Stanley Marcus
Encyclopedia
Harold Stanley Marcus was an early president (1950–1972) and later chairman of the board (1972–1976) of the luxury retailer Neiman Marcus
in Dallas, Texas
, which his father and aunt had founded in 1907. During his tenure at the company, he also became a published author, writing his memoir Minding the Store and also a regular column in The Dallas Morning News
. After Neiman Marcus was sold to Carter Hawley Hale Stores
, Marcus initially remained in an advisory capacity to that company, but later began his own consulting business, which continued until his death. He served his local community as an avid patron of the fine arts and as a civic leader. In a chapter titled "Mr. Stanley" — the name by which Marcus was known locally for decades — in his 1953 work Neiman-Marcus, Texas, Frank X. Tolbert
called him "Dallas' most internationally famous citizen" and worthy of being called "the Southwest's No. 1 businessman-intellectual."
Marcus introduced many of the innovations for which Neiman-Marcus became known, creating a national award for service in fashion and hosting art exhibitions in the store itself, as well as weekly fashion shows and an annual Fortnight
event highlighting a different foreign country for two weeks each year. He established the Neiman-Marcus Christmas Catalogue, which became famous for extravagant "His and Hers" gifts such as airplanes and camels. Marcus prided himself on his staff's ability to provide service and value for each client, often citing his father's dictum, "There is never a good sale for Neiman Marcus unless it's a good buy for the customer."
He received the Chevalier Award from the French Legion of Honor
, was listed in the Houston Chronicle
' s list of the 100 most important Texans, and was named by Harvard Business School
among the greatest American Business Leaders of the 20th century. The Advertising Hall of Fame notes: "Stanley Marcus was among the most important figures in the history of American retail merchandising and marketing. Through his many innovations, he transformed a local Dallas clothing store into an international brand synonymous with high style, fashion and gracious service."
, Sr., who later became a co-founder of the original Neiman-Marcus store with his sister Carrie and her husband, Al Neiman. Stanley was the first of four sons born to Herbert, Sr., and his wife, the former Minnie Lichtenstein; the pregnancy indirectly led to the eventual founding of Neiman-Marcus, as Herbert Sr. decided to leave Sanger's
, where he was a buyer of boys' clothing, when he deemed his raise insufficient to support a family. Returning from two years spent in Atlanta, Georgia
, establishing a successful sales-promotion business, the Marcuses and Neimans used the $25,000 made in the sale of that business to establish their store at the corner of Elm and Murphy. Given that the family's other option for the money was to invest in the then-unknown Coca-Cola
Company, Marcus loved to say that Neiman-Marcus was established "as a result of the bad judgment of its founders". In his memoir, Marcus recalled his father as "affectionate" and his mother as even-handed in her attention to each of their children, making sure even into their adulthood to give them equivalent gifts and make sure they were praised equally.
One of Stanley Marcus's first jobs was as a 10-year-old salesman of Saturday Evening Post, bringing him into the family's business tradition from a young age. He attended Forest Avenue High School, where he studied debate
as well as English with teacher Myra Brown, whom he later credited with much of his early interest in books. He began his university studies at Amherst College
, but when traditions preventing Jews
from joining clubs or fraternities
drastically curtailed his social life, he transferred to Harvard University
after the first year. At his new school, he became a member of the historically Jewish fraternity Zeta Beta Tau
, later rising to become the group's president.
While living in Boston and pursuing his chosen major
, English literature, Marcus began a lifelong hobby of collecting rare and antique books
. To finance his pursuits, he began The Book Collector's Service Bureau, a mail-order book service, beginning with a letter of introduction sent to 100 homes. The venture proved so successful that for a time Marcus considered entering that line of work full time, concerned that entering the retail business might curtail his freedom of expression in politics and other areas of interest; his father persuaded him that he would always be granted the liberty of his own views, and pointed out that retailing was more profitable and thus would allow him to amass a large book collection that much sooner.
from Harvard in 1925, he began his career at the retailer that same year as a simple stockboy organizing inventory
, but upon beginning in sales, quickly outstripped other sales staff. He went back to study at Harvard Business School
in 1926, leaving after one year to participate in a massive expansion of the retail operation in Dallas.
He married the former Mary "Billie" Cantrell in 1932; she initially worked in the Neiman-Marcus Sports Shop department until she retired in 1936 after the birth of their first child, Jerrie, followed two years later by twins Richard and Wendy. (One year after his wife's 1978 death, he married Linda Robinson, a longtime librarian at the Dallas Public Library, in a marriage that lasted until Stanley Marcus's own death in 2002.) In 1935 the Marcuses commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright
to design a home for them on Nonesuch Road, but rejected the eventual design, which included cantilever
ed steel beams and terraces swathed in mosquito net
ting. Instead, the couple chose a design by local firm DeWitt & Washburn, whose creation became a Texas Historic Landmark. As of 1937, Marcus was one of only 22 Texans to earn a salary of $50,000 or more, according to the House Ways and Means Committee; his father, Herbert, was another, earning $75,000 as company president while vice president Stanley drew an even $50,000.
Marcus was responsible for a number of innovations at the Dallas retailer. He created the annual Neiman-Marcus Award for Distinguished Service in Fashion, beginning in 1938, which led to the Neiman-Marcus Exposition, a fall fashion show held annually from 1938 to 1970, then periodically thereafter. His department store was the first American haute couture
boutique to introduce weekly fashion shows, and the first to host concurrent art exhibitions at the store itself. In 1939, he established the annual Christmas Catalogue, which in 1951 offered the first of its extravagant "His & Hers Gifts," starting with a matching pair of vicuña
coats, and going on to include matching bathtubs, a pair of Beechcraft
airplanes, "Noah's Ark
" (including pairs of animals), camels, and live tigers.
on December 27, 1941, less than three weeks after the United States entered World War II
. Ineligible for military service due to his age, he instead helped the war effort by championing the conservation of scarce resources normally devoted to fashion trends. He encouraged men to wear drooping socks (to save much-needed rubber
that would normally be used for elastic
) and devised regulations for the manufacture of women's and children's clothing that would enable the nation to divert more textile
resources to uniforms and other war-related needs:
In addition to these restrictions, Marcus recommended to the WPB that coats, suits, jackets and dresses be sold separately "to make them go further." The changes were expected to create a total savings of 100000000 yards (91,440,000 m) of fabric to be used in the war effort.
Conscious of the role of the media in fashion promotion, Marcus prompted the members of the National Retail Dry Goods Association to convince their local press outlets to treat women's fashions as a serious subject rather than as an object of ridicule. He solicited nationally famous women to proclaim their support of the new standards; TIME' s report on the WPB quoted author Adela Rogers St. Johns
predicting, "The overdressed woman will be as unpatriotically conspicuous as though she wore a Japanese kimono."
Marcus addressed the fashion press in national meetings, encouraging editors to reassure women that stores would carry adequate supply of attractive styles, in order to prevent shoppers from flooding the stores or hoarding stock. TIME reported on meetings of "70 fantastic hats," representing the presence of national magazine editors from Ladies' Home Journal
and Harper's Bazaar
, as well as from newspapers in the urban centers of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, all complying with the WPB's instructions for their coverage of women's and children's fashions.
His work promoting cooperation with the WPB's mandates did not still Marcus's competitive instincts. With the fall of Paris, the traditional fashion capital, New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia began to declare his city the new leader at every opportunity. To this claim, Marcus retorted in the international press, "New York is finished as a manufacturing center. ... They're making clothes in Kansas, Philadelphia and Texas now and they won't give it up. The day is gone when only a New York dress is a good dress."
