Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. And today's
Speaker 1: episode was requested approximately one hundred years ago, if you
Speaker 1: go by way of hyperbole by our listener other not
Speaker 1: really one hundred years ago, but it feels that way.
Speaker 1: It was a very long time, and I have had
Speaker 1: it on my list throughout that time, but I am
Speaker 1: only just now getting to it for a variety of reasons. Uh.
Speaker 1: We are talking today about Levi Strauss, and his story
Speaker 1: is really historically interesting because it touches on a lot
Speaker 1: of important moments in US history. So he was an
Speaker 1: immigrant who ended up in a business that was impacted
Speaker 1: by and in turn affected the U s Civil War
Speaker 1: and American clothing culture. He has a story that's tied
Speaker 1: to the Gold Rush. He also had a vision for
Speaker 1: his adopted city of San Francisco that he worked really
Speaker 1: hard to achieve so the future generations would benefit from it. Uh,
Speaker 1: and his life in many ways is the story of
Speaker 1: the United States in the nineteenth century from the perspective
Speaker 1: of a Jewish immigrant who became a captain of industry.
Speaker 1: And before we get into a story, I will make
Speaker 1: a confession, which is that until fairly recently, probably five
Speaker 1: years this Shougo, I thought Levi and Strauss were two
Speaker 1: different people that have been in business together. That's what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. So clearly I missed this in history class
Speaker 1: because even though people wear Levi's and you'd call it
Speaker 1: Levi Strauss, I didn't realize that was one person's proper name.
Speaker 1: So I grew up in North Carolina, not all that
Speaker 1: far away from Cone Mills, which is who made the
Speaker 1: denim for Levi's five oh ones, for but two hundred
Speaker 1: years or something, so like this is a piece of
Speaker 1: history that is like I'm a little more steeped, and
Speaker 1: I didn't have confusion about whether Levi and Straus were
Speaker 1: two people. It's not my proudest moment. But in my defense,
Speaker 1: even though I am a clothes person, I don't think
Speaker 1: I owned a pair of jeans of any flavor from
Speaker 1: about until like two years ago. Like that's just never
Speaker 1: been my things. So that's that's my excuse paltry, though
Speaker 1: it may be that I just never examined Levi Strouse.
Speaker 1: If it makes you feel better, I thought Hannah Barbera
Speaker 1: was one person. It was a woman. Oh no, that'd
Speaker 1: be funny, but no. So Levi was born Lub Strauss
Speaker 1: on February eighteen twenty nine in Budenheim, Germany. His father,
Speaker 1: Hersch Strauss, was a salesman who sold household goods store
Speaker 1: to door. His mother's name was Rebecca has Strauss, and
Speaker 1: both she and Hersh grew up in Franconia. It's an
Speaker 1: area in the north of modern day Bavaria which was
Speaker 1: predominantly Jewish. Rebecca was Hersh's second wife. His first wife,
Speaker 1: Martel Bauman Strauss, had died at the age of thirty five,
Speaker 1: leaving him with five children. Then Hersh and Rebecca had
Speaker 1: two more children together, a daughter, and then Lub and Hersh.
Speaker 1: Rebecca and their seven children lived in a three room
Speaker 1: downstairs floor of a two story house. So this was
Speaker 1: a time when Bavaria's udn Addict or jew law was
Speaker 1: in effect that had started in the eighteen teens. In
Speaker 1: this law seemed as though it offered Jewish citizens the
Speaker 1: opportunity to pursue a number of jobs that had once
Speaker 1: been forbidden to them, but in return it also created
Speaker 1: really strict regulations for their lives. Among them, marriage and
Speaker 1: immigration of new Jews was severely limited. All Jews had
Speaker 1: to be registered, they had to take German names, they
Speaker 1: could not own land, and even their language was codified
Speaker 1: so all public records had to be kept in German.
Speaker 1: They could not use Hebrew. For those someone like Hersh Strauss,
Speaker 1: who traveled through the area selling his wares, also served
Speaker 1: as messengers and as community connectors during this time, and
Speaker 1: in this profession, Kursh was sort of exempted from a
Speaker 1: part of the Union edict. Working as a peddler, which
Speaker 1: had been a traditional job for Jewish Men in the
Speaker 1: area for a long time, was no longer considered an
Speaker 1: acceptable career, but older people like Hirsh who weren't able
Speaker 1: to pick up a new profession were allowed to keep
Speaker 1: doing it. Yeah, it was expected that they would just
Speaker 1: eventually die off, and so would that profession, and all
Speaker 1: of the limitations of the Union Addict eventually inspired emigration.
Speaker 1: One of the marriage laws that really created a problem
Speaker 1: was that only the eldest son of any Jewish household
Speaker 1: could get married, and so there were some workarounds, like
Speaker 1: if another son that was younger wanted to marry a
Speaker 1: widow that was acceptable, or if a couple that had
Speaker 1: no children wanted to give up the slot, their eldest
Speaker 1: son would have had to another family so they could
Speaker 1: have two sons. Mary they could, but basically this really
Speaker 1: limited the entire societal culture because all of these young
Speaker 1: women could not get married, all of these young men
Speaker 1: could not get married. It was frustrating. So eventually they
Speaker 1: wanted to leave, and in eighteen thirty seven there was
Speaker 1: a group of eighteen people that left. Eighteen young people
Speaker 1: and two of Lub's older siblings were part of that.
Speaker 1: They left Germany to make homes in London and New York.
Speaker 1: In nineteen forty nine, one two more of the Straw's
Speaker 1: children followed suit. In eighteen forty six, first died of tuberculess.
Speaker 1: Rebecca remarried soon after to hersh's brother, who was a
Speaker 1: widower named Lippman, but Lippmann died just a few weeks
Speaker 1: after the wedding. Lub was seventeen at that time and
Speaker 1: two of his sisters were still living at home. An
Speaker 1: immigration at this point was not easy. You couldn't just
Speaker 1: pick up and leave. The Bavarian government had to approve
Speaker 1: anyone who wished to leave the country, and you had
Speaker 1: to prove that neither you nor anyone in your family
Speaker 1: had any sort of criminal record, and that you could
Speaker 1: afford to make the trip. On March seventeenth, eighteen forty seven,
Speaker 1: Rebecca Strouss filed an immigration petition in which she stated
Speaker 1: that because she was a wi know she didn't have
Speaker 1: the financial support anymore. She didn't know how she would
Speaker 1: provide for her youngest son, but she had children in
Speaker 1: the United States who could help her get settled there.
