Regenstrief: Legacy of the Dishwasher King
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PROLOG: THE UNOFFICIAL MR. R 1 PROLOG THE UNOFFICIAL MR. R A drawerful of plaques…a scrapbook of newspaper clippings…snapshots of men clasping hands at a farewell banquet… These are the pedestrian objects that surface on the tide of a man’s life, inanimate stand-ins for a caring human being, traces of those ritual honorings that said “this man is somebody.” We hold on to the flotsam and jetsam because it betokens a life rich with accomplishments, but the objects themselves hold little meaning. We look into and beyond them to conjure up the man himself. REGENSTRIEF: LEGACY OF THE DISHWASHER KING …a brown marble desk set engraved “From Your Friends at Rex Manufacturing”…a Holy Bible presented by the brothers of Warren Lodge No. 15…a tiny gold-framed photo of a smiling couple dressed for a picnic… A line of dust rolls along on the horizon of the Indiana countryside, trailing a badly dented late-model Chevy sedan. Behind the wheel sits a man in his early sixties. He is short and thick, gray haired, wearing thick glasses. He drives like a madman, heading for Indianapolis. …life membership in the American Ordnance Association, dedicated to scientific and industrial preparedness for 2 the common defense, June 1943…a Hebrew prayer book adorned with silver and turquoise… This man lives in a small town, in the house he bought thirty-two years ago when he married Myrtie Barnette of Franklin, Indiana. He smokes a cigar. He brags about his golf game. He goes to temple on high holy days. He carries a buckeye in his pocket for luck. …a shiny long-handled shovel, used just once, a few spots of rust showing the passage of time…fifteen Steuben glass figurines, one for each year served as bank trustee, carefully tucked away in a cardboard box…the Partners in Progress award presented at Sears Tower, September 1976… This man is Sam Regenstrief. He makes dishwashers for a living, more dishwashers than anyone else. He is a wealthy man, with a net worth of more than $50 million. His employ- ees call him Sam, or Mr. R. PROLOG: THE UNOFFICIAL MR. R …silky bright colors, the honorific garb of universities never attended…portraits of a husband and wife hung in a lobby, she wearing the same peach dress in which she was buried… Sam Regenstrief is a man of contrasts. A leading citizen in his community, he seems embarrassed and shy when in the limelight. A great talker, he leaves his listeners scratching their heads. Master of his company domain, he visits with workers on the picket line. He drives his managers to dis- traction, but wins their devotion. He’ll spend only ten bucks on a pair of shoes, but he gives away a fortune so that ordi- nary people can have excellent health care. …a Grand Sachem’s framed invitation to attend caucuses, conclaves, powwows, and 3 other affairs of state and conviviality among fellow Sagamores of the Wabash…the miniature helmet of a samurai warrior, gift of a company far away… This is the story of a complex man. It is also the story of a family, a small Indiana town, a dishwasher company, a failing county hospital, a reason for philanthropy, an era of optimism, a construction project, a medical record system, an ending, a harvest, and a rich inheritance. Sam Regenstrief does not tell his own story—the man rarely writes anything down. He writes, instead, vivid memories in the minds of those who know him. Memorable is one word for Sam—unique, charming, cantankerous, controlling, intuitive, generous, and humble are some of the others—and many who knew him remember him fondly. In the spirit of their words, this is Sam’s story. 4 5 SAM’S BABY At the age of 48, in Connersville, Indiana, Samuel Nathan Regenstrief fathered a child. The October 31, 1958, News- Examiner carried the story: Connersville industrialist Sam N. Regenstrief announced today that he is forming a new company and has contracted to purchase…a large portion of the plant and equipment of the American Kitchens Division of the Avco Manufacturing Corp. The new company will be called Design and Manufacturing Corporation and will manufacture products involving plastics and metals. Its products will find a high potential market among manufacturers of household appliances, office furniture, building materials, and many other lines. REGENSTRIEF: LEGACY OF THE DISHWASHER KING It was no surprise that Sam’s baby made headlines. The hotshot management consultant who had turned around the town’s failing Rex Manufacturing Company and had gone on to become a vice president of Philco Corporation was coming home to Connersville to stay. For Indiana’s “City of Industry,” that