Faced with increasing shortages in silk
and even new synthetics such as rayon
, which seemed likely to create long lines of dissatisfied customers seeking a product in inadequate supply, Marcus created the Neiman Marcus Hosiery-of-the-Month Club, which sent two pair of stockings in fashionable shades to each female charge-card customer, with no membership fees. In his memoirs Marcus recalled, "Many women opened charge accounts just to become members of the club, and in a short time we had a membership of over 100,000, extending all over the country."
of the company, with Carrie Marcus Neiman
as chairman of the board
. Neiman died in 1953, in which year TIME proclaimed that Stanley Marcus's "combination of showmanship and salesmanship" had been instrumental in increasing the company's annual revenue from $2.6 million in 1926 to $20 million.
Marcus began yet another Neiman-Marcus tradition, the "International Fortnight
," in 1957 as a way to attract customers in the lull between the fall fashion rush and the Christmas
shopping crunch. The idea was inspired by seeing a store in Stockholm, Sweden, that was having a France-themed sales promotion, leading Marcus to propose to the French government a sponsorship of an even more elaborate event in his own store. The initial Fortnight included concurrent events of art, symphonic music, and film at other locations around Dallas, with an Air France
jet bringing "writers, painters, government officials, models, and industry leaders." In the years following, the Fortnight focused on various other countries and added related food service as well as items from the relevant country in every department, ending in 1986 with the Australian Fortnight. Other international traditions introduced at Neiman's included Dallas' first espresso
bar, brought by Marcus after World War II.
As a retailer, Marcus believed strongly in making his store into a place where everything a customer needed could be found and, if necessary, brought to the customer's front door. He was said to have helped one customer discover the shoe size of Queen Elizabeth II
so as to give the gift of stockings and a pair of shoes, and he ordered that the store stock such items as a set of Steuben
plates with the Mexican national crest, "because sooner or later somebody will be going to call on the President of Mexico and need a proper gift." He personally delivered a fur coat to a St. Louis, Missouri
, customer who could not make the trip to Dallas. Another story often recounted is that of a shopper who, in searching for a present for his wife, said that he was not sure what to buy, but that he would know it when he saw it. In response, Marcus inquired about the woman's clothing sizes and asked the customer to wait briefly. Taking an oversized brandy
snifter
from a display, Marcus gathered cashmere sweaters of various colors, arranged them in imitation of a pousse-café, topped with a white angora
sweater to simulate whipped cream
, and in place of a cherry
, garnished the concoction with a 10-karat ruby
ring
, at a total cost of $25,350, which the customer gladly paid. When one customer decided his Christmas purchases were not sufficiently impressive, Marcus helped to arrange a full duplication of the store's display window, complete with mannequins and lighting, inside the man's home.
Despite his love of such larger-than-life salesmanship, Marcus also maintained the assertion of his father, Herbert, that "there is no good sale for Neiman-Marcus unless it is a good buy for the customer." Stanley Marcus would sometimes persuade the buyer to purchase a lower-priced item that he considered more suitable, as when a man shopping for a mink coat for his 16-year-old daughter was personally steered by Marcus toward a $295 muskrat coat instead, as being more appropriate to her youth. Marcus also routinely insisted customers would be wiser to buy the top quality of a reasonably priced line rather than scaled-down or second-rate versions of an expensive product.
Marcus continued throughout his tenure to hold tightly to his father's assurance that he would be able to maintain and act on his political convictions while running the business. He supported the United Nations
in its early years, an unpopular position in Dallas for that time. In the early 1950s he began to explore the ramifications of ending the store's participation in the then-common practice of excluding black
customers from shopping in the store, and while his legal advisors cautioned against that step, he offered support for any black entrepreneur looking to establish a quality store and, in 1954, began to hire black staff in some departments.
Moving into the 1960s, Marcus became ever more convinced that his city and his company needed to take action to promote racial equality, both as a moral issue and to reduce the growing civil unrest. In 1968, he announced that Neiman-Marcus's buyers
would give preference to companies employing and training significant numbers of minority
employees, making his firm one of the first companies in the nation to have such a policy.
, a Reform
synagogue that is today the largest in the Southwest. Stanley Marcus became a leading figure in the temple in the 1950s and a member of the American Council for Judaism
despite being largely a secular Jew who once joked that he was afraid to visit Israel
"because he might be converted."
Marcus was well-known for cultivating the arts and for defending even unpopular political causes. He introduced art exhibits at Neiman-Marcus as well as providing corporate sponsorship of artwork elsewhere in the city, and cultivated an extensive private collection. He helped found the Dallas Opera
, helped save the Dallas Symphony from a financial crisis, and served as chairman of the board for the Dallas Museum of Fine Art (now the Dallas Museum of Art
).
While serving as museum chair, Marcus was once called upon by Fred Florence, then chairman of a major local bank and a fellow Temple Emanu-El leader, to explain his inclusion of "a lot of Communist
art" he'd been told would be included in an upcoming DMFA "Sports in Art" exhibit, co-sponsored by Sports Illustrated
and United States Information Agency
as a fund-raiser for the 1956 Olympic team
. Artists represented in the show included four supposed Communist supporters, Leon Kroll
, Yasuo Kuniyoshi
, Ben Shahn
, and William Zorach
. Asking Florence to indicate which pieces were being questioned, Marcus dismissed each claim one by one: "I don't know how anybody could think hitting a baseball
was communist," Marcus said when shown Shahn's "The National Pastime." His response to Zorach's "Fisherman" was similar, as he shook his head and remarked, "I don't think too many people think fishing is communist either." Marcus followed up by going to local newspapers The Dallas Morning News
and the Dallas Times-Herald and getting the publishers of both to agree that they would not stand for censorship in the arts.
In organizing a 1952 exhibition of abstract art
, Marcus lured local leaders to the show by two means. First, he solicited the donation of art from the collections of David Rockefeller
and his brothers, along with those from other noted national business leaders. Second, he requested that the donors personally write letters of invitation to their Dallas colleagues, feeling that the otherwise suspect art would benefit from the imprimatur of respected figures known for their fine taste. His efforts were rewarded by a numerous and appreciative turnout for the show.
Marcus also involved himself in issues of civil rights and social justice. One unusual case involved three male students at W. W. Samuell High School who, in 1966, were stopped at the school's front door and ordered to cut their hair in order to be admitted to the school. The young men filed a lawsuit against the Dallas Independent School District
, claiming the restriction interfered with their constitutional freedom of expression. Despite not knowing the boys involved, Marcus stepped forward to champion their case before the public, taking out a newspaper ad defending the choice as a simple fashion decision rather than rebellion against authority. Additionally, he offered legal support if needed, noting in a telegram to school board president Lee McShan, Jr., "I don’t like long hair any more than the principal does, but I will fight for the rights of those students to wear hair any way they choose." Though the case was lost and appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court without success, decades letter the men still appreciated Marcus' support. Paul Jarvis, one of the plaintiffs, said of Marcus after his death in 2002: "He was just a nice man and a great contributor to Dallas and to the arts. He wanted to do what was right."
of United States President John F. Kennedy
. An early supporter of Kennedy's run for the presidency, Marcus had tolerated the closing of several customers' accounts when he announced his support for the candidate in the 1960 elections. In fact, he had cautioned that Kennedy's visit be reconsidered in light of the city's earlier poor reception of Adlai Stevenson and Vice-President Lyndon Baines Johnson. In Kennedy's memory, Marcus arranged to have 500 hand-typeset and bound copies printed of Kennedy's scheduled speech at the Dallas Trade Mart, of which the first copy went to Kennedy's widow, Jacqueline. The following New Year's Day, 1964, Marcus took out a full-page advertorial
in The Dallas Morning News titled, "What's Right With Dallas?"
The editorial ad – a Neiman-Marcus tradition introduced by his father in the store's early days – both defended the city against outside critiques and offered more intimate criticisms from one who knew the town and its people well. The message said that Dallas needed to address four areas for community improvement: one, its slum
problem; two, its political extremism (called "absolutism" in the text); three, too much attention to physical growth at the expense of "quality" in civic endeavors such as "schools, colleges, symphonies, operas, and museums"; and four, a need to focus less on "civic image" and more on "doing good things and not doing bad things", which he described as "the best public relations." In a 2003 article on the 40th anniversary of the assassination, Ralph Blumenthal of The New York Times
praised the message as "strik[ing] a perfect balance", though he notes the author met not only with support from some, but from canceled accounts and "anti-Semitic attacks" that only increased after an article in Life
referenced Marcus's Jewish heritage.
