CLOSE-UP Legacies Continued on preceding page Hite Photo "Onsite" One Hour Custom Film Labs • Over 30 Years' Experience in Color Film Processing • Next Day Black & White Film Developing • 10-Minute Passport Photos • Custom Enlargements up to 20" x 24" WEST BLOOMFIELD 7385 ORCHARD LAKE RD. (1/4 Mile N. of 14 Mile Rd.) 851-6340 9-7 MON.-WED., 10-6 THURS.-SAT. DETROIT New Center One Bldg. (Across from GM Bldg.) 873-4330 9-5 Mon.-Fri. OFF FILM PROCESSING COUPON GOOD FOR 40% OFF REGULAR PRICE OF C-41 COLOR ROLL FILM PROCESS- ING WITH HITE OVERNITE SERVICE. OFFER MAY NOT BE COMBINED WITH OTHER SPECIALS. 34 FRIDAY, OCTOBER 19, 1990 home with two children, Morton and Leonard. "My mom was not inter- ested in being a housewife," recalls Dr. Morton Hack, to- day retired from the shoe company his parents would launch. "She would do anything not to keep house." One day in 1916, Mrs. Hack was talking to her doc- tor, J.B. Kennedy. She told him she was upset. Nathan traveled quite a bit, and she wanted to go into business. He suggested the shoe busi- ness. She decided to contact her brother, Dr. Emil Surock, who brought them to Detroit from Bay City so Mrs. Hack could keep house for him, then a bachelor. When her brother married, Mrs. Hack had nothing to do. She needed his help. He loaned her $1,000 and became a vice president of the company. Her brother also rented her space at a favorable rate in a flat he owned at Hastings and Frederick streets. Nathan liked this idea, and he joined his wife. At first, they sold regular, fami- ly shoes. They knew little about shoes or feet, but Nathan, a self-taught man, read up on the subject, cramming into his mind loads of information about shoes. Located near a children's hospital, The Hack Shoe Co. started getting orders for or- thopedic shoes. They con- tinued selling many kinds of shoes until 1925, when they sold the company. They started anew, opting to concentrate on orthopedic shoes. It was rough at first. On the first day, the Hacks sold three pair of shoes. The next week, they sold one pair. The next week, they sold two. "They spent more money than they took home," Dr. Morton Hack says. "My mother kept the books, paid bills, and apologized to the suppliers when she couldn't pay. "They stuck with us," he recalls. "We got a bank loan just before the Great Depression. The bills were paid in order. It was rough. Eventually, my parents paid off everything. They were sticklers for paying bills." Eventually, business pick- ed up. Nathan kept improv- ing the shoes, and he in- vented a shoe for the club foot. The company would later become known as the inventor of the ripple sole. World War II was key to the Hack family success story. There was a great shortage of shoes, so people were forced to buy better shoes. The Hacks opened a branch for children's shoes, which turned out to be a worthwhile venture. Dr. Morton Hack, who became a podiatrist, and his brother, Leonard, came into the business in the mid- 1940s. Their parents retired, leaving them to tend to the family legacy. "I came out of the service and didn't know what to do," Dr. Hack says. "There were 2,000 children waiting for shoes and I thought of it as 2,000 customers. That ought to be good business, so I went into the business." In its heyday, Hack Shoes ran six stores. But business got complicated when the children of two families all wanted to run the show. In the early 1980s, the family split, selling most of the buildings. At the time, Dr. Morton Hack and his son, James, moved into one store. Today the business is run by James, out of a rented storefront on Southfield Road. It is smaller, yet still profitable, as the business still relies heavily on prescription footware. ❑ UJA Seeking Exodus Cash New York — Cash flow. That is the message being delivered to Jewish commu- nity federations across the country from the United Jewish Appeal (UJA). Instead of hurrying to follow up on the tremendous success of Operation Exodus with another special cam- paign for Soviet Jewry, UJA, in consultation with the fed- erations, has determined that sending cash at the fastest rate possible would be the best way to assist Israel with the flood of Soviet immigrants arriving there. UJA's "first priorities" now, according to a recent UJA report, are collecting cash for Operation Exodus, collecting cash for UJA's 1990 regular campaign and launching the 1991 regular campaign, whose goal will be $800 million. Most of the actual fund- raising for Operation Ex- odus has already been com- pleted, just nine months after the special campaign was first announced.