Posted: August 19, 2024 12:24 pm
By David G. Glosser, who along with his family has donated a historic cash register from Glosser Bros. to JAHA (as seen in above photo by Makenzie Croyle: retired JAHA President Richard Burkert, Stephanie and David G. Glosser, JAHA Curator Amy Regan). When presenting the register to JAHA on August 16, he said that the success of the Glossers’ retail enterprises was due to generations of Johnstowners spending their money at the Glosser stores — “the register belongs to the people of Johnstown,” he said. “This is where it belongs.” We’re so grateful to receive this donation, and pleased to share this remembrance of a truly remarkable family that has played a major role in Johnstown history.
An early image of the Glosser Bros. store.
Glosser Bros. purchased this NCR cash register in 1911 and installed it as the first of its kind in a retail establishment in Johnstown. The Glosser family and I, David G. Glosser, who was the last family member to work in the family business that closed in 1993, are donating this historic cash register to the Johnstown Area Heritage Association (JAHA).
I was named after my grandfather, Dave Glosser, who passed away in 1954. He was born in 1889 in Antopol, Russia, and came to Johnstown in 1905 with his father, Wolf Leib, and brothers, Nathan, Samuel, and Saul, and a sister, Bella. They established the Glosser Bros. store in 1906 and together laid the foundation for a thriving and remarkable retail enterprise.
Glosser Bros. started as a single storefront selling used clothing and grew into a four-story department store that expanded to occupy the entire block and more.
The store combined grocery and department store elements into one enterprise, including a bulk candy section with the famous smell of roasted nuts on the first floor, and a grocery store in the basement. It also boasted the town’s only escalator. Over the years, the store employed many thousands of people and was known for offering affordable merchandise to the families of steel and coal workers who helped build Johnstown into a thriving industrial city.
The Glosser store focused on family and served as the center of many community activities. They organized a Halloween parade featuring local high school bands, a Halloween student window painting contest, and large-scale wedding fashion shows at the War Memorial. Customers loved lunching in the legendary cafeteria, often treating themselves to ice cream sundaes from the soda fountain.
Dave Glosser’s legacy via stories from family members or archival material indicates he was a pivotal force in the store. He was a larger-than-life self-made man, an immigrant like thousands of others in Johnstown. He reached a high pinnacle of success and led the Glosser Store in its amazing growth to a city block and its success for many decades.
Archival Glosser family film clip of Dave and Sylvia Glosser as they posed in the front row for this 1931 photo of Glosser employees:
As the store expanded, it celebrated a “Grand Re-Opening” in 1931, and employees gathered for a photo. The footage above shows Dave and Sylvia Glosser in the front row (in the left third of the shot).
I grew up with the second generation leading the store. My uncle and cousins and many hundreds of what felt like a giant Glosser family impacted my early life in Johnstown, and the store was a wonderful place to grow up. People who did the artwork for advertising, the display windows, the truck drivers, the twins who made sundaes in the cafeteria, the accounting teams, the operators on the fourth floor, the elevator operators, the night watchman, the clerks in each amazing department, from the record department to the shoes, to the clothing to grocery, it was all there. The larger Glosser family, the people who contributed to the store and its success — including the Gee Bee people — were part of an amazing family that has a very deep connection to Johnstown history and my growing up in an extraordinary time.
My father, Paul Glosser, worked in the store all his adult life. I remember his office in the basement in the grocery department. He spent a lot of years on the road in the 60s and 70s with the Gee Bee’s growth. His toughest year was after the 1977 flood and the quagmire of the grocery department in the basement of the main store. The devotion and effort of the extended Glosser family and the phenomenal effort to reopen the store after the flood gave a glimmer of hope to the town after a monumental tragedy.
David and Paul Glosser, U-Save Supermarket opening, 1985.
My role in the store as third generation in the family business started in the early 80s in the supermarket division, which was sold off, then on to the Dollars stores which was a short-lived depletion of resources for the company. I then spent several years in Richland Gee Bee and then on to headquarters and as a buyer, where I concluded my career in retail and in the family business, which closed in 1993 after 80 years in business.
My grandfather, Dave Glosser, served as President of Glosser Brothers Department Store in downtown Johnstown and played a vital role as a community leader. His leadership drove the store’s remarkable growth and success, transforming it into one of the largest independent retail establishments in the state. Dave became president of the store in 1946 and oversaw retail operations and the growth of the store from a single stall to the entire block. His brother Sam oversaw physical operations of the building. Eldest brother Nathan moved to Miami Beach and developed a hotel in the 1930s. Another brother, Saul, passed away in 1944.
David, Nathan and Saul in 1940.
Dave met Sylvia Sachs (1897-1980) in October 1916. She was born in Burlington, Vermont, the youngest daughter of Rabbi William Harris Sachs. She had come to Johnstown to visit her sister Sarah, who lived in Boswell. After a brief courtship, they married in December 1916 and had five children: Ruth, Betty, Naomi, Doris, and Paul. Dave and Sylvia’s descendants represent the largest branch of the extensive Glosser family tree. Betty’s husband, Leonard Black, became president of the store in the 1950s. Paul later led the supermarket division, which grew to 15 Gee Bee supermarkets, combining many with retail sites that grew to 26 discount stores, a concept decades ahead of its time.
Coincidentally, another David Glosser settled in Johnstown around the same time and built a successful scrap company, M. Glosser and Sons. This David Glosser, a second cousin, used the middle initial “A” to distinguish himself from his merchant cousin. The general community held the Glosser Family in high esteem. The name “Dave Glosser” carried weight. Be it “Store Dave”, the Glosser merchant or “Scrap Dave” the giant in Johnstown industry and whose legacy established the David A. Glosser Foundation, these “Daves” got things done. Both were involved with 1936 Johnstown Flood relief and were key to lead gifts for the Cambria County War Memorial, YMCA, and Conemaugh Memorial Hospital.
As the Glosser Bros. store expanded, Dave played a pivotal role in fostering Johnstown’s growth by actively volunteering his time and leadership. As president of the company, he became renowned for his exceptional leadership, earning respect and admiration from both the greater Johnstown and Jewish communities. His dedication to civic and public service left a lasting impact, solidifying his legacy as an influential leader.
Beyond his philanthropic work, Dave was passionate about promoting sports and recreation. He helped organize the professional baseball team, the “Johnstown Johnnies,” and sponsored a Glosser Bros. basketball team in the city league. An archival film from 1931 captures him posing with the championship team in front of the Glosser store windows, seen below:
Dave and Sylvia began wintering in Miami Beach as early as the 1940s. Although their son Paul was born in Johnstown, he graduated from Miami Beach High School. After college, he served in the Army during the Korean War. When he returned, he married Rita Gordon from Pittsburgh and began working at Glosser Bros., eventually heading the supermarket division.
Rita and Paul Glosser enjoying retirement in Sarasota, Florida.
Rita and Paul Glosser raised four children in Johnstown and actively participated in the community. Rita championed civic causes and women’s issues, while Paul served as treasurer of Mercy Hospital for many years. Rita and Paul eventually moved to Florida.
I, David G. Glosser, am Rita and Paul’s eldest son and worked in the family company for 12 years. When the main store closed in 1989, I secured the cash register and am now donating it to the Johnstown Area Heritage Association.