EMIL SIMENAUER
Emil Simenauer is now head of one of the
prosperous mercantile establishments of San Francisco. He has made his success
almost entirely since the great San Francisco fire.
Mr. Simenauer was born July 29, 1870, in the
German District of Silesia. He had a common high school education there, and
worked four years for his room and board while serving an apprenticeship to a
retail dry goods merchant. In 1889, at the age of nineteen, he became salesman
for a firm at Gotha, Germany, and continued there in various responsibilities
for a dozen years.
Mr. Simenauer came to the United States and
located at San Francisco in 1901. He arrived friendless and almost without
capital, and having command of only a few words of English he experienced much
difficulty in A. Crocker & Company, wholesale dry goods, starting in at a
wage of $7.50 a week. He familiarized himself with business, with the language
of his adopted country, and had made himself extremely useful to the firm
before the earthquake and fire of 1906 which destroyed the business.
In May following the earthquake, Mr.
Simenauer asked his former employer, Mr. Crocker, what he intended to do with
goods in transit. Mr. Crocker at once responded by asking if Mr. Simenauer
would be interested in having some of the goods to start a small business of
his own. As soon as the goods reached San Francisco Mr. Simenauer opened his
moderate establishment in the basement of a building at 648 Hayes Street. He
paid $10 a month for rent for these quarters, but at once subleased part of the
space to the Standard Glove Company at $5 a month. With the advice and
encouragement and assistance of Mr. Crocker the young merchant was soon
prospering sufficiently to bring an offer from Mr. Crocker of a partnership. Mr.
Simenauer accepted, realizing the great help it would be to him in prestige and
credit. The business was then moved to larger quarters on Eddy Street, between
Hyde and Larkin streets. A few years later Mr. Simenauer bought out the Crocker
interest, but has since continued the business as A. Crocker & Company.
After the retirement of Mr. Crocker he took a brother-in-law and incorporated
the business and it has since then been an established and growing concern at
32 Battery Street.
Mr. Simenauer married in Germany Ida
Jacobson. They had three daughters, Elsa, wife of H.M. Raulet of New York;
Margaret, wife of Earl L. Alexander of Fresno, California, and Hermine, who is
with the firm A. Crocker & Company. Mr. Simenauer is an Oddfellow and
Mason, belongs to the Sons of Hermann and the Jewish Society of Independent
Order B’nai B'rith and B'nai B’rith.
Louise E. Shoemaker, Transcriber March 14th,
2004
Source: "The San
Francisco Bay Region" by Bailey Millard Vol. 3 pages 125-126. Published by The
American Historical Society, Inc. 1924.
© 2004 Louise Shoemaker