Following Kennedy's death, Marcus maintained close ties with Johnson and his administration, being considered for diplomatic
posts to France and to the United Nations General Assembly
while continuing to run his company and providing the wedding dresses for both the Johnsons' daughters, personally assisting Luci Johnson in selecting the designer for her own dress and the styles for the bridesmaids' gowns. After Johnson's retirement, Marcus's invitations were among the few the former president and his wife continued to accept. Marcus's own daughter Wendy joined Mrs. Johnson's staff for a time in 1963, working under Mrs. Johnson's personal secretary, Liz Carpenter
.
, and Marcus accepted a position as corporate executive vice president and director of CHH. He retired as Chairman Emeritus in 1975, turning over the store to his son, Richard C. Marcus.
}
Despite retiring officially from the company, Marcus continued to be closely involved as an advisor even through the final weeks of his life. He established a sideline as a retailing consultant
, maintaining regular business hours in his offices at Crescent Court for more than a decade and offering advice locally to luxury car dealership Sewell Corporation and hotelier Rosewood Corporation
as well as internationally to such businessmen as Mohamed Al-Fayed
of Harrods
. Called on to consult for Amazon.com
's Jeff Bezos
, the 94-year-old businessman recalled arriving in his customary expensive tailored suit to discover 300 casually dressed employees: "I took off my coat, my necktie and my shirt, down to my T-shirt. And then I said, 'Okay. Let’s talk.' I couldn’t have planned it better. It broke the ice. I was on stage for two hours."
In addition to writing a weekly column for The Dallas Morning News
for 15 years, Marcus was the author of multiple retailing
-oriented books, including Minding the Store: A Memoir (1974), the sequel
Quest for the Best (1979), and His & Hers: The Fantasy World of the Neiman Marcus Catalogue (1982) He was a close friend of other writers, including Jane Trahey, an author and longtime advertising copywriter
who at one time worked for Neiman Marcus, and historian David McCullough
. A television presenter for the public broadcasting program American Experience
, McCullough said he once asked Stanley Marcus – "one of the wisest men I know" – what single problem or aspect of American life, if given a magic wand, he would change, to which Marcus replied, "I'd try to do something about television." When asked why, he explained, "Because", he said, "If you could do something about television, think how far you could go to solve all the other problems."
Marcus was an avid art collector, as well as amassing a collection of mask
s from around the world. In 2002, the Sotheby's
auction house mounted a sale of works from his estate, calling Marcus "an insightful and forward-looking collector and a generous lender whose contributions to exhibitions helped bring notice to the world of Latin American Art during the 40s, 50s and 60s." The auction house also noted that Marcus had begun collecting at age five (influenced by his parents), but had found his interest in good design vastly deepened by a 1925 graduation trip to Europe, where he visited a famed international exhibition of decorative arts and thus was introduced to the earliest works of Art Deco
. The Marcus collections included significant works by Mexican
artists Rufino Tamayo
, David Alfaro Siqueiros
, Diego Rivera
, and Rivera's lesser-known friend and colleague Antonio Ruíz
; the American sculptor Alexander Calder
, and American painter Georgia O'Keeffe
. Marcus was friends with Rivera and Tamayo – playing a major role in bringing one of Tamayo's mural
s to the Dallas Museum of Art
– and one of the first board members of the O'Keeffe museum, which honored him at the time of his death with a paid notice in The New York Times that stated "Stanley's generous support, leadership, enthusiasm, friendship and keen artistic judgment were instrumental in the Museum's inception and success. We shall miss him greatly."
Another Marcus contribution to the arts was his own work in the area of photography
. Over the course of his adult life, Marcus took thousands of photographs, both of famous and anonymous subjects, which he turned over to granddaughter Alison V. Smith, a professional photographer, upon moving out of his Nonesuch Road home into a smaller residence in the late 1990s. Two years after his death, Smith began making digital scans of the photos and posting them to the sharing site Flickr
; despite the fact that their authorship was not identified, within a year the photographs had drawn 10,000 views. For the 100th anniversary of Neiman Marcus, Smith and her mother, Jerrie Marcus Smith, decided to assemble a representative selection of the nearly 5,000 images into a book; titled Reflection of a Man, the 192-page book was published by Cairn Press in October, 2007, and accompanied by an exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art.
Southern Methodist University
hosts a Stanley Marcus collection at its DeGolyer Library in Dallas, including photographs, correspondence, and clippings. The library also houses a collection of more than 8,000 books donated by Marcus, including 1,100 miniature books, many from the press he founded.
Neiman Marcus
Neiman Marcus, formerly Neiman-Marcus, is a luxury specialty retail department store operated by the Neiman Marcus Group in the United States. The company is headquartered in the One Marcus Square building in Downtown Dallas, Texas, and competes with other department stores such as Saks Fifth...
in Dallas, Texas
Dallas, Texas
Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the ninth-largest in the United States. The Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is the largest metropolitan area in the South and fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
, which his father and aunt had founded in 1907. During his tenure at the company, he also became a published author, writing his memoir Minding the Store and also a regular column in The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News is the major daily newspaper serving the Dallas, Texas area, with a circulation of 264,459 subscribers, the Audit Bureau of Circulations reported in September 2010...
. After Neiman Marcus was sold to Carter Hawley Hale Stores
Carter Hawley Hale Stores
Broadway Stores, Inc. was an American retailer based in Southern California. Known through its history as Carter Hawley Hale Stores and Broadway Hale Stores over time, it acquired other retail store chains in regions outside its California home base and became in certain retail sectors a regional...
, Marcus initially remained in an advisory capacity to that company, but later began his own consulting business, which continued until his death. He served his local community as an avid patron of the fine arts and as a civic leader. In a chapter titled "Mr. Stanley" — the name by which Marcus was known locally for decades — in his 1953 work Neiman-Marcus, Texas, Frank X. Tolbert
Frank X. Tolbert
Francis Tolbert , better known as Frank X. Tolbert, was a Texas journalist, historian, and chili enthusiast. For the Dallas Morning News, he wrote a local history column called Tolbert's Texas that ran from 1946 until his death in 1984.-Biography:Tolbert was born in Amarillo, and was raised in...
called him "Dallas' most internationally famous citizen" and worthy of being called "the Southwest's No. 1 businessman-intellectual."
Marcus introduced many of the innovations for which Neiman-Marcus became known, creating a national award for service in fashion and hosting art exhibitions in the store itself, as well as weekly fashion shows and an annual Fortnight
Fortnight
The fortnight is a unit of time equal to fourteen days, or two weeks. The word derives from the Old English fēowertyne niht, meaning "fourteen nights"....
event highlighting a different foreign country for two weeks each year. He established the Neiman-Marcus Christmas Catalogue, which became famous for extravagant "His and Hers" gifts such as airplanes and camels. Marcus prided himself on his staff's ability to provide service and value for each client, often citing his father's dictum, "There is never a good sale for Neiman Marcus unless it's a good buy for the customer."
He received the Chevalier Award from the French Legion of Honor
Légion d'honneur
The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
, was listed in the Houston Chronicle
Houston Chronicle
The Houston Chronicle is the largest daily newspaper in Texas, USA, headquartered in the Houston Chronicle Building in Downtown Houston. , it is the ninth-largest newspaper by circulation in the United States...
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School is the graduate business school of Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts, United States and is widely recognized as one of the top business schools in the world. The school offers the world's largest full-time MBA program, doctoral programs, and many executive...
among the greatest American Business Leaders of the 20th century. The Advertising Hall of Fame notes: "Stanley Marcus was among the most important figures in the history of American retail merchandising and marketing. Through his many innovations, he transformed a local Dallas clothing store into an international brand synonymous with high style, fashion and gracious service."