meant jobs. A tranquil town nestled at the foot of a hill midway between Dayton, Cincinnati, and Indianapolis, Connersville had the distinction of having launched the nation’s first high school band. But almost from the time that pioneer John Conner established a trading post along the banks of the west fork of the Whitewater River, the site had potential for manufacturing. Connersville became a vital stop along the original Whitewater Canal extending from the Ohio River to Hagerstown, Indiana. A Mr. John McFarlan started a buggy business there in the 1800s and converted a five-acre 6 cornfield into the nation’s first industrial park, which became home to makers of automobile bodies, axles, enclo- sures, engines, lamps, springs, and tops. Known to many car buffs as “Little Detroit,” during the 1920s and 1930s Connersville manufactured some of the finest automobiles ever built—the Auburn, Cord, Lexington, and McFarlan, among others. Sam Regenstrief was coming home to the simple life in a Connersville that he already knew and loved. A man of substance, worth several million, he had been traveling about the East Coast looking for a place to land, a place to invest his talent for squeezing pennies out of manufacturing pro- cesses and to use his solid experience in metal bending. At his age, and with his considerable wealth, Sam could have chosen an early and comfortable retirement. But retirement was out of the question for this energetic man who defined himself by hard work. Life had not been easy for the burly redhead with the green eyes and charming smile. He was born into a nation on the brink of war. His mother bedrid- den, he had raised a younger sister and sold newspapers to help support the family. This pattern of effort, established young, still served him well in his late forties. “I just like to work.…I’m driven to accomplishment,” he once told a re- porter. Retirement was not for Sam Regenstrief. After twenty years of helping others run their manufacturing operations, SAM’S BABY this efficiency expert was ready to risk his fortune on a busi- ness venture he could call his own. “Sam Regenstrief—yesterday an immigrant newsboy, today a millionaire businessman and philanthropist—is living testimony that the American Dream works.” Indianapolis News editorial, January 31, 1972 Sam’s younger sister Helen Barrett is the only sibling of Sam’s still living, so by default she has become the family historian. What Helen knows of their earliest years as a fam- ily comes from stories told to her by her four brothers—Sam, Morris, Nathan, and Sigmond—and her sister, Sara. All but Helen were born in Bucharest, Romania, although when asked where he came from, Sam usually said Vienna or Austria, per- 7 haps because these names would be more familiar. In the family’s transition from World War I Europe to the sleepy midwestern town of Indianapolis, some of the details of fam- ily history got lost. It is said that fire destroyed their family papers. Half the family spelled their name Regenstrief, the other half Regenstreif—Sam used to sign it both ways. Of the siblings, only Helen could be sure of her exact date of birth. The Regenstrief children figured their ages ac- cording to the closest Jewish or Christian holiday. They would say, “Well, I remember when you were born—it was the month of [such-and-such holiday].” They kept track of their ages not in absolute terms but in relation to other members of the family. Helen always knew she was fourteen years younger than sister Sara and twelve years younger than brother Sam. Sam Regenstrief celebrated two birthdays be- cause one person told him he was born in November and another said he was born in June. The family had to nail it down somehow when as a teen he applied for citizenship papers, for which he had to have a birth certificate. He didn’t have one, so they created one for him. No one who wrote about Sam in later years could agree on a date either. Sam’s own statement—a rare written document from a man who never wrote things down—says he was born in Austria in 1906 and came to this country about two years later. The REGENSTRIEF: LEGACY OF THE DISHWASHER KING Connersville News-Examiner had him born November 22, 1910, in Vienna. Fortune magazine brought him to America at the age of four. An investor’s report on Sam’s company had his birth date as May 22, 1911, and so on. Sketchy as the facts may be, the outlines of the story are clear. Sam’s father Isig (Isaac) left his wife Fannie Widenfeld Regenstrief and children in Romania and crossed the Atlantic to establish a new life for them in America. Before he could bring the family to join him, World War I broke out.