Speaker 1: Lib was old enough to work and contribute to the
Speaker 1: family's finances once they arrived, and for his part, Lub
Speaker 1: wrote his own petition stating quote, no members of my
Speaker 1: family will stay behind. I will share the faith that
Speaker 1: has been assigned to me with them in foreign lands.
Speaker 1: I thus joined my mother and her plea. On June seven,
Speaker 1: Rebecca and her children, so Lib and his two sisters
Speaker 1: were approved for immigration, but they didn't leave immediately because
Speaker 1: Rebecca needed to make sure that the family that had
Speaker 1: gone on to New York had indeed made preparations for
Speaker 1: the three of them to arrive and live there. They
Speaker 1: finally made their way in the spring of eighteen forty eight,
Speaker 1: although the specifics of their transatlantic passage aren't really documented
Speaker 1: or known. Jonas and Louis Strauss, Lib's brothers had both
Speaker 1: become dry goods merchants in the city. They had opened
Speaker 1: up a shop at three and a half Grand Street,
Speaker 1: but by the time the family arrived, they had moved
Speaker 1: to a more lucrative location at two oh three and
Speaker 1: a half Division Street. They lived above the shop. Jonas
Speaker 1: had also gotten married and started his own family, and
Speaker 1: at some point Lub followed the example that his siblings
Speaker 1: had and he changed his name to a more Americanized version.
Speaker 1: This was not uncommon, uh, and in the eighteen fifty
Speaker 1: censes he is listed as Levi with a Y. He
Speaker 1: also started working in the family dry goods business. While
Speaker 1: he was there, he learned English really quickly so that
Speaker 1: he could speak with business partners and customers, and he
Speaker 1: applied for U S citizenship, just as his brothers had
Speaker 1: done before him. The Strouse's dry goods business was doing
Speaker 1: really well. They moved to another new location near Union
Speaker 1: Market in eighteen fifty one, and as their family business
Speaker 1: was growing, a new opportunity was making itself apparent across
Speaker 1: the country as the California Gold Rush fostered New Town's
Speaker 1: new prosperity and a need for dry goods. The Strauss
Speaker 1: brothers did not want to miss a chance to capitalize
Speaker 1: on this new market, but they also needed to keep
Speaker 1: their established New York business going, and so the youngest
Speaker 1: brother of the family was sent west. Five days after
Speaker 1: he took his oath of citizenship. On January one, eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty three, Lob Strauss, who was now going by Levi,
Speaker 1: left New York for San Francisco aboard the U. S
Speaker 1: Mail ship Georgia, which was a steamer, and the family
Speaker 1: had already loaded a shipment of merchandise aboard another ship
Speaker 1: called the Winged Racer for Levi to take possession of.
Speaker 1: Once he reached San Francisco. The clipper Winged Racer was
Speaker 1: sailing down around the tip of South America and then
Speaker 1: north to California. Levi would make the trip in less time,
Speaker 1: traveling through Panama. This was, of course, before the Panama
Speaker 1: Canal was built, so he took the steamer Georgia to
Speaker 1: Panama and then traveled across that thin strip of the
Speaker 1: country to Panama City on the Pacific side. It got
Speaker 1: on another steamer there called the Isthmus and that was
Speaker 1: bound for San Francisco. He arrived in San Francisco on
Speaker 1: March thirteenth, eighteen fifty three. This was considered for a
Speaker 1: lot of people a safer plan than trying to travel
Speaker 1: overland from New York to San Francisco because uh, people
Speaker 1: often did not survive that journey, or if they did
Speaker 1: get to California, they got there in pretty sorry shape. Uh.
Speaker 1: This was a little bit of an easier move, and
Speaker 1: the specifics of Levi's first days in San Francisco are
Speaker 1: also unknown. He would have needed to rent warehouse space
Speaker 1: for the goods that were coming in on the winged Racer,
Speaker 1: and he would have needed to find lodgings for himself.
Speaker 1: He most likely had some letters of introduction to family
Speaker 1: connections that had already made that journey west, so it
Speaker 1: wasn't as though he just showed up and had to
Speaker 1: figure everything out by himself. He had some security net
Speaker 1: in place that merchandise that had been shipped showed up
Speaker 1: two weeks after Leavi did on March, Unlike other merchants
Speaker 1: who had to bid on merchandise that was shipped on
Speaker 1: spec once it got to the port at San Francisco,
Speaker 1: Leavin knew what was coming. He just had to inspect it,
Speaker 1: accept it, and then move it into the warehouse. As
Speaker 1: I got to know the market in California, he could
Speaker 1: ensure that future shipments contained items that would be the
Speaker 1: most likely to move and to make the most money.
Speaker 1: And for clarity, the Strouss were not opening a retail
Speaker 1: shop in San Francisco, even though they had sort of
Speaker 1: a similar one in New York. They were basically setting
Speaker 1: up a wholesale business that would sell stock to other
Speaker 1: merchants for their shops. So Levi had to invest time
Speaker 1: in developing really good relationships with other businessmen in the area,
Speaker 1: and he was twenty four at this point. He wasn't
Speaker 1: supporting a wife or family, so aside from attending synagogue
Speaker 1: and participating in social events primarily within San Francisco's Jewish community,
Speaker 1: all of his efforts could be focused on establishing the
Speaker 1: family's new West Coast firm. And he wasn't only working
Speaker 1: with retailers in San Francisco either. He also traveled inland
Speaker 1: to Sacramento, and he paid visits to smaller mining towns
Speaker 1: to make deals with the shopkeepers there, and this was
Speaker 1: an ongoing practice for the business that he pretty much
Speaker 1: carried out forever. So when news broke of new or
Speaker 1: strikes or a new town popping up, Strauss was smart
Speaker 1: enough to go get into those towns that sprouted up
Speaker 1: in those places really quickly and forged those new business partnerships.