Personal life and retail career
Marcus was born in The Cedars, Dallas, Texas, the son of Herbert MarcusHerbert Marcus
Herbert Marcus was one of the co-founders of Neiman Marcus, and later became its chief executive officer.Marcus was born in Kentucky but moved to Hillsboro, Texas after dropping out of high school to work and live near his brother Theodore, his three sisters and his parents...
, Sr., who later became a co-founder of the original Neiman-Marcus store with his sister Carrie and her husband, Al Neiman. Stanley was the first of four sons born to Herbert, Sr., and his wife, the former Minnie Lichtenstein; the pregnancy indirectly led to the eventual founding of Neiman-Marcus, as Herbert Sr. decided to leave Sanger's
Sanger-Harris
Sanger-Harris was a department store chain from 1961 to 1987. It was formed by Federated Department Stores in 1961 from two Dallas, Texas chains, Sanger Brothers and A. Harris and Co., that dated from the 19th century...
, where he was a buyer of boys' clothing, when he deemed his raise insufficient to support a family. Returning from two years spent in Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
, establishing a successful sales-promotion business, the Marcuses and Neimans used the $25,000 made in the sale of that business to establish their store at the corner of Elm and Murphy. Given that the family's other option for the money was to invest in the then-unknown Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola is a carbonated soft drink sold in stores, restaurants, and vending machines in more than 200 countries. It is produced by The Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta, Georgia, and is often referred to simply as Coke...
Company, Marcus loved to say that Neiman-Marcus was established "as a result of the bad judgment of its founders". In his memoir, Marcus recalled his father as "affectionate" and his mother as even-handed in her attention to each of their children, making sure even into their adulthood to give them equivalent gifts and make sure they were praised equally.
Debate
Debate or debating is a method of interactive and representational argument. Debate is a broader form of argument than logical argument, which only examines consistency from axiom, and factual argument, which only examines what is or isn't the case or rhetoric which is a technique of persuasion...
as well as English with teacher Myra Brown, whom he later credited with much of his early interest in books. He began his university studies at Amherst College
Amherst College
Amherst College is a private liberal arts college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. Amherst is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution and enrolled 1,744 students in the fall of 2009...
, but when traditions preventing Jews
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
from joining clubs or fraternities
Fraternities and sororities
Fraternities and sororities are fraternal social organizations for undergraduate students. In Latin, the term refers mainly to such organizations at colleges and universities in the United States, although it is also applied to analogous European groups also known as corporations...
drastically curtailed his social life, he transferred to Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
after the first year. At his new school, he became a member of the historically Jewish fraternity Zeta Beta Tau
Zeta Beta Tau
Zeta Beta Tau was founded in 1898 as the nation's first Jewish fraternity, although it is no longer sectarian. Today the merged Zeta Beta Tau Brotherhood is one of the largest, numbering over 140,000 initiated Brothers, and over 90 chapter locations.-Founding:The Zeta Beta Tau fraternity was...
, later rising to become the group's president.
While living in Boston and pursuing his chosen major
Academic major
In the United States and Canada, an academic major or major concentration is the academic discipline to which an undergraduate student formally commits....
, English literature, Marcus began a lifelong hobby of collecting rare and antique books
Book collecting
Book collecting is the collecting of books, including seeking, locating, acquiring, organizing, cataloging, displaying, storing, and maintaining whatever books are of interest to a given individual collector. The love of books is bibliophilia, and someone who loves to read, admire, and collect...
. To finance his pursuits, he began The Book Collector's Service Bureau, a mail-order book service, beginning with a letter of introduction sent to 100 homes. The venture proved so successful that for a time Marcus considered entering that line of work full time, concerned that entering the retail business might curtail his freedom of expression in politics and other areas of interest; his father persuaded him that he would always be granted the liberty of his own views, and pointed out that retailing was more profitable and thus would allow him to amass a large book collection that much sooner.
Early years at Neiman-Marcus
After receiving a B.A. degreeBachelor of Arts
A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...
from Harvard in 1925, he began his career at the retailer that same year as a simple stockboy organizing inventory
Inventory
Inventory means a list compiled for some formal purpose, such as the details of an estate going to probate, or the contents of a house let furnished. This remains the prime meaning in British English...
, but upon beginning in sales, quickly outstripped other sales staff. He went back to study at Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School
Harvard Business School is the graduate business school of Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts, United States and is widely recognized as one of the top business schools in the world. The school offers the world's largest full-time MBA program, doctoral programs, and many executive...
in 1926, leaving after one year to participate in a massive expansion of the retail operation in Dallas.
He married the former Mary "Billie" Cantrell in 1932; she initially worked in the Neiman-Marcus Sports Shop department until she retired in 1936 after the birth of their first child, Jerrie, followed two years later by twins Richard and Wendy. (One year after his wife's 1978 death, he married Linda Robinson, a longtime librarian at the Dallas Public Library, in a marriage that lasted until Stanley Marcus's own death in 2002.) In 1935 the Marcuses commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...
to design a home for them on Nonesuch Road, but rejected the eventual design, which included cantilever
Cantilever
A cantilever is a beam anchored at only one end. The beam carries the load to the support where it is resisted by moment and shear stress. Cantilever construction allows for overhanging structures without external bracing. Cantilevers can also be constructed with trusses or slabs.This is in...
ed steel beams and terraces swathed in mosquito net
Mosquito net
A mosquito net offers protection against mosquitos, flies, and other insects, and thus against diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever, and various forms of encephalitis, including the West Nile virus, if used properly and especially if treated with an insecticide, which can double...
ting. Instead, the couple chose a design by local firm DeWitt & Washburn, whose creation became a Texas Historic Landmark. As of 1937, Marcus was one of only 22 Texans to earn a salary of $50,000 or more, according to the House Ways and Means Committee; his father, Herbert, was another, earning $75,000 as company president while vice president Stanley drew an even $50,000.
Marcus was responsible for a number of innovations at the Dallas retailer. He created the annual Neiman-Marcus Award for Distinguished Service in Fashion, beginning in 1938, which led to the Neiman-Marcus Exposition, a fall fashion show held annually from 1938 to 1970, then periodically thereafter. His department store was the first American haute couture
Haute couture
Haute couture refers to the creation of exclusive custom-fitted clothing. Haute couture is made to order for a specific customer, and it is usually made from high-quality, expensive fabric and sewn with extreme attention to detail and finished by the most experienced and capable seamstresses,...
boutique to introduce weekly fashion shows, and the first to host concurrent art exhibitions at the store itself. In 1939, he established the annual Christmas Catalogue, which in 1951 offered the first of its extravagant "His & Hers Gifts," starting with a matching pair of vicuña
Vicuña
The vicuña or vicugna is one of two wild South American camelids, along with the guanaco, which live in the high alpine areas of the Andes. It is a relative of the llama, and is now believed to share a wild ancestor with domesticated alpacas, which are raised for their fibre...
coats, and going on to include matching bathtubs, a pair of Beechcraft
Beechcraft
Beechcraft is an American manufacturer of general aviation and military aircraft, ranging from light single engine aircraft to business jets and light military transports. Previously a division of Raytheon, it has been a brand of Hawker Beechcraft since 2006....
airplanes, "Noah's Ark
Noah's Ark
Noah's Ark is a vessel appearing in the Book of Genesis and the Quran . These narratives describe the construction of the ark by Noah at God's command to save himself, his family, and the world's animals from the worldwide deluge of the Great Flood.In the narrative of the ark, God sees the...
" (including pairs of animals), camels, and live tigers.
