Feb 12, 2005 9 min read

With tunney sigBy Glenn Tunney For the Herald-Standard

“Do you have any information on a grocery business that was operated by a Mr. Ziskind?”

When I relayed this question to the Reader Roundtable last month, I had never heard of the grocer about whom Pitt Gas native Ken Tremba was inquiring. I was not at home on the day the article appeared in the Herald-Standard, and when I entered my house that evening, my daughter met me at the door and informed me, “We have been getting calls all day about Mr. Ziskind!”

Why did Ken Tremba wish to learn more about Mr. Ziskind?

“Mr. Ziskind had a business that came to our little community of Pitt Gas (near Clarksville in Greene County) in the late 30s and early 40s,” Ken explained in an e-mail. “I can remember a green panel truck with its rear doors open and this older man weighing out meat. I recall my parents commenting on how he supplied us with food on credit terms during the dark days of the Depression.

“Although I was too young to thank him for all he did for our family and others, it is never too late to thank any surviving members. He was a real blessing to our family and many others in our coal mining patch.”

Not knowing anything about Mr. Ziskind, I turned for help to our reliable Reader Roundtable and assigned it a two-fold mission: to fully identify Ken’s mysterious kind-hearted grocer, and then to locate the grocer or his descendants, so that Ken could express his family’s gratitude for a nearly 70-year-old good deed.

Our readers’ response to Ken’s question revealed that there was more than one grocer named Ziskind in this area. The grocer whom readers mentioned most frequently was Henry Ziskind.

“Back in the thirties,” Regina Lilley of Brownsville informed me over the phone, “my family lived in Fredericktown, and although I was a small child, I do remember that a man named Henry Ziskind had a meat market in Fredericktown.”

“The store was called Ziskind and Brown,” 82-year-old Victor Kovach of Rice’s Landing elaborated, “and Brown was the one who came around with the truck. We called him ‘Butcher Brown,’ and a fellow named Al Darney drove the truck for him.”

“To what time period are you referring?” I asked Victor.

“Back in the thirties,” he replied. “My dad was Hungarian, and Mr. Brown spoke Hungarian fluently. We had a farm near Rice’s Landing, and on occasion, Mr. Brown would butcher a calf right there and put the meat in the truck.” In a bit of understatement, Victor added, “The sanitary regulations then were not as strict as they are now.”

“During the late thirties and early forties,” South Brownsville native Sherman Elias added in an e-mail, “my dad worked for Henry Ziskind and his brother-in-law, Eugene Brown, at their store in Fredericktown. They sent a truck to the patches selling meats and groceries, and when I came out of the military in 1956, I went to work for that same store. For three years I drove a ‘bus’ from which we sold fresh meats and groceries. Then I moved away, but it was a wonderful experience for me. And yes – it was all credit.”

Another gentleman who remembers Henry Ziskind is Alex Kweller.

“After reading your article,” e-mailed Sandi Kweller Ree of San Antonio, Texas, “I was talking to my father, Alex Kweller, about Henry Ziskind, whose Fredericktown grocery store my father remembers. According to my father, there were several small grocery stores in the mining towns, including that of my grandfather, Max Kweller, in Richeyville. My grandfather eventually closed his Richeyville store and opened one in Brownsville, possibly on Green Street.

“These little stores all extended credit to their customers in order to compete against the company stores. Local families had their accounts kept in a separate small book, and on payday they would come in to pay off as much as they could. When I was a small child, I would go to my grandfather’s store to ‘work.’ At the time, I couldn’t understand why some people didn’t pay, since for me the best part of being there was opening the cash register.”

Alex explained to his daughter how a small grocer could afford to ‘carry’ so many cash-poor customers through months and months of economic hard times.

“When the miners were on strike,” Sandi explained, “those were also bad times for the store owners, yet they continued to give families credit. When I asked my father how my grandfather could continue to buy groceries to sell, he said that the grocery wholesalers also had to give credit to the storekeepers. Times surely have changed, but it seems as if people took care of each other in those days.”

By the late fifties, Henry Ziskind was looking to get out of the grocery and meat business. Fredericktown native Lewis Crumrine of California called to tell me that after Ziskind and Brown’s butcher shop finally closed in the late fifties or early sixties, Friedlander and Brown opened a butcher shop in Fredericktown.

“Friedlander and Brown delivered too,” Lewis said. “As for Mr. Ziskind, after he got out of the grocery business, he got involved in real estate. He also converted an old service station and sold Kaiser-Frazier automobiles.”