Speaker 1: Coming up, we'll talk more about how Levi Strouss set
Speaker 1: up the Strouss family business in San Francisco, but first
Speaker 1: we will take a little break for a word from
Speaker 1: a sponsor. So Levi quickly established a list of regular clientele,
Speaker 1: and even as he had received shipment of that first
Speaker 1: load of freight that his brothers had sent, there were
Speaker 1: already two other shipments on the way. He was doing
Speaker 1: business ostensibly for the company that his brother founded, which
Speaker 1: was J. Strauss and Brother, but he was invoicing clients
Speaker 1: sort of as a separate business as just Levi Strauss.
Speaker 1: In July etive, Levi sent a shipment of gold back
Speaker 1: to his brothers. This was valued at a little over
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars at the time, which is estimated to
Speaker 1: be close to a quarter of a million dollars in
Speaker 1: modern currency. Of course, it's really difficult to make those estimates. Clearly,
Speaker 1: the California office was doing really well. In spite of
Speaker 1: the fact that there was something of a financial panic
Speaker 1: going on in San Francisco that year, it didn't seem
Speaker 1: to impact Strauss. By the end of eighteen fifty five,
Speaker 1: he'd sent more than eighty thousand dollars home in gold. Yeah.
Speaker 1: One of the things that really made his business. It'll
Speaker 1: come up over and over that even when their difficulties,
Speaker 1: they still managed to pull through and even do pretty well.
Speaker 1: Like people will always need dry goods, they always need
Speaker 1: clothes and linen's and household basics. So it was a
Speaker 1: really smart business to be in in the first place.
Speaker 1: In eighteen fifty six saw continued expansion of the Strouss
Speaker 1: enterprise in California. Levis sister Fogla, who had changed her
Speaker 1: name to Fanny when she moved to the United States,
Speaker 1: moved to San Francisco with her husband, David Stearns, and
Speaker 1: their children to assist with the growing responsive elities of
Speaker 1: the business, and his brother Lewis also joined them. It
Speaker 1: is possible, though unconfirmed, that his mother, Rebecca, made the
Speaker 1: journey as well, and for the first time since moving
Speaker 1: to the US. Levi actually had a home with an
Speaker 1: address that was separate from his business, not living above
Speaker 1: it or within it, indicating that there was this ongoing
Speaker 1: trend of prosperity. The firm also changed names that year.
Speaker 1: It went from J. Strouss and Brother to J. Strouss
Speaker 1: Brother and Company, maybe to acknowledge Levi's contribution, but on
Speaker 1: all records in California it was listed as Levi Strausse.
Speaker 1: Levi sent more than double the amount to New York
Speaker 1: in eighteen fifty six that he had in eighteen five.
Speaker 1: That amounted to approximately two d thousand dollars. Eventually, in
Speaker 1: the late eighteen sixties, Levi changed the name of the
Speaker 1: California branch to Levi Strousse and Company, recognizing his family
Speaker 1: members contributions. Eighteen fifty six was also the year that
Speaker 1: Levi Strouss became involved, along with his brother in law,
Speaker 1: in the Committee of Vigilance, which was a vigilante group
Speaker 1: made up largely of merchants that formed a combat the
Speaker 1: city's growing political corruption and related violence. While business and
Speaker 1: politics had largely stayed separate up to that point, concerns
Speaker 1: over how businesses could be impacted by the lawlessness of
Speaker 1: men and power led to the Committee of Vigilance nominating
Speaker 1: and eventually electing many of the city's business leaders into
Speaker 1: political office. So they picked people that they knew from
Speaker 1: other merchants and put them in office because they thought
Speaker 1: that was safer. And while Strauss did not seem to
Speaker 1: have any political ambitions of his own, he did back
Speaker 1: the political efforts of the committee. Those committees that there
Speaker 1: were several of them and several places at this time period,
Speaker 1: and in some places their activities were kind of controversial
Speaker 1: because there was like an extra judicial violence capacity in
Speaker 1: this combat of corruption, so it's like there's a whole
Speaker 1: bigger story there. But his involvement was really about out
Speaker 1: electing businessmen to city positions, and there had actually been
Speaker 1: a similar committee in San Francisco several years prior to
Speaker 1: this that was much more of like a vigilante law
Speaker 1: force that thought that they would fill the gap between
Speaker 1: the crime that was going on and the police that
Speaker 1: were obviously to their minds, not doing anything about it.
Speaker 1: So that existed in San Francisco as well, although he
Speaker 1: was not part of that at the time. In eighteen
Speaker 1: fifties seven, the Strousse family experienced a financial loss. In September,
Speaker 1: the SS Central America, which had picked up passengers and
Speaker 1: freight in Panama, including a large shipment of gold, went
Speaker 1: down in a hurricane off the US coast in the Atlantic.
Speaker 1: More than four hundred people died and an estimated one
Speaker 1: point five million dollars of gold was lost, including seventy
Speaker 1: six thousand dollars that was en route to J. Strouss
Speaker 1: brother and Company from Levi Strouss and Company. Incidentally, the
Speaker 1: wreckage of the Central America was found and much of
Speaker 1: the treasure recovered in although there was a significant legal
Speaker 1: battle over who should get that gold. The thinking of
Speaker 1: the Central America set off a financial panic. There was
Speaker 1: a lot of gold that New York banks had been
Speaker 1: expecting on that ship, so when it didn't show up
Speaker 1: that was It was a significant economic disruption. And yet,
Speaker 1: as seems to be the pattern of his life, Levi
Speaker 1: Strauss weathered this storm. Part of this was because his
Speaker 1: brothers were the ones shipping him good so that meant
Speaker 1: he didn't have to reassure a supplier of his good
Speaker 1: credit and be like, no, no, I know, I lost
Speaker 1: some money, but I will make it up to you.
Speaker 1: They were like yeah, we'll just keep it going. So
Speaker 1: the Strauss family continued business as usual, and because other
Speaker 1: entrepreneurs didn't have the credit or the leverage to do
Speaker 1: the same thing, Levi's business flourished as others shut down.