The war years
For all his professional emphasis on glitz and glamour, he made another, very different mark on the American fashion industry when he was asked to join the War Production Board in Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
on December 27, 1941, less than three weeks after the United States entered World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Ineligible for military service due to his age, he instead helped the war effort by championing the conservation of scarce resources normally devoted to fashion trends. He encouraged men to wear drooping socks (to save much-needed rubber
Rubber
Natural rubber, also called India rubber or caoutchouc, is an elastomer that was originally derived from latex, a milky colloid produced by some plants. The plants would be ‘tapped’, that is, an incision made into the bark of the tree and the sticky, milk colored latex sap collected and refined...
that would normally be used for elastic
Elastomer
An elastomer is a polymer with the property of viscoelasticity , generally having notably low Young's modulus and high yield strain compared with other materials. The term, which is derived from elastic polymer, is often used interchangeably with the term rubber, although the latter is preferred...
) and devised regulations for the manufacture of women's and children's clothing that would enable the nation to divert more textile
Textile
A textile or cloth is a flexible woven material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibres often referred to as thread or yarn. Yarn is produced by spinning raw fibres of wool, flax, cotton, or other material to produce long strands...
resources to uniforms and other war-related needs:
In addition to these restrictions, Marcus recommended to the WPB that coats, suits, jackets and dresses be sold separately "to make them go further." The changes were expected to create a total savings of 100000000 yards (91,440,000 m) of fabric to be used in the war effort.
Conscious of the role of the media in fashion promotion, Marcus prompted the members of the National Retail Dry Goods Association to convince their local press outlets to treat women's fashions as a serious subject rather than as an object of ridicule. He solicited nationally famous women to proclaim their support of the new standards; TIME
Adela Rogers St. Johns
Adela Rogers St. Johns was an American journalist, novelist, and screenwriter. She wrote a number of screenplays for silent movies and, late in life, appeared with other early twentieth-century figures as one of the 'witnesses' in Warren Beatty's Reds, but she is best remembered for her...
predicting, "The overdressed woman will be as unpatriotically conspicuous as though she wore a Japanese kimono."
Marcus addressed the fashion press in national meetings, encouraging editors to reassure women that stores would carry adequate supply of attractive styles, in order to prevent shoppers from flooding the stores or hoarding stock. TIME reported on meetings of "70 fantastic hats," representing the presence of national magazine editors from Ladies' Home Journal
Ladies' Home Journal
Ladies' Home Journal is an American magazine which first appeared on February 16, 1883, and eventually became one of the leading women's magazines of the 20th century in the United States...
and Harper's Bazaar
Harper's Bazaar
Harper’s Bazaar is an American fashion magazine, first published in 1867. Harper’s Bazaar is published by Hearst and, as a magazine, considers itself to be the style resource for “women who are the first to buy the best, from casual to couture.”...
, as well as from newspapers in the urban centers of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, all complying with the WPB's instructions for their coverage of women's and children's fashions.
His work promoting cooperation with the WPB's mandates did not still Marcus's competitive instincts. With the fall of Paris, the traditional fashion capital, New York mayor Fiorello LaGuardia began to declare his city the new leader at every opportunity. To this claim, Marcus retorted in the international press, "New York is finished as a manufacturing center. ... They're making clothes in Kansas, Philadelphia and Texas now and they won't give it up. The day is gone when only a New York dress is a good dress."
Faced with increasing shortages in silk
Silk
Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The best-known type of silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori reared in captivity...
and even new synthetics such as rayon
Rayon
Rayon is a manufactured regenerated cellulose fiber. Because it is produced from naturally occurring polymers, it is neither a truly synthetic fiber nor a natural fiber; it is a semi-synthetic or artificial fiber. Rayon is known by the names viscose rayon and art silk in the textile industry...
, which seemed likely to create long lines of dissatisfied customers seeking a product in inadequate supply, Marcus created the Neiman Marcus Hosiery-of-the-Month Club, which sent two pair of stockings in fashionable shades to each female charge-card customer, with no membership fees. In his memoirs Marcus recalled, "Many women opened charge accounts just to become members of the club, and in a short time we had a membership of over 100,000, extending all over the country."
Taking the helm
In 1950, with the death of Herbert Marcus, Sr., Stanley Marcus was elected president and CEOChief executive officer
A chief executive officer , managing director , Executive Director for non-profit organizations, or chief executive is the highest-ranking corporate officer or administrator in charge of total management of an organization...
of the company, with Carrie Marcus Neiman
Carrie Marcus Neiman
Carrie Marcus was born in Louisville, Kentucky to Jewish German immigrants Delia and Jacob Marcus. Jacob was a cotton broker and in 1895 the family followed a daughter to Hillsboro, Texas when she married a grocer there. Carrie moved with her family to Dallas, Texas in 1899 and married Abraham...
as chairman of the board
Chairman of the Board
The Chairman of the Board is a seat of office in an organization, especially of corporations.Chairman of the Board may also refer to:*Chairman of the Board , a 1998 film*Chairmen of the Board , a 1970s American soul music group...
. Neiman died in 1953, in which year TIME proclaimed that Stanley Marcus's "combination of showmanship and salesmanship" had been instrumental in increasing the company's annual revenue from $2.6 million in 1926 to $20 million.
Marcus began yet another Neiman-Marcus tradition, the "International Fortnight
Fortnight
The fortnight is a unit of time equal to fourteen days, or two weeks. The word derives from the Old English fēowertyne niht, meaning "fourteen nights"....
," in 1957 as a way to attract customers in the lull between the fall fashion rush and the Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
shopping crunch. The idea was inspired by seeing a store in Stockholm, Sweden, that was having a France-themed sales promotion, leading Marcus to propose to the French government a sponsorship of an even more elaborate event in his own store. The initial Fortnight included concurrent events of art, symphonic music, and film at other locations around Dallas, with an Air France
Air France
Air France , stylised as AIRFRANCE, is the French flag carrier headquartered in Tremblay-en-France, , and is one of the world's largest airlines. It is a subsidiary of the Air France-KLM Group and a founding member of the SkyTeam global airline alliance...
jet bringing "writers, painters, government officials, models, and industry leaders." In the years following, the Fortnight focused on various other countries and added related food service as well as items from the relevant country in every department, ending in 1986 with the Australian Fortnight. Other international traditions introduced at Neiman's included Dallas' first espresso
Espresso
Espresso is a concentrated beverage brewed by forcing a small amount of nearly boiling water under pressure through finely ground coffee. Espresso is widely known throughout the world....
bar, brought by Marcus after World War II.
As a retailer, Marcus believed strongly in making his store into a place where everything a customer needed could be found and, if necessary, brought to the customer's front door. He was said to have helped one customer discover the shoe size of Queen Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom
Elizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
so as to give the gift of stockings and a pair of shoes, and he ordered that the store stock such items as a set of Steuben
Steuben Glass Works
Steuben Glass Works was an American art glass manufacturer, founded in the summer of 1903 by Fredrick C. Carder and Thomas G. Hawkes in Corning, New York, which is in Steuben County, from which the company name was derived. Hawkes was the owner of the largest cut glass firm then operating in Corning...
plates with the Mexican national crest, "because sooner or later somebody will be going to call on the President of Mexico and need a proper gift." He personally delivered a fur coat to a St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...
, customer who could not make the trip to Dallas. Another story often recounted is that of a shopper who, in searching for a present for his wife, said that he was not sure what to buy, but that he would know it when he saw it. In response, Marcus inquired about the woman's clothing sizes and asked the customer to wait briefly. Taking an oversized brandy
Brandy
Brandy is a spirit produced by distilling wine. Brandy generally contains 35%–60% alcohol by volume and is typically taken as an after-dinner drink...
snifter
Snifter
A snifter — also called a balloon — is a type of stemware, a short-stemmed glass whose vessel has a wide bottom and a relatively narrow top. It is mostly used to serve aged brown spirits such as brandy and whisky...
from a display, Marcus gathered cashmere sweaters of various colors, arranged them in imitation of a pousse-café, topped with a white angora
Angora wool
Angora wool or Angora fibre refers to the downy coat produced by the Angora rabbit. While their names are similar, Angora fibre is distinct from mohair, which comes from the Angora goat. Angora is known for its softness, thin fibres, and what knitters refer to as a halo...
sweater to simulate whipped cream
Whipped cream
Whipped cream is cream that has been beaten by a mixer, whisk, or fork until it is light and fluffy. Whipped cream is often sweetened and sometimes flavored with vanilla, in which case it may be called Chantilly cream or crème Chantilly ....
