Although the former were of a superior commercial
civilization, it was, after all, a case of Greek meeting Greek, and
the circumstances were such that just because they represented a
superior commercial civilization they were doomed to be beaten
The German manufacturers were the pioneers of the industry in
America. It was a new industry, in fact, scarcely twenty years old.
Formerly, and as late as the '70's, women's cloaks and jackets were
little known in the United States. Shawls were worn by the
masses. What few cloaks were seen on women of means and
fashion were imported from Germany. But the demand grew.
So, gradually, some German-American merchants and an
American shawl firm bethought themselves of manufacturing
these garments at home. The industry progressed, the new-born
great Russian immigration--a child of the massacres of 1881 and
1882--bringing the needed army of tailors for it. There was big
money in the cloak business, and it would have been unnatural if
some of these tailors had not, sooner or later, begun to think of
going into business on their own hook.
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