Speaker 1: By the end of the year, he was shipping gold
Speaker 1: to New York once again, and he had expanded to
Speaker 1: have offices in the city that were actually separate from
Speaker 1: his warehouse. He was also taking shipments of raw materials
Speaker 1: from suppliers outside the family, which he then leveraged in
Speaker 1: deals that got him discounts on the goods that were
Speaker 1: made from those raw materials. As the country found itself
Speaker 1: in the grip of the Civil War, San Francisco's citizens
Speaker 1: realized they could eventually be impacted by it. California had
Speaker 1: entered the Union as a free state, as outlined in
Speaker 1: the Compromise of eighteen fifty, but while most of the
Speaker 1: city was loyal to the Union, there were some concerns
Speaker 1: about some government officials wanting to ally with the Confederacy.
Speaker 1: After a pro Union rally in the city on May eleventh,
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty one, at the junction of Montgomery Market and
Speaker 1: Post Streets, a resolution was put forth that formed a
Speaker 1: Union Committee of thirty four. This is a committee of
Speaker 1: respected men who would uphold the ideals of the Union,
Speaker 1: phil vacant government posts, and keep an eye out for treason.
Speaker 1: Levi Strauss was one of the men named as a
Speaker 1: member of this group, and one of only three Jewish
Speaker 1: men included. Yeah, they were very worried that there were
Speaker 1: people that were infiltry in California who were pro slavery,
Speaker 1: and that it was gonna completely cause an upheaval of
Speaker 1: everything going on in the state, and particularly in a
Speaker 1: large city like San Francisco. So they really wanted to
Speaker 1: try to keep an eye out and prevent such a problem.
Speaker 1: And when the troops that were stationed at the Presidio
Speaker 1: were sent east to fight, it really left the people
Speaker 1: of San Francisco a little bit uneasy and they were
Speaker 1: fearful without protection, and the volunteer group known as the
Speaker 1: Home Guard was founded that consisted of three thousand men
Speaker 1: and it sort of served as a makeshift military force.
Speaker 1: The Home Guard and the Union Committee of thirty four
Speaker 1: actually disbanded though, when Leland Stanford was elected California Governor.
Speaker 1: Stanford was a pro union Republican who was very well
Speaker 1: respected successful and powerful, so the concerns of some sort
Speaker 1: of pro Confederacy uprising that had led to the formation
Speaker 1: of those two groups were pretty diminished under his leadership.
Speaker 1: Strauss and his California business continued to do well through
Speaker 1: all of this, and the prosperity of California's merchants helped
Speaker 1: keep the country of floats through the Civil War. Strauss
Speaker 1: had recognized the value of real estate fairly early on
Speaker 1: and had invested in a number of properties throughout the city,
Speaker 1: which he often sold as a profit after holding them
Speaker 1: for some time. Levi Strauss and Company also moved into
Speaker 1: a new space that he purchased in eighteen sixty seven.
Speaker 1: This was a four story building on Battery Street that
Speaker 1: clearly showed the company's success. The company was known for
Speaker 1: its excellent and speedy service and the ability of its
Speaker 1: employees to satisfy client needs with even the largest orders. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a write up where they actually used the
Speaker 1: word empowered to describe the salespeople and clerks at Levi
Speaker 1: Strouse as being able, like they were empowered to meet
Speaker 1: the needs and agree to deals with clients, which is
Speaker 1: sort of a weird word to be using in the
Speaker 1: eighteen sixties, but there it was. Unfortunately, the late eighteen
Speaker 1: sixties also came with family loss, as Levi's half sister
Speaker 1: Mary died in eighteen sixty six and his mother, Rebecca
Speaker 1: passed three years later. After Rebecca's death, Levi traveled back
Speaker 1: to New York, and he stayed there for a month,
Speaker 1: presumably to help settle accounts and get her affairs in order.
Speaker 1: There was also an embezzlement scandal at Levi, strouss and
Speaker 1: Company in October of eighteen sixty six, when news broke
Speaker 1: that a bookkeeper had taken five hundred thousand dollars and
Speaker 1: left the country. While the company, not wanting to scare
Speaker 1: away business partners, said that there was no money missing,
Speaker 1: it also made a statement in an advertisement that the
Speaker 1: man in question, G. S. Goodman, was no longer with
Speaker 1: the company it was not authorized to conduct business on
Speaker 1: behalf of Levi Stroussing Company. This mix of messages seemed
Speaker 1: to blow over. While Mr Goodman never saw any retribution
Speaker 1: of the fact that he had taken money from his
Speaker 1: employer quite a lot of money from his employer, neither
Speaker 1: the company nor Levi strousse personally seemed to suffer any
Speaker 1: negative fallout from it either. Yeah, that's one of those
Speaker 1: stories where it's like they completely claimed that it had
Speaker 1: not happened, so there is no record of it happening.
Speaker 1: But then the fact that they're also like, but also
Speaker 1: if you talk to that guy, he doesn't work for
Speaker 1: us anymore. Um, you know, it does seem like it's
Speaker 1: a little bit of a weird combination of things to
Speaker 1: put out in the press. The company continued explosive growth
Speaker 1: right into the eighteen seventies as Levi, who obviously had
Speaker 1: an impressive business instinct, realized that he needed to expand
Speaker 1: into international markets. At that point, his business had expanded
Speaker 1: to supply merchants all along the Western Seaboard and into
Speaker 1: Oregon and Montana, but he was also expanding farther into
Speaker 1: the American Southwest, and then he started to reach out
Speaker 1: to potential clients in Canada, Mexico, and Hawaii. Coming up,
Speaker 1: we're going to dive into the thing that the Levi
Speaker 1: Strouths name is most closely associated with today, which is
Speaker 1: blue jeans. First, we're gonna have a quick sponsor break.
Speaker 1: Jacob Davis, who presumably started at his yakub and americanized
Speaker 1: his name when he got here. Was also a Jewish immigrant,
Speaker 1: and he had moved to the United States from Russia
Speaker 1: as a young man. He, like Levi, also worked in
Speaker 1: dry goods as a cutter and a tailor, although he
Speaker 1: had also dabbled in the brewery business and some other enterprises.