, and in place of a cherry
Cherry
The cherry is the fruit of many plants of the genus Prunus, and is a fleshy stone fruit. The cherry fruits of commerce are usually obtained from a limited number of species, including especially cultivars of the wild cherry, Prunus avium....
, garnished the concoction with a 10-karat ruby
Ruby
A ruby is a pink to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum . The red color is caused mainly by the presence of the element chromium. Its name comes from ruber, Latin for red. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called sapphires...
ring
Ring (finger)
A finger ring is a circular band worn as a type of ornamental jewelry around a finger; it is the most common current meaning of the word ring. Other types of metal bands worn as ornaments are also called rings, such as arm rings and neck rings....
, at a total cost of $25,350, which the customer gladly paid. When one customer decided his Christmas purchases were not sufficiently impressive, Marcus helped to arrange a full duplication of the store's display window, complete with mannequins and lighting, inside the man's home.
Despite his love of such larger-than-life salesmanship, Marcus also maintained the assertion of his father, Herbert, that "there is no good sale for Neiman-Marcus unless it is a good buy for the customer." Stanley Marcus would sometimes persuade the buyer to purchase a lower-priced item that he considered more suitable, as when a man shopping for a mink coat for his 16-year-old daughter was personally steered by Marcus toward a $295 muskrat coat instead, as being more appropriate to her youth. Marcus also routinely insisted customers would be wiser to buy the top quality of a reasonably priced line rather than scaled-down or second-rate versions of an expensive product.
Marcus continued throughout his tenure to hold tightly to his father's assurance that he would be able to maintain and act on his political convictions while running the business. He supported the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
in its early years, an unpopular position in Dallas for that time. In the early 1950s he began to explore the ramifications of ending the store's participation in the then-common practice of excluding black
Black people
The term black people is used in systems of racial classification for humans of a dark skinned phenotype, relative to other racial groups.Different societies apply different criteria regarding who is classified as "black", and often social variables such as class, socio-economic status also plays a...
customers from shopping in the store, and while his legal advisors cautioned against that step, he offered support for any black entrepreneur looking to establish a quality store and, in 1954, began to hire black staff in some departments.
Moving into the 1960s, Marcus became ever more convinced that his city and his company needed to take action to promote racial equality, both as a moral issue and to reduce the growing civil unrest. In 1968, he announced that Neiman-Marcus's buyers
Buyer (fashion)
In the retail industry, a buyer is an individual who selects what items will be stocked in a store, based on his or her predictions about what will be popular with shoppers. Retail buyers usually work closely with designers and attend trade fairs and fashion shows to observe trends. They may work...
would give preference to companies employing and training significant numbers of minority
Minority group
A minority is a sociological group within a demographic. The demographic could be based on many factors from ethnicity, gender, wealth, power, etc. The term extends to numerous situations, and civilizations within history, despite the misnomer of minorities associated with a numerical statistic...
employees, making his firm one of the first companies in the nation to have such a policy.
Civic leadership
The Marcus family had been among the founders of Dallas' Temple Emanu-ElTemple Emanu-El of Dallas
Temple Emanu-El of Dallas, Texas was the first Reform Jewish congregation in North Texas, and is the largest synagogue in the South.- History :...
, a Reform
Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism refers to various beliefs, practices and organizations associated with the Reform Jewish movement in North America, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. In general, it maintains that Judaism and Jewish traditions should be modernized and should be compatible with participation in the...
synagogue that is today the largest in the Southwest. Stanley Marcus became a leading figure in the temple in the 1950s and a member of the American Council for Judaism
American Council for Judaism
The American Council for Judaism is an organization of American Jews committed to the proposition that Jews are not a nationality but merely a religious group, adhering to the original stated principles of Reform Judaism, as articulated in the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform.The ACJ was founded in June...
despite being largely a secular Jew who once joked that he was afraid to visit Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
"because he might be converted."
Marcus was well-known for cultivating the arts and for defending even unpopular political causes. He introduced art exhibits at Neiman-Marcus as well as providing corporate sponsorship of artwork elsewhere in the city, and cultivated an extensive private collection. He helped found the Dallas Opera
Dallas Opera
The Dallas Opera is an opera company located in Dallas, Texas . The company was founded in 1957 as the Dallas Civic Opera by Laurence Kelly and Nicolà Rescigno, both of whom had been active with the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the first as administrator, the second as artistic director.-The company's...
, helped save the Dallas Symphony from a financial crisis, and served as chairman of the board for the Dallas Museum of Fine Art (now the Dallas Museum of Art
Dallas Museum of Art
The Dallas Museum of Art is a major art museum located in the Arts District of downtown Dallas, Texas, USA, along Woodall Rodgers Freeway between St. Paul and Harwood. In 1984, the museum moved from its previous location in Fair Park to the Arts District, Dallas, Texas...
).
While serving as museum chair, Marcus was once called upon by Fred Florence, then chairman of a major local bank and a fellow Temple Emanu-El leader, to explain his inclusion of "a lot of Communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
art" he'd been told would be included in an upcoming DMFA "Sports in Art" exhibit, co-sponsored by Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
and United States Information Agency
United States Information Agency
The United States Information Agency , which existed from 1953 to 1999, was a United States agency devoted to "public diplomacy". In 1999, USIA's broadcasting functions were moved to the newly created Broadcasting Board of Governors, and its exchange and non-broadcasting information functions were...
as a fund-raiser for the 1956 Olympic team
1956 Summer Olympics
The 1956 Melbourne Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XVI Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was held in Melbourne, Australia, in 1956, with the exception of the equestrian events, which could not be held in Australia due to quarantine regulations...
. Artists represented in the show included four supposed Communist supporters, Leon Kroll
Leon Kroll
-External links:* *...
, Yasuo Kuniyoshi
Yasuo Kuniyoshi
was an American painter, photographer and printmaker born in Okayama, Japan.He migrated to America in 1906, a year later began studying at the Los Angeles School of Art and Design. In 1935 he was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship. He taught at the Art Students League of New York in New York City...
, Ben Shahn
Ben Shahn
Ben Shahn was a Lithuanian-born American artist. He is best known for his works of social realism, his left-wing political views, and his series of lectures published as The Shape of Content.-Biography:...
, and William Zorach
William Zorach
William Zorach was a Lithuanian-born American sculptor, painter, printmaker, and writer. He won the Logan Medal of the arts.-Life and career:...
. Asking Florence to indicate which pieces were being questioned, Marcus dismissed each claim one by one: "I don't know how anybody could think hitting a baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
was communist," Marcus said when shown Shahn's "The National Pastime." His response to Zorach's "Fisherman" was similar, as he shook his head and remarked, "I don't think too many people think fishing is communist either." Marcus followed up by going to local newspapers The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News is the major daily newspaper serving the Dallas, Texas area, with a circulation of 264,459 subscribers, the Audit Bureau of Circulations reported in September 2010...
and the Dallas Times-Herald and getting the publishers of both to agree that they would not stand for censorship in the arts.
In organizing a 1952 exhibition of abstract art
Abstract art
Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an...
, Marcus lured local leaders to the show by two means. First, he solicited the donation of art from the collections of David Rockefeller
David Rockefeller
David Rockefeller, Sr. is the current patriarch of the Rockefeller family. He is the youngest and only surviving child of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and the only surviving grandchild of oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, founder of Standard Oil. His five siblings were...
and his brothers, along with those from other noted national business leaders. Second, he requested that the donors personally write letters of invitation to their Dallas colleagues, feeling that the otherwise suspect art would benefit from the imprimatur of respected figures known for their fine taste. His efforts were rewarded by a numerous and appreciative turnout for the show.
