Month: December 2018

Part 581: Deeds & Funk, the Ad Men

A number of studios specializing advertising curtains appeared during the first decade of the twentieth century. Many were short-lived, such as Deeds & Funk. Advertisements for available spaces were placed Deeds & Funk placed in local newspapers, noting various reasons to purchase an ad space. One included, “Because the rates are lower in proportion than any other advertising. It reaches more people than any other ad you can place.”

In 1904, the “Morning Register” included an interesting announcement by “Deeds & Funk, the Ad Men” (Eugene, Oregon, 3 July 1904, page 2):

“Two Classes of people who do not attend the theater. Those who do not believe in such a place of entertainment, and those who are physically incapacitated, aside from these two classes, upon some one occasion or another during the eighty times or more every year that this local opera house is used, nearly every man, woman, and child in this city, and surrounding community attend. At a cost of not exceeding 25 cents, nor less than 12 ½ cents each night, you can put an ad where they can not help but read it, namely on a new scenic ad curtain in a space of no less than eight and up to twenty square feet.

It is a straight, honest, publicity, recognized and used as such by leading merchants throughout the world. The curtains contain over six hundred square feet, and as two-fifths of it is devoted to scenery and draperies, it is a work of art as well as a splendid advertising medium.

There are about twenty-five spaces and each space is separate and by itself.

Ten of the leading business firms of Eugene have already engaged spaces, and their ads are now being artistically arranged and painted in their separated spaces.

Think it over. We’ll call on you if you don’t call on us.

It’s Good and it Catches the eye.

That’s the way it strikes us.

How does it strike you?

(signed) Deeds & Funk, the Ad Men”

Deeds & Funk of Los Angeles and Sacramento owned and operated over 40 advertising curtains in California and Oregon during 1904 (Rosenburg Review, 16 June 1904, page 2). In 1904, they created an advertising curtain for the theater in Eugene, Oregon. The Eugene “Morning Register” elaborated, “they have on their list 50 curtains they have designed between Eugene and their home city, the last one completed at Rosenburg” (Morning Register, Eugene, Oregon, 29 June 1904, page 8). The article’s heading noted that the new Eugene Theatre was “ready of the cards of Eugene business firms,” explaining “The curtain is now ready for the advertisements of representative business firms at a reasonable figure, putting the finishing to a drop curtain the equal for beauty of any found in the state.”

To be continued…

Part 580: Harry J. Kuckuck

In 1901, the Lee Lash was the head of two companies, one in Philadelphia and one in New York City. The Lee Lash Studio offices were located at 39^th and Broadway in New York City and 732 Drexel Building in Philadelphia.

Lash established the Philadelphia studio in 1892. From the very beginning of its founding, a local scenic artist found work there – Harry J. Kuckuck (1876-1945). He would ascend the studio ranks, just as Thomas Moses (1856-1934) did at the Sosman & Landis studio in Chicago. Similarly to Moses, Harry J. Kuckuck would attempt to purchase the studio in the 1920s, eventually purchasing the company from Lash during 1926. At this point, the studio name changed to H. J. Kuckkuck’s Lee Lash Studio. It remained in operation for another twenty years, until the time of his death in 1945.

Looking in a 1918-19 New York Corporation Directory, Harry J. Kuckuck was associated with two Lee Lash Companies – Lee Lash Co (NY) that specialized in advertising and Lee Lash Studios, Inc. (NY) that specialized in scenery. Each was listed in R. L. Polk & Co.’s 1918-19 Trow New York Co-partnership and Corporation Directory, Boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx (page 644).

In the directory, Lash was listed as president of Lee Lash Co (NY) and Harry J Kuckuck was listed as the treasurer. The capital for the company was $500,000, with the directors being Lee Lash and Harry Kuckuck. In the same directory, Lee Lash Studios Inc. (NY) also listed Lee Lash as president, Hugo Gerber as Secretary, and Harry J. Kuckuck as treasurer. The capital for this company was reported to be $100,000. The directors were Lee Lash, Hugo Gerber and Harry Kuckuck. Both companies were located in the same building at 1478 Broadway Road 724.

I have uncovered very little information about Harry J. Kuckuck’s personal life. Kuckuck was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during 1876. He began working for Lee Lash at the age of 16 years old when Lash opened a studio in Philadelphia during 1892. That meant he was the same age as many other boys who entered the scenic art industry at the time, starting as pot boys and apprentices. For Lash, Kuckuck was a necessary addition to the new studio, providing cheap labor for the newly formed company. In 1894.

Kuckuck was still listed as living in Philadelphia at 1944 North Fourth Street That year his family hosted a birthday party for him and published it in the local paper (Philadelphia Enquirer, 9 Dec 1894, page 14). He was still in the city during 1897 when the “Times” reported, “On Wednesday evening, January 6, Mrs. Annie M. Kuckuck celebrated the twenty-first birthday of her son, Harry J. Kuckuck, at their home on North Fourth Street” (Philadelphia 10 Jan 1897, page 21).

Many years later, Kuckuck even mentioned as a New York artist who “paints on scenery and drapes” in a entertaining poem. It was published in the “Arizona Daily Star” during 1938. At the time, Kuckuck would have been working as a scenic artist for 46 years (8 Jan 1938, page 18). Here is the poem:

The “Sky” Line of New York

“Did you ever go a-messin’

Round the land of delicatessen

Way up in Harlem or the Bronx?

Where there’s Abe and Jake and

Izzy,

Whose last names would make you

Dizzy,

Like Tinskys and the Plotskys

And the Kronkes.

Ther’s Finifter and Dorshininsky,

Gronowitz and Sam Tuchinsky,

Manowitz and Katrowitz and Weiss.

Where the Haases and the Hesses

Handle cloaks and suits and dresses,

And the Wassermans are friends

Of Kalt and Heiss.

Wishnofsky and Wishnettsly,

Turkenvich and J. Pisetsky,

Dinerman who offers Kosher meat,

Rabbi Yarshun fixes marriages,

Hyman Zarchin, baby carriages,

While Suckerman the lawyer’s

‘cross the street.

Joseph Spitz sells atomizers,

Jacob Slutsky appetizers,

Harry Kuckuck paints on scenery

And drapes,

I Janowitz sells butter,

And so does Perlmutter,

Izzy Sklarsky deals in oranges, and

Grapes.

There is Yokel and there’s Yevel;

All these names are on the level.

I’m telling you the truth, I hope

To die,

If you doubt it have your own look

Thru the pages of your phone book.

For I’m sure the Book of Numbers

Doesn’t lie.

Now I’ve been a cheap ham actor,

Peddled books and run a tractor,

Around the honky-tonks;

I’d take any job you’d tell me,

But one job you couldn’t sell me-

That’s the guy who takes the census

In the Bronx.

-El Toro”

I have located little else about Kuckuck, other than in a 1940 census. Harry J. Kuckuck was listed in the 1940 census as a 64 year old man who was born in Pennsylvania during 1876. These dates match newspaper accounts mentioning his 21^st birthday in Philadelphia during 1897. The census also listed Kuckuck’s residence as being in Assembly District 21, Manhattan, New York City, New York. Other people in his household at the time were Leonora (age 55 yrs.) and Frederick (age 26 yrs.) His marital status was widowed.

To be continued…