Speaker 1: He was also an inventor. He had developed a screw
Speaker 1: based clothing fastener and ironing board that could also stretch clothes,
Speaker 1: and a folding press, and those last two items were
Speaker 1: granted patents, but that fastener was not. Jacob had also
Speaker 1: expanded his tailoring work to make tents and wagon covers
Speaker 1: to capitalize on a need for those kinds of goods
Speaker 1: in mining towns in Nevada, where he lived, he started
Speaker 1: making very sturdy, long lasting trousers for laborers out of
Speaker 1: duck and Denham. Duck is like a very densely woven cloth,
Speaker 1: and he eventually, on the suggestion of a relative, started
Speaker 1: buying his duck yardage from Levi strap Us in company. Yeah,
Speaker 1: duck is usually compared to like a very densely woven canvas. Almost.
Speaker 1: It's a It's one of those things that people still
Speaker 1: make work clothes out of. Sometimes I don't love it.
Speaker 1: It's a little stiff for my taste. It's very sturdy.
Speaker 1: It will last you a long time. And to please
Speaker 1: one of his tailoring customers who came in to order
Speaker 1: work pants for her husband, who apparently wore through them
Speaker 1: at a pretty good clip, Davis used rivets to reinforce
Speaker 1: the pockets. The story goes that the wife came in
Speaker 1: because she said, my husband is worn not all his
Speaker 1: pants and cannot leave the house. I have to come
Speaker 1: to place this order. Um. So she had to go
Speaker 1: back with a piece of string and mark like his
Speaker 1: waistline and other measurements, and then bring it back to
Speaker 1: the shop and she was delighted. It appeared her husband
Speaker 1: was delighted. Jacob later saw her husband around town wearing
Speaker 1: these pants, so it seemed like everything was going great.
Speaker 1: And he included that detail, those riveted pockets on a
Speaker 1: number of other pairs of pants because people started to
Speaker 1: see these pants in town and asked where they came
Speaker 1: from and could they also get the same ones, And
Speaker 1: so he started making these pants with duck canvas and
Speaker 1: riveted pockets for more and more people. As the riveted
Speaker 1: pants pocket became popular with his customers, Davis decided he
Speaker 1: should patent them, but that was a really expensive process,
Speaker 1: and the story goes that his wife didn't want him
Speaker 1: to spend money that they didn't have trying to do it.
Speaker 1: So along with a payment on an invoice that he
Speaker 1: sent to Levi Strauss in company, he also sent two
Speaker 1: pairs of pants with the proposition that the company apply
Speaker 1: for the patent in his name and in return he
Speaker 1: would give the company half the rights to sell the pants.
Speaker 1: This is like the most trusting move I can possibly
Speaker 1: imagine someone doing. I know, here's this thing I invented.
Speaker 1: I would like you to help me patent. By the way,
Speaker 1: it's not patented yet, but here it is yet. Especially
Speaker 1: having been working on this day in history class and
Speaker 1: recently recording episodes on people like Filo Farnsworth and Nicola Tesla, like,
Speaker 1: there are so many stories about a big business that's like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take this patent from you for no money
Speaker 1: and exploited um. In a lecture that I was watching
Speaker 1: online of Levi Strouss, biographer whose book I used for
Speaker 1: a lot of this, she was saying, like to her,
Speaker 1: this really indicates how trustworthy Levi Strouss was perceived to
Speaker 1: be by people that I just knew his name, like,
Speaker 1: he just had this reputation for being a really honest
Speaker 1: and good man, and so this person completely trusted him
Speaker 1: with his invention, and there it went. And Strauss was
Speaker 1: no fool. He went for the idea really quickly. Uh
Speaker 1: He wrote up an agreement that gave the company Levi
Speaker 1: Straus and Company exclusive rights to sell the pants on
Speaker 1: the West Coast, and that quote rights outside of the
Speaker 1: Pacific Coast and territory shall be equally divided between ourselves
Speaker 1: and Davis. Davis agreed to these terms and made it
Speaker 1: very clear that this was not just about the rivets,
Speaker 1: it was also about the cut and can instruction. He
Speaker 1: offered to oversee the manufacture of the pants, either in
Speaker 1: New York or in San Francisco, whichever Strauss preferred, and
Speaker 1: the first patent application filed on behalf of Davis was
Speaker 1: rejected on the basis that the military had been using
Speaker 1: rivets in the construction of shoes already and so that
Speaker 1: just using them on pockets was really not an innovation.
Speaker 1: Strauss did not accept this. He hired lawyers who specialized
Speaker 1: in patent law to appeal the case, but it was
Speaker 1: once again rejected. In early eighteen seventy three, Strauss and
Speaker 1: Davis were preparing another go at a patent for these
Speaker 1: riveted pants. Jacob Davis and his family moved to San Francisco.
Speaker 1: In May, a revised version of their application was submitted,
Speaker 1: this time with more detail about the distinction between the
Speaker 1: riveting that they were using on clothes and the way
Speaker 1: that rivets had been used on shoes. Just a few
Speaker 1: weeks later, on May twenty, eighteen seventy three, the patent
Speaker 1: was issued. Strauss paid Davis for the value of his
Speaker 1: home and store in Reno, Nevada, and the Davis has
Speaker 1: made their move to San Francisco permanent so that Jacobs
Speaker 1: could oversee production of this new line of riveted trousers.