Marcus also involved himself in issues of civil rights and social justice. One unusual case involved three male students at W. W. Samuell High School who, in 1966, were stopped at the school's front door and ordered to cut their hair in order to be admitted to the school. The young men filed a lawsuit against the Dallas Independent School District
Dallas Independent School District
The Dallas Independent School District is a school district based in Dallas, Texas . Dallas ISD, which operates schools in much of Dallas County, is the second largest school district in Texas and the twelfth largest in the United States.In 2009, the school district was rated "academically...
, claiming the restriction interfered with their constitutional freedom of expression. Despite not knowing the boys involved, Marcus stepped forward to champion their case before the public, taking out a newspaper ad defending the choice as a simple fashion decision rather than rebellion against authority. Additionally, he offered legal support if needed, noting in a telegram to school board president Lee McShan, Jr., "I don’t like long hair any more than the principal does, but I will fight for the rights of those students to wear hair any way they choose." Though the case was lost and appealed all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court without success, decades letter the men still appreciated Marcus' support. Paul Jarvis, one of the plaintiffs, said of Marcus after his death in 2002: "He was just a nice man and a great contributor to Dallas and to the arts. He wanted to do what was right."
Presidential connections
Marcus used his public-relations skills once again when Dallas was labeled "City of Hate" following the November 22, 1963, assassinationJohn F. Kennedy assassination
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the thirty-fifth President of the United States, was assassinated at 12:30 p.m. Central Standard Time on Friday, November 22, 1963, in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas...
of United States President John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
. An early supporter of Kennedy's run for the presidency, Marcus had tolerated the closing of several customers' accounts when he announced his support for the candidate in the 1960 elections. In fact, he had cautioned that Kennedy's visit be reconsidered in light of the city's earlier poor reception of Adlai Stevenson and Vice-President Lyndon Baines Johnson. In Kennedy's memory, Marcus arranged to have 500 hand-typeset and bound copies printed of Kennedy's scheduled speech at the Dallas Trade Mart, of which the first copy went to Kennedy's widow, Jacqueline. The following New Year's Day, 1964, Marcus took out a full-page advertorial
Advertorial
An advertorial is an advertisement in the form of an editorial. The term "advertorial" is a portmanteau of "advertisement" and "editorial." Merriam-Webster dates the origin of the word to 1946....
in The Dallas Morning News titled, "What's Right With Dallas?"
The editorial ad – a Neiman-Marcus tradition introduced by his father in the store's early days – both defended the city against outside critiques and offered more intimate criticisms from one who knew the town and its people well. The message said that Dallas needed to address four areas for community improvement: one, its slum
Slum
A slum, as defined by United Nations agency UN-HABITAT, is a run-down area of a city characterized by substandard housing and squalor and lacking in tenure security. According to the United Nations, the percentage of urban dwellers living in slums decreased from 47 percent to 37 percent in the...
problem; two, its political extremism (called "absolutism" in the text); three, too much attention to physical growth at the expense of "quality" in civic endeavors such as "schools, colleges, symphonies, operas, and museums"; and four, a need to focus less on "civic image" and more on "doing good things and not doing bad things", which he described as "the best public relations." In a 2003 article on the 40th anniversary of the assassination, Ralph Blumenthal of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
praised the message as "strik[ing] a perfect balance", though he notes the author met not only with support from some, but from canceled accounts and "anti-Semitic attacks" that only increased after an article in Life
Life (magazine)
Life generally refers to three American magazines:*A humor and general interest magazine published from 1883 to 1936. Time founder Henry Luce bought the magazine in 1936 solely so that he could acquire the rights to its name....
referenced Marcus's Jewish heritage.
Following Kennedy's death, Marcus maintained close ties with Johnson and his administration, being considered for diplomatic
Diplomacy
Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of groups or states...
posts to France and to the United Nations General Assembly
United Nations General Assembly
For two articles dealing with membership in the General Assembly, see:* General Assembly members* General Assembly observersThe United Nations General Assembly is one of the five principal organs of the United Nations and the only one in which all member nations have equal representation...
while continuing to run his company and providing the wedding dresses for both the Johnsons' daughters, personally assisting Luci Johnson in selecting the designer for her own dress and the styles for the bridesmaids' gowns. After Johnson's retirement, Marcus's invitations were among the few the former president and his wife continued to accept. Marcus's own daughter Wendy joined Mrs. Johnson's staff for a time in 1963, working under Mrs. Johnson's personal secretary, Liz Carpenter
Liz Carpenter
Mary Elizabeth "Liz" Sutherland Carpenter was a writer, feminist, former reporter, media advisor, speechwriter, political humorist, and public relations expert....
.
Stepping down
In 1969 Stanley Marcus recommended to the board of directors that the company merge with Broadway-Hale of California in order to have enough capital to expand. Neiman's subsequently became a subsidiary of Carter-Hawley Hale, Inc.Carter Hawley Hale Stores
Broadway Stores, Inc. was an American retailer based in Southern California. Known through its history as Carter Hawley Hale Stores and Broadway Hale Stores over time, it acquired other retail store chains in regions outside its California home base and became in certain retail sectors a regional...
, and Marcus accepted a position as corporate executive vice president and director of CHH. He retired as Chairman Emeritus in 1975, turning over the store to his son, Richard C. Marcus.
}
Despite retiring officially from the company, Marcus continued to be closely involved as an advisor even through the final weeks of his life. He established a sideline as a retailing consultant
Consultant
A consultant is a professional who provides professional or expert advice in a particular area such as management, accountancy, the environment, entertainment, technology, law , human resources, marketing, emergency management, food production, medicine, finance, life management, economics, public...
, maintaining regular business hours in his offices at Crescent Court for more than a decade and offering advice locally to luxury car dealership Sewell Corporation and hotelier Rosewood Corporation
The Mansion on Turtle Creek
The Mansion on Turtle Creek is a highly regarded restaurant located in the Turtle Creek neighborhood in the Oak Lawn area of Dallas, Texas , within the hotel Rosewood Mansion on Turtle Creek. The menu is primarily New American cuisine, and both the menu and prices are upscale.- External links :*...
as well as internationally to such businessmen as Mohamed Al-Fayed
Mohamed Al-Fayed
Mohamed Abdel Moneim Al-Fayed is an Egyptian businessman and billionaire. Amongst his business interests are ownership of the English Premiership football team Fulham Football Club, Hôtel Ritz Paris and formerly Harrods Department Store, Knightsbridge...
of Harrods
Harrods
Harrods is an upmarket department store located in Brompton Road in Brompton, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London. The Harrods brand also applies to other enterprises undertaken by the Harrods group of companies including Harrods Bank, Harrods Estates, Harrods Aviation and Air...
. Called on to consult for Amazon.com
Amazon.com
Amazon.com, Inc. is a multinational electronic commerce company headquartered in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the world's largest online retailer. Amazon has separate websites for the following countries: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, and...
's Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos
Jeffrey Preston "Jeff" Bezos is the founder, president, chief executive officer , and chairman of the board of Amazon.com.-Early life and background:...
, the 94-year-old businessman recalled arriving in his customary expensive tailored suit to discover 300 casually dressed employees: "I took off my coat, my necktie and my shirt, down to my T-shirt. And then I said, 'Okay. Let’s talk.' I couldn’t have planned it better. It broke the ice. I was on stage for two hours."
Legacy
The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News is the major daily newspaper serving the Dallas, Texas area, with a circulation of 264,459 subscribers, the Audit Bureau of Circulations reported in September 2010...
for 15 years, Marcus was the author of multiple retailing
Retailing
Retail consists of the sale of physical goods or merchandise from a fixed location, such as a department store, boutique or kiosk, or by mail, in small or individual lots for direct consumption by the purchaser. Retailing may include subordinated services, such as delivery. Purchasers may be...
