got to make it here so he came here and took a job at Neiman Marcus instead of that my dear and it was sweet to the buying office and they are met and died the name of Harris Georgiana's Greek guy he was their head of merchandising before Epicure and he came to be secretly one day said Mervyn get into the gourmet chocolate business no and he's doing it in Neiman's
was importing new house from Belgium and I didn't even have never heard of a need of new astronauts and he they showed me the boxes said we get it out of the man we're going to Neiman Marcus Belgian chocolates I'm going to introduce you to the importer he wants to open stores at two of you that said that's unbelievable Nutella meters I'll tell you what I'm not an Allie Saum ethicist gentleman by the name of Walker Morris went east whereas had meetings and we decided and he knew the leasing managed at North got more and we opened and we he said I'll give you the
space how you gonna look what are gonna do move its gonna do it and day by day they came to look how are you gonna do is what are you putting here and out of my out of my mind I'm pretty I'm gonna speak up I'm pretty creative all that sort of stuff all the stuff I've done is my own design and we took pictures from the boxes and are copied things and that's how a store came up and we opened up on the day that Reagan became president in 1980 on November 4th 1980 we opened the store with an Edward that said come and
taste one of the world's rarest jewels and we had silver from from from Belgium all in antique silver pieces like idea and we had marzipan in all different shapes in footballs in croissants eggs and cheese shapes they must be earth mushrooms most beautiful stuff and and business started but he was a crook and pretend I am a baby and he was a crook and he tried to catch me financially caught him out and after six months of terrible strain or got rid of him hanging out in for a living and you know house became mine and in 1982 we opened the Galleria in 84 of
the press who would then we are compelling you and then we opened a store across the road for Kristen Royal south east corner and I had five tunnel rat don't ask me today power and faith maybe trouble running one but and then time went on and we you know we did it right and somebody came to off wanted to buy my business from me and I was negotiated with my manager who and who was working for me was the same age as me who had come from Cleveland and even the same kind of business and he worked for me and he said to me one
down over your conversation he was sending the business I want to buy the business for my two kids I said fine if you use this system this I'll cancel my the deal and he did what I asked him financially and sitting but I'm keeping the Galleria stores in fine the deal was done and one year later he was gone blew out no toaster he'd been with me for nine years and I thought he knew and you know he knew but he didn't know you're gonna be the person who put such crumbs on the table at first prize that's when you learn whatever Thanks otherwise you
think it's almost handed to you as a working machine and the machine doesn't keep going unless you know how to keep it go right let me ask you this is there anything that you either of you miss at all about South Africa the ocean got a little bit crazed the ocean when we go we've got a California sometimes and we just be going to cover so the Lucas Mexico we love the sea I was a surfer water skier surfing love to see you and you end up in Dallas a little lake some way I could not cause a sticker this is longboards rule and this
model of respecting the house here in the summer posters in it and do you still go back fairly regularly yeah when my mom and dad were alive I went back at twice a year and then when my dad my dad wasn't well I think I did three times in one year and slightly a week and it's a long way it's a 30-hour door-to-door trip with all the chuck plan changes and all that it's long very fortunate to earn a lot of air miles through credit cards in my business and able to travel comfortably on the plane because it must be murder - yeah so tell
me a little bit about earning your citizenship what that process was well it came through that gentleman in father Albert Fadiman who on the very first day in New York on a visit to New York said to me tell me I'll help you tell me what I have to do I said yes my lawyers name and we set up a job offer situation which no American could fall on exporting but we did we did something to do with boston boston way coming out of Africa with a language problem that does have every because I could speak the language that they need it at all and
in two three years and avenged the paperwork actually clean we came here with proper paperwork no risk involved a lot of people came here and had a hard time worrying about getting getting deported they came through everything was in all of other time we came through here so big job to put it together yet there police reports of fingerprints and everything in the world and I set up a whole file of us together put it together who wonderful it's gotten a little bit easier I think so something while they were separate Ovitz it's a CH a TR OWI TC same name had a Shortland correctly
I shouldn't be in a second a bar which goes back the beginning of the interview but my dad pulled himself more a setter and second to us was er so we were here about revenue to mention my brother knife actually officially change our names to Mervyn and Jonathan setter er New York very good I'm not related to the biggest drug company in Switzerland and I'm not related to Marks & Spencer in London oh well before we end I just want to ask you in general are you glad you came here and if so why in your own words I'm sorry we have to leave silently
if we wouldn't have had to leave we'd be very happy my friends are very happy very good life they're all friends I can make new friends yeah I've made some but most each annasmith people I've made more friends of England the guy's butt and then I said what a couple of I bet nothing and grew up with people from our neighborhood who are still my friends we were little kids together can never replace that I know my way around their posters I was like Kimmy I knew everything English people knew me from because of the position my business understands business so you would be a
bigger than you became so are we so I think I'm sorry that we had to move would have been wonderful to go my life to me I could have owned that business and dad's business and only solvent we did it for the children that's what everybody's doing they're doing them for their children and I left my mom and dad said goodbye to him lost a sister 18 and then my brother went to live in London I came here and I believed them was terrible terrible split see other families all the families are broken up all the older people as they get older they medical expenses
were going higher higher but travel to visit their kids one in Australia one in Israel one in Canada cost of a fortune they can't get decent ceases they can't travel again because it's uncomfortable for all people and they get older then they can travel at all so we love it so the ferries are running back to visit them and they're getting sick and and you stay with him for a while and then they seem to be okay and you fly back and while you fight back they die so then what do you do turn around the plank I went back to bury them first such
a problem is there anything else you want to add or tell us where are they now only goddess luckily they're about feminism death oh wow that's amazing and what are they doing my oldest is Karen she married von Berg virtual father got divorced my second daughter Amy very rippln got divorced still divorced both of them in David Sakura and my son married fine Steve dr. Weinstein's daughter Suri and they still married with four lovely kids Karen's got a boy the girl and he's got two boys and we're a happy family year that's good Mary Kay thank you works with Rishi rather they're helping that tremendously in the store I'm 70 now it's getting tougher go and do what I used to go I'll think okay but I can't then they helps me a lot as well very Linda anything you want to say your ad you said it all cow Moos all right thank you very much wonderful you