Speaker 1: Strouss later sold this back to Davis for a dollar
Speaker 1: and he flipped it. Yeah, it was a couple of
Speaker 1: years later that Davis bought back his house and shopping Reno,
Speaker 1: and I think it was only like three months after
Speaker 1: that that he sold it. And at the time, they
Speaker 1: marketed these new pants as overalls, and that word did
Speaker 1: not have the connotation of bib overalls that it would
Speaker 1: have today. Uh, they were sometimes called waste overalls. Like
Speaker 1: basically part of that was because you could wear them
Speaker 1: over other pants, um, but people wore them without pants
Speaker 1: underneath it as well. The first batches went out in
Speaker 1: June of eighteen seventy three, so that was just a
Speaker 1: month after the patent was approved. At nineteen fifty per
Speaker 1: dozen pair, so nineteen dollars fifty cents for a dozen
Speaker 1: of them. This was a substantial increase over previous market
Speaker 1: prices for similar garments, more than a dollar more than
Speaker 1: individual purchasers were used to seeing. So for a merchant
Speaker 1: that was the middleman to have to pay that much
Speaker 1: per pant was significant. They really had to explain, No,
Speaker 1: these are gonna last you so long. They are way
Speaker 1: stronger and better than other pants. Strauss opened up a
Speaker 1: new factory location so they can start more serious production.
Speaker 1: The following month, he placed an ad for first class
Speaker 1: female sewing machine operators. These operators had to bring their
Speaker 1: own sewing machines that were suitable for heavy work. Yeah
Speaker 1: he even uh. In the advertisement they laid out which
Speaker 1: sewing machine models would be acceptable and if you didn't
Speaker 1: have one of those, don't apply for the job. Uh
Speaker 1: Soon Levi Strauss and Company also started selling riveted duck
Speaker 1: coats for hunting, and by the end of eighteen seventy
Speaker 1: three they had sold an estimated twenty thousand garments. The
Speaker 1: pants that they were making at the beginning bore pretty
Speaker 1: much all the characteristics we see on Levi's today, although
Speaker 1: they have shifted in style a little. It so they
Speaker 1: had copper rivets, they had that mustard orange thread for stitching,
Speaker 1: and the curvy, shallow V stitching on the back pocket.
Speaker 1: The year after Levi and Jacob's Riveted overalls hit the market,
Speaker 1: Levi was named by the New York Times as one
Speaker 1: of San Francisco's millionaires. He had also set up the company,
Speaker 1: which was basically functioning on its own as a separate
Speaker 1: entity from j. Strouss brother in company. It's a co
Speaker 1: partnership with his brothers so that they would have power
Speaker 1: of attorney and be able to make decisions about the business.
Speaker 1: And the event that he was not able to, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he kind of realized this has grown massive, and I
Speaker 1: can't be the only one who makes decisions if something
Speaker 1: goes awry. And that same year, Levi Strauss also sued
Speaker 1: a competitor who started using rivets in the construction of
Speaker 1: their pants. That other manufacturer, A. B. L. Felt In Company,
Speaker 1: pulled all the product that they had made from shelves
Speaker 1: once that suit was filed, but Strauss continued the legal
Speaker 1: action anyway in order to deter others from infringing on
Speaker 1: the patent. Just a couple of years later, Levi Strauss
Speaker 1: and his brothers set up an East Coast factory under
Speaker 1: Jacob Davis's supervision to make riveted goods. But in late
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy six, another manufacturer, H. W. King and Company
Speaker 1: started making riveted goods as well. Levi Strauss saw his
Speaker 1: company's numbers drop even as they brought an infringement suit
Speaker 1: against this other company. After a four year legal battle,
Speaker 1: the case was decided in favor of Levi Strauss and Company. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a long time for that to drag out, but
Speaker 1: they were like, nope, we're going to do it eventually.
Speaker 1: They did start as their you know, patents did not
Speaker 1: last forever, and they started realizing that they had to
Speaker 1: do branding so that their genes were completely recognizable from
Speaker 1: others and people could ask for them by look. That's
Speaker 1: how they developed their logo. They kind of knew they
Speaker 1: couldn't stave off other people using rivets forever. Uh So
Speaker 1: they've got very savvy about how they presented their clothes.
Speaker 1: There were also two more deaths in the Strouss family
Speaker 1: in eighteen seventy four. Levi's brother in law and senior partner,
Speaker 1: David Stern, died in January and in August. One of
Speaker 1: David's sons, who was just eighteen, died for reasons that
Speaker 1: have been lost to the historical record. And even as
Speaker 1: there were losses, the family also continued to grow through
Speaker 1: marriage and children, and it reached a point where fourteen
Speaker 1: people were all living in Strauss's house, including himself, so
Speaker 1: they moved to a larger home on Leavenworth Street. In
Speaker 1: the eighteen seventies, Chinese immigrants in California were being viewed
Speaker 1: with increasing hostility as they competed for jobs with white
Speaker 1: labors in the same market with fewer and fewer opportunities.
Speaker 1: In eighteen seventy six, Strauss was named in an expose
Speaker 1: that appeared in the Daily Morning Call. The claim was
Speaker 1: that Strauss was employing five hundred Chinese workers. A rebuttal
Speaker 1: appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle. The following day, saying
Speaker 1: that the company employed exactly one Chinese person and that
Speaker 1: that person was in a position the white laborers had
Speaker 1: quote again and again tried and failed to do. That
Speaker 1: position was cutting the dense fabrics that were used to
Speaker 1: make these overalls. Generally, Levi Strauss and Company, like a
Speaker 1: lot of manufacturers at the time, really stressed in their
Speaker 1: advertising that their goods were made by white labor. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this was a whole problematic thing. We're going to talk
Speaker 1: about it a little more in a moment, but we
Speaker 1: have talked before also on the show, about the racism
Speaker 1: that became rampant, particularly on the West Coast of the
Speaker 1: United States during this time, towards Asian immigrants. Uh. And
Speaker 1: he continued to do business with Chinese merchants. He did
Speaker 1: not seem to have an aversion to them at all
Speaker 1: or be racist towards them in terms of business partnerships.
Speaker 1: But he kind of knew that if he was like, yes,
Speaker 1: I hired Chinese labors, that it would tank the company
Speaker 1: because people would not trust him anymore. So he was
Speaker 1: complicit in this whole system. But that doesn't seem to
Speaker 1: reflect like a personal outward racism, right Uh And In
Speaker 1: eighteen eighty he worked on the committee that arranged the
Speaker 1: San Francisco visit of President Rutherford B. Hayes. This was
Speaker 1: kind of funny because it was reported that Mr. And
Speaker 1: Mrs Levi Strousse attended a dinner in the President's honor,
Speaker 1: But Levi never got married, so it is unclear if
Speaker 1: he had taken a female relative to this event or
Speaker 1: an acquaintance, or if the paper simply got the facts wrong.