Henry Ziskind’s real estate venture was mentioned in a letter that I received from two sisters, Lenora Ross and Alma Marisa. Writing from Fredericktown, the ladies explained, “Part of Fredericktown is called Ziskindville because, we believe, Mr. Ziskind bought, then sold, the plots of land in this section.”

Pearson Fleisher of Monroe Township, New Jersey, provided some insight into Henry Ziskind’s later years. Pearson’s local connection is through his father, who operated a junkyard near Stapleton’s Dairy in West Brownsville. In a letter to me, Pearson explained, “Henry Ziskind retired and came to live in South Brownsville on Pearl Street, next to Henry Morrow’s house, and built four homes for his family. They lived there into the seventies.”

Henry Ziskind was not the only “Mr. Ziskind” who was a traveling grocer in this region. Readers Wilbur Landman and Bill Snyder recall another Ziskind, this one doing business in Republic.

“Louis Ziskind operated a grocery store in Republic in the late forties and early fifties,” Bill Snyder explained. “His trademark was that he delivered groceries. Back then, many people didn’t own a car, or the family car was usually at work with the breadwinner. Louie, as he was called, and his delivery person, Jake Sieradzki, would take the orders by phone and deliver them throughout the area in their old panel truck.

“The store was located where the Redstone Pharmacy now stands. The store was in operation until the sixties or early seventies, when Louie was too old to operate it any longer. My grandmother, Irene Beal, utilized his services constantly, and I remember, as a young child, seeing ‘Jake’ deliver groceries and chat with the customers while he made his rounds.”

So the Roundtable had found not one, but two Mr. Ziskinds, and the search was not finished. Readers then turned up yet another Mr. Ziskind who was in the grocery business in California. Charlotte Drylie of California called to tell me that she worked for a Mr. Ziskind in California when she was a teenager, and 83-year-old Maynard Levine confirmed that Jake Ziskind, who operated a meat market in California, went around in a truck selling groceries and meat.

Which Mr. Ziskind was the kind-hearted merchant whom Ken Tremba remembered? Was it Henry? Louis? Jake?

Judging from the proximity of Ken’s home town of Pitt Gas to Fredericktown, Henry Ziskind seemed most likely to have been the generous traveling grocer whom Ken Tremba remembered from the days of the Depression. Now the challenge became, could we find any descendants of Henry Ziskind whom Ken could properly thank for their ancestor’s kindness?

“Henry Ziskind had two daughters,” Sandi Kweller Ree wrote helpfully in her e-mail, “Sylvia and Charlotte. They would be in their eighties today, but my father does not know if they are still living or where they might be,” to which Pearson Fleisher’s letter added, “Henry’s two daughters settled in Florida. I do not know if they are still living.”

After some investigating, I was able to locate a woman in Charleroi named Joni Ziskind. She is the granddaughter of the California merchant, Jake Ziskind. Joni put me in touch with her father, Sherman Ziskind of Dunlevy. Sherman, who operates the Hollow Lounge on Route 88 in Speers, is the son of Jake Ziskind.

I explained to Sherman that I was attempting to locate any descendant of a Fredericktown grocer named Henry Ziskind, and I told him the unusual reason for my search. Sherman’s reply supplied the final link that connected all of the Ziskinds whom our readers’ efforts have uncovered.

“Jake Ziskind was my father, who sold meat and groceries in California,” Sherman began. “Henry was my uncle, and he sold meat and groceries in Fredericktown. Louie, another uncle, had the same type of business in Republic, and I had another uncle, Arthur, who also sold meat and groceries. All four of them are now deceased.”

“So Jake, Henry, Louie and Arthur were brothers,” I reflected. “I am guessing that the merchant whom Ken Tremba remembers from his childhood days was your uncle Henry. Sherman, do you have any idea if Henry has any living descendants?”

“Yes,” Sherman replied, “I believe his two daughters are still living. I will find out where they are and get you their addresses.”

Bingo!

“That is exactly what I was hoping for,” I told Sherman. “I appreciate your help, and I will pass those addresses on to Ken Tremba, so that he can express his gratitude for the help Henry gave to his family 70 years ago.”

What is the moral of this tale of cash-strapped Depression families and kind-hearted grocers?

That it is never too late to thank someone.

I commend Ken Tremba for acting upon his desire to express gratitude for kindnesses done for his family so long ago. Now, thanks to the help of our Reader Roundtable, Ken will have his opportunity to do just that.

Glenn Tunney may be contacted at 724-785-3201 or 6068 National Pike East, Grindstone, PA 15442. Comments about these weekly articles may be sent to editor Mark O’Keefe, 8-18 E. Church S.t, Uniontown, PA or e-mailed to begin mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com end

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