-oriented books, including Minding the Store: A Memoir (1974), the sequel
Sequel
A sequel is a narrative, documental, or other work of literature, film, theatre, or music that continues the story of or expands upon issues presented in some previous work...
Quest for the Best (1979), and His & Hers: The Fantasy World of the Neiman Marcus Catalogue (1982) He was a close friend of other writers, including Jane Trahey, an author and longtime advertising copywriter
Copy (written)
Copy refers to written material, in contrast to photographs or other elements of layout, in a large number of contexts, including magazines, advertising, and book publishing....
who at one time worked for Neiman Marcus, and historian David McCullough
David McCullough
David Gaub McCullough is an American author, narrator, historian, and lecturer. He is a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States' highest civilian award....
. A television presenter for the public broadcasting program American Experience
American Experience
American Experience is a television program airing on the Public Broadcasting Service Public television stations in the United States. The program airs documentaries, many of which have won awards, about important or interesting events and people in American history...
, McCullough said he once asked Stanley Marcus – "one of the wisest men I know" – what single problem or aspect of American life, if given a magic wand, he would change, to which Marcus replied, "I'd try to do something about television." When asked why, he explained, "Because", he said, "If you could do something about television, think how far you could go to solve all the other problems."
Marcus was an avid art collector, as well as amassing a collection of mask
Mask
A mask is an article normally worn on the face, typically for protection, disguise, performance or entertainment. Masks have been used since antiquity for both ceremonial and practical purposes...
s from around the world. In 2002, the Sotheby's
Sotheby's
Sotheby's is the world's fourth oldest auction house in continuous operation.-History:The oldest auction house in operation is the Stockholms Auktionsverk founded in 1674, the second oldest is Göteborgs Auktionsverk founded in 1681 and third oldest being founded in 1731, all Swedish...
auction house mounted a sale of works from his estate, calling Marcus "an insightful and forward-looking collector and a generous lender whose contributions to exhibitions helped bring notice to the world of Latin American Art during the 40s, 50s and 60s." The auction house also noted that Marcus had begun collecting at age five (influenced by his parents), but had found his interest in good design vastly deepened by a 1925 graduation trip to Europe, where he visited a famed international exhibition of decorative arts and thus was introduced to the earliest works of Art Deco
Art Deco
Art deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
. The Marcus collections included significant works by Mexican
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
artists Rufino Tamayo
Rufino Tamayo
Rufino Tamayo was a Mexican painter of Zapotec heritage, born in Oaxaca de Juárez, Mexico. Tamayo was active in the mid-20th century in Mexico and New York, painting figurative abstraction with surrealist influences....
, David Alfaro Siqueiros
David Alfaro Siqueiros
José David Alfaro Siqueiros was a social realist painter, known for his large murals in fresco that helped establish the Mexican Mural Renaissance, together with works by Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco, and also a member of the Mexican Communist Party who participated in an...
, Diego Rivera
Diego Rivera
Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...
, and Rivera's lesser-known friend and colleague Antonio Ruíz
Antonio Ruiz
Antonio Ruiz Cervilla is a retired Spanish football midfielder and manager.-Playing career:...
; the American sculptor Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder was an American sculptor and artist most famous for inventing mobile sculptures. In addition to mobile and stable sculpture, Alexander Calder also created paintings, lithographs, toys, tapestry, jewelry and household objects.-Childhood:Alexander "Sandy" Calder was born in Lawnton,...
, and American painter Georgia O'Keeffe
Georgia O'Keeffe
Georgia Totto O'Keeffe was an American artist.Born near Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, O'Keeffe first came to the attention of the New York art community in 1916, several decades before women had gained access to art training in America’s colleges and universities, and before any of its women artists...
. Marcus was friends with Rivera and Tamayo – playing a major role in bringing one of Tamayo's mural
Mural
A mural is any piece of artwork painted or applied directly on a wall, ceiling or other large permanent surface. A particularly distinguishing characteristic of mural painting is that the architectural elements of the given space are harmoniously incorporated into the picture.-History:Murals of...
s to the Dallas Museum of Art
Dallas Museum of Art
The Dallas Museum of Art is a major art museum located in the Arts District of downtown Dallas, Texas, USA, along Woodall Rodgers Freeway between St. Paul and Harwood. In 1984, the museum moved from its previous location in Fair Park to the Arts District, Dallas, Texas...
– and one of the first board members of the O'Keeffe museum, which honored him at the time of his death with a paid notice in The New York Times that stated "Stanley's generous support, leadership, enthusiasm, friendship and keen artistic judgment were instrumental in the Museum's inception and success. We shall miss him greatly."
Another Marcus contribution to the arts was his own work in the area of photography
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
. Over the course of his adult life, Marcus took thousands of photographs, both of famous and anonymous subjects, which he turned over to granddaughter Alison V. Smith, a professional photographer, upon moving out of his Nonesuch Road home into a smaller residence in the late 1990s. Two years after his death, Smith began making digital scans of the photos and posting them to the sharing site Flickr
Flickr
Flickr is an image hosting and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community that was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. In addition to being a popular website for users to share and embed personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers to...
; despite the fact that their authorship was not identified, within a year the photographs had drawn 10,000 views. For the 100th anniversary of Neiman Marcus, Smith and her mother, Jerrie Marcus Smith, decided to assemble a representative selection of the nearly 5,000 images into a book; titled Reflection of a Man, the 192-page book was published by Cairn Press in October, 2007, and accompanied by an exhibit at the Dallas Museum of Art.
Southern Methodist University
Southern Methodist University
Southern Methodist University is a private university in Dallas, Texas, United States. Founded in 1911 by the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, SMU operates campuses in Dallas, Plano, and Taos, New Mexico. SMU is owned by the South Central Jurisdiction of the United Methodist Church...
hosts a Stanley Marcus collection at its DeGolyer Library in Dallas, including photographs, correspondence, and clippings. The library also houses a collection of more than 8,000 books donated by Marcus, including 1,100 miniature books, many from the press he founded.
Awards and honors
- Inaugural inductee, Retailing Hall of Fame (2004)
- First recipient of the Design Patron award, National Design Awards (2001)
- Inductee, Advertising Hall of Fame (1999)
- Honoree, Linz Award (1995)
- Inductee, Texas Business Hall of Fame (1984)
- Honorary doctoral degree recipient, North Texas State University (1983)
- Honorary Fellow, American Institute of ArchitectsAmerican Institute of ArchitectsThe American Institute of Architects is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to support the architecture profession and improve its public image...
(1972) - Honorary doctoral degree recipient, Southern Methodist University (1965)
- Recipient, National Retail Merchants Association gold medal (1961)
- New York Fashion Designers Annual Award (1958)
- Chevalier Award, French Legion of Honor, presented on March 27, 1949, by Henri Bonnet, French Ambassador to the United States, "for eminent services to the cause of French industrial and commercial recovery"
- Elected chairman, American Retailing Federation
- Listed, "The Tallest Texans", Houston ChronicleHouston ChronicleThe Houston Chronicle is the largest daily newspaper in Texas, USA, headquartered in the Houston Chronicle Building in Downtown Houston. , it is the ninth-largest newspaper by circulation in the United States...
- profiles of 100 key figures in the state's history - Listed, "20th Century Great American Business Leaders", Harvard Business School
See also
- History of the Jews in Dallas, TexasHistory of the Jews in Dallas, TexasThe History of the Jews in Dallas, Texas is one of the oldest Jewish communities in the state. Dallas is one of the largest cities in Texas and has one of the largest Jewish communities in the state.-Early history:Its first Jewish cemetery was established in 1854...
Additional references
- Infoplease. Noteworthy Deaths, 2002
- "Farewell to the Merchant Prince", The Dallas Morning News multimedia obituary tribute
External links
- Career Highlights video, from Advertising Hall of Fame