Speaker 1: In January of eighteen eighty one, the San Francisco bullet
Speaker 1: And published the details of Levi Strouss's funeral. There's one problem,
Speaker 1: he was very much alive at this point. Initially this
Speaker 1: sounds like a really funny mix up, but it was
Speaker 1: actually a really sad moment. Levi's brother Louis had been
Speaker 1: the one who had died, and the paper had to
Speaker 1: publish a correction the next day. Three years later, the
Speaker 1: Strouss's sister, Fanny, who had been very close to Levi,
Speaker 1: also died, and the oldest sibling and founder of the
Speaker 1: family business, Jonah Strouss, died in eighteen eighty five. Of
Speaker 1: Like Levi, his siblings had also been really involved in
Speaker 1: philanthropic work. Yeah, we're going to talk about his philanthropy
Speaker 1: in just a moment, but all of their obituaries talk
Speaker 1: about all of the places that they donated both money
Speaker 1: and time, all of the causes they supported. It definitely
Speaker 1: was a family affair in terms of like wanting a
Speaker 1: better community and a better future for the children that
Speaker 1: would come after. Another devastating loss came in eighteen nine
Speaker 1: three when Levi's nephew, Nathan, who had been running the
Speaker 1: New York offices for the firm, shot himself in his
Speaker 1: office bathroom. And while it eventually came out that he
Speaker 1: had lost a good bit of money, it was never
Speaker 1: discovered exactly how that had happened. There were certainly lots
Speaker 1: of rumors about how it might have happened, but there
Speaker 1: is no clear evidence as to actually what had led
Speaker 1: him to that moment. In nine hundred, Levi, Strauss and
Speaker 1: Company printed its first catalog. The business seemed to have
Speaker 1: no limit to its potential at this point. He weathered
Speaker 1: a labor strike that took place throughout the city that year.
Speaker 1: In two he also joined with other community leaders to
Speaker 1: speak out against making the provisions of the two Geary
Speaker 1: Act permanent. The Geary Act had extended the provisions of
Speaker 1: the eighteen eighty two Chinese Exclusion Act, and we've talked
Speaker 1: about the Chinese Exclusion Act on the show before. Uh
Speaker 1: the telegram that was sent by Strauss and his colleagues
Speaker 1: to Washington d C. Stated that barring legitimate Chinese merchants
Speaker 1: was an injustice. This plea did not have the desired effect,
Speaker 1: though the extension of the Geary Act came through. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and there's discussion of just how much this was like
Speaker 1: an activist moment versus you're stupid to turn away business
Speaker 1: that's going to help our country and particularly our community grow.
Speaker 1: But he did speak out against it, even though that
Speaker 1: did not play out the way they had hoped. In
Speaker 1: September of nineteen o two, Levice Trouse was diagnosed after
Speaker 1: feeling a little unwell for a bit with a slight
Speaker 1: congestion of the liver, and it was believed that he
Speaker 1: was going to recover, and he did start to feel better,
Speaker 1: and two days after a doctor had visited and given
Speaker 1: him this diagnosis, Levi Strauss died after eating dinner with
Speaker 1: his family and then returning to bed. He was interred
Speaker 1: at the family mausoleum at the Home of Peace Cemetery
Speaker 1: after a funeral at his home, and his four surviving
Speaker 1: nephews inherited the business and his fortune. His nieces each
Speaker 1: received a significant sum to be given directly to them
Speaker 1: and not to their spouses or other male relatives for management.
Speaker 1: That was something that one of his brothers had done
Speaker 1: as well. And he also left money to all of
Speaker 1: the various charities that he had worked with over the years.
Speaker 1: So I will tell you, and if you have listened
Speaker 1: to this podcast for any period of time, you can
Speaker 1: understand why as I researched this episode, I kept waiting
Speaker 1: for the other shoe to drop, because we have so
Speaker 1: many instances of really interesting seeming people that then in
Speaker 1: the course of actually digging into their biography we find
Speaker 1: out some horrifying thing that they did or were a
Speaker 1: part of. Here's the secret evil. I didn't think I
Speaker 1: was signing up for with this r right, Oh, I
Speaker 1: thought this was like, no, they're horrible. Um. And while
Speaker 1: Levi Strouss was certainly a shrewd businessman who did look
Speaker 1: after the interests of his company, he also seems to
Speaker 1: have been a genuinely nice and pretty good human being.
Speaker 1: Surely not faultless, but I kept expecting some horrific thing
Speaker 1: to appear and it didn't. Yeah, we've got plenty of
Speaker 1: things that, like we said, we're problematic, like being like,
Speaker 1: oh no, we only employ white people. That yeah, that
Speaker 1: that's not great. But also it was not a case
Speaker 1: of like, let me literally enslave people in the basement,
Speaker 1: which seems like that's more often than not the story
Speaker 1: we accidentally wind up telling. Um. In his Prosperity, Levi
Speaker 1: strouss upheld the Jewish ideology of benevolence. He donated money
Speaker 1: to worthy causes in the San Francisco community. Both the
Speaker 1: was run by various iterations of Jewish benevolent associations and
Speaker 1: non Jewish charities as well. Yeah, he actually started donating
Speaker 1: money almost as soon as he started making money after
Speaker 1: he moved to California. Um it seemed to have been
Speaker 1: just something that was deeply important to him, and in
Speaker 1: the eighteen sixties he donated to the U. S. Sanitary
Speaker 1: Commission to help clean up union camps to minimize the
Speaker 1: rampant disease there. He advocated for and participated in a
Speaker 1: shutdown of businesses in San Francisco on election day. On
Speaker 1: November eight, eighteen sixty four. That was the election that
Speaker 1: Lincoln won for what would have been his second term.
Speaker 1: He was also one of the founders of the Concordia Society,
Speaker 1: which began in January of eighteen sixty five, which was
Speaker 1: a place where Jewish leaders and professionals could gather for
Speaker 1: social and educational events. Strauss was the club's first vice president. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was another one of those institutions that was really
Speaker 1: forward facing in terms of like looking to the future.
Speaker 1: They also wanted to make sure that uh young Jewish
Speaker 1: professionals could come in and learn from mentours and get
Speaker 1: a support system to help them succeed. And he became
Speaker 1: increasingly involved in community government and politics over the years.
Speaker 1: He seemed to think it was his responsibility as a
Speaker 1: successful person. He was a vocal supporter of the Hawaiian
Speaker 1: Reciprocity Treaty of eighteen seventy five, which removed tariffs on
Speaker 1: goods traded between the Kingdom of Hawaii and the US,
Speaker 1: and he also advocated for building regulations that would reduce
Speaker 1: the risk of fire spreading in the increasingly tightly packed city.
Speaker 1: He had had some fires himself that impacted his properties
Speaker 1: and so of course those efforts had benefit to other people,
Speaker 1: but they also benefited his personal business. He also drummed
Speaker 1: up donations for the Garfield Monument Fund Association, donated to orphanages,
Speaker 1: and helped set up the Labor Exchange, which was a
Speaker 1: group that was intended to help the unemployed men of
Speaker 1: the city make connections to find temporary and parliament work.
Speaker 1: He also became heavily involved in the Society for the
Speaker 1: Prevention of Cruelty to Children, which was incorporated in eighteen
Speaker 1: seventy six. He served in one leader ship role or
Speaker 1: another with the organization for the rest of his life.
Speaker 1: That was a particularly important one to him. Uh and
Speaker 1: as the eight nineties had moved on, Strauss had stayed busy,
Speaker 1: even though he was going through a lot of family
Speaker 1: tragedy at the time. He was working with other merchants
Speaker 1: and civic leaders to actualize infrastructure projects, including a railroad
Speaker 1: to compete with the Southern Pacific. He knew that a
Speaker 1: city that was appealing to new residents would mean sustained
Speaker 1: growth for the businesses there, so he was constantly donating
Speaker 1: both his personal money and on behalf of Levi Straussing
Speaker 1: Company to the creation of things like parks or the
Speaker 1: improvement of public spaces, and he supported efforts like the
Speaker 1: Pioneer Kindergarten Society because he knew that educating children was
Speaker 1: a vital part of making a future for the city.
Speaker 1: He was not only interested in early childhood education, though.
Speaker 1: He also donated to the University of California, Berkeley so
Speaker 1: they could keep their library open longer hours, and he
Speaker 1: created a scholarship fund at that school that Levi Strouss
Speaker 1: Scholarship continues to this day. One of strouss As employees,
Speaker 1: named Henry Richmond, later wrote of him, quote, Mr. Strouss
Speaker 1: was very quiet, affable, always immaculately dressed. Yeah, and he apparently,
Speaker 1: uh did not like to be called Mr. Strauss. He
Speaker 1: wanted everybody to just call him Levi. He seems like
Speaker 1: a lovely, lovely gentleman. And I also wanted to include
Speaker 1: as our final note a point of trivia related to
Speaker 1: one of our previous episodes, because Levi Strauss was a
Speaker 1: founding member of the Pacific Coast Auxiliary of the Jewish
Speaker 1: Publication Society of America, and another member of that group
Speaker 1: was Ferdinand Toklis, father of Alice B. Toklis. It's one
Speaker 1: of those moments where you just see all the history
Speaker 1: puzzle pieces starting to click together. Itsal connected, Yes, and
Speaker 1: Levi Strouss is so connected in many ways like that
Speaker 1: to California history because you know he was on all
Speaker 1: sorts of like public works committees and efforts with you know,
Speaker 1: people like Stanford and other other famed people that really
Speaker 1: formed a lot of the foundation of California as we
Speaker 1: know it today. Yeah, you have some listener mail for us.
Speaker 1: I do this listener mail is very exciting to me personally.
Speaker 1: You'll find out why in a second. Uh. It is
Speaker 1: from our listener, Karen, who writes, Dear Holly and Tracy,
Speaker 1: greetings from New York. Thank you for your wonderful podcast
Speaker 1: and all that you do. My name is Karen, and
Speaker 1: I'm a Swedish expat living in the US. Your podcast
Speaker 1: has been a great help in immersing myself in American
Speaker 1: history and culture. As a thank you, I wanted to
Speaker 1: send you a few pieces of Swedish history, especially since
Speaker 1: I know you have some interest in the history of fashion.
Speaker 1: These are three women's magazines from Sweden. An issue of
Speaker 1: Hemmett's Journal dated September ninety five, an issue of Whose
Speaker 1: Modern dated nineteen fifty two, and an Allah's dated nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty four. Side note, Hemmet's Journal was first published in
Speaker 1: nineteen twenty one and is still in print today. Aside
Speaker 1: from fun advertisements and fashion illustrations, these are a few
Speaker 1: of my favorite tidbits, and she points out some of
Speaker 1: the fun stuff to look for in there. Uh. This
Speaker 1: is one of those things that is so cool to me.
Speaker 1: I can't even quite deal with it. Hey. I kind
Speaker 1: of opened this parcel and went, I have to put
Speaker 1: this away because I have work to do, and if
Speaker 1: I actually just sit with this since I've been time
Speaker 1: with it, I will lose the day. Uh. So, Karen,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for this incredibly lovely and generous gift. Uh.
Speaker 1: We also got a series of fantastic suggestions about Scandinavian
Speaker 1: history in this letter, so I will put those on
Speaker 1: the list. Thank you, thank you, thank you. If you
Speaker 1: would like to write to us, you can do so
Speaker 1: at History Podcast at how Stuff Works dot com. You
Speaker 1: can find us across the spectrum of social media as
Speaker 1: Missed in History and Missed in History dot Com is
Speaker 1: our web page where you will find every episode that's
Speaker 1: ever existed in our archive and show notes for any
Speaker 1: of the ones that Tracy and I have worked on.
Speaker 1: So come and hang out with us and we'll talk
Speaker 1: about some history together. At missed in history dot com
Speaker 1: for more on this and thousands of other topics. Is
Speaker 1: it how staff works dot com