SPECIAL POST! Majestic Metal Specialties, Inc

Majestic Metal Specialties, Inc. – A History – With input from relatives of the company’s founder and the president of the Plainfield Historical Society

Assortment of Majestic plastic and metal bags of various designs and patterns. From the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

A prolific manufacturer of purse accessories, including compacts and cigarette cases, Majestic also created fabric, plastic and metal handbags. Majestic’s distinctive logo features dots above the rounded letter “M,” making it resemble a bejeweled coronet. Like a number of other handbag makers of the era, the company designated a portion of its factory during and after WWII for the manufacture of aircraft parts.

Majestic manufacturer imprint/logo inside one of the bags from the top photo.

Company founder Nathan Kasdan (1889-1974) married Dora Leshin (1900-1984) in 1920. They had three children, Saul, Leonard and Arna Sue. The Vintage Purse Museum contacted Ditta Kasdan, granddaughter of Nathan, who graciously responded to our email. Her father Leonard is deceased, but Ms. Kasdan and her mother, Leonard’s widow, shared the following information via email:

“Nathan Kasdan (my grandfather) was born in Russia and was trained in metal work. He left Russia just before the Russian Revolution and arrived in New York penniless. He was a very skilled metal worker and initially worked for other companies. Because of his skill and talent, he eventually started a business of his own. Initially this focused on producing for the aeronautical industry during World War I. Nathan was an inventor and designer so his interests migrated to designing for the cosmetic industry. You can follow this link to one of the patents for his lipstick holder: https://patents.google.com/patent/US2099488A/en or google 'Nathan Kasdan patents.' Another invention I remember as a young child, unrelated to purses, was a heel for a man's shoe that could be rotated when one side wore out. He also designed elaborate compacts that dealt with the problems of using (loose) powder. Nathan's real interest in Majestic purses was so that he could sell the cosmetic containers. He also designed the metal work on the purses. For a very brief time he and a business partner had a store on 5th avenue in New York but it was not a lucrative project and did not last long.”

Majestic cigarette case with US map. From the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

Majestic manufacturer stamp/logo inside cigarette case in above photo.

28 Nov 1950, Tue The Terre Haute Tribune (Terre Haute, Indiana) Newspapers.com

In 1918, Majestic Machine and Tool Company leased space from Charles B. Walker at 178 Centre St., New York. Two years later, Majestic Machine and Tool Co., Inc. filed for incorporation. In 1923, a patent on behalf of Majestic was assigned to D. Pollack for a “combination vanity article.” According to a 1927 newspaper announcement, a “vanity box” patent was issued to Majestic and its inventors, Nathan Kasdan from the Bronx and Daniel Pollack from Brooklyn. It’s not clear if Kasdan and Pollack were partners, or if Pollack was an employee of the company. 1930 Census records show the person we believe to be the correct Daniel Pollack as superintendent of a machine factory. The same year’s Census lists Nathan Kasdan’s occupation as proprietor of a metal specialties company. By 1935, the company was located on Varick St. in New York City. We could not find evidence of dissolution of the pair’s business relationship, but the factory, renamed Majestic Metal Specialties, Inc., relocated to Moosup, CT around 1939. However, according to the 1940 Census, Daniel Pollack was still in New York, managing a factory that manufactured pinballs. (Pinball machines were hugely popular in the 1930s.) This indicates that Daniel Pollack and Nathan Kasdan were no longer working together at the time of the move to Moosup. Although his name is somewhat common, we believe, per genealogy records, that this Daniel Pollack was born in 1891 and died in 1944.

Majestic brocade clutch with built-in coin purse. From the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

08 Dec 1952, Mon The Minneapolis Star (Minneapolis, Minnesota) Newspapers.com

Black velvet Majestic "carryall" clutch with rhinestone decoration. It came with the booklet and comb, but may originally have had more accessories, such as a compact, as it was sold as a "fitted" kit. From the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

Inside of booklet from photo above, showing Majestic's showroom address.

Although Majestic had a Fifth Avenue address in NYC during the 1950s, this was likely its showroom, as was common for many makers of the era. Purse companies would often have a Manhattan showroom address for their salespeople or representatives to host retail-store buyers while manufacturing facilities were located elsewhere. (Majestic's showroom address was 377 Fifth Ave., which is now a luxury apartment building.) Majestic's manufacturing operation was located from 1939-1958 in Moosup, CT. The Vintage Purse Museum spoke with Ruth Bergeron, president of the Plainfield (CT) Historical Society and she was kind enough to share some regional history.

The town of Plainfield, CT was founded in 1699 as a farming community. The town is made up of four villages: Plainfield, Moosup, Wauregan and Central Village. We gave Ms. Bergeron some employee names we found in old articles about Majestic, and she told us she knew some of them. Many people who live in the area are descendants of families that settled there long ago.

Original post card, postmarked 1907, showing the Aldrich Manufacturing Co. in Moosup, CT. The building was occupied by Majestic Metal Specialties Inc. about four years after Aldrich closed in 1935. Post card from the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

According to the local history book “Plainfield” (Arcadia Publishing, 2007), farmers in the area had “established small gristmills, sawmills and fulling mills on the Moosup River” in the 1700s. In 1809, Union Manufacturing Company built a factory that was tasked with spinning cotton into yarn. After David Aldrich purchased it in 1880, the site was expanded. The Aldrich textile mill closed in 1935 and Nathan Kasdan established Majestic there about four years later.

It’s unclear why Nathan Kasdan chose Mooseup, Connecticut for his factory, but a 1940 article said that he was taking over the Moosup Products Company, which also made compacts and lipstick holders, so perhaps he knew the operators of that business. There was a bit of a rocky period, said Ms. Bergeron, when workers went on strike at Majestic and another nearby company. We found a 1941 article that says this was the Moosup Products Company, and 300 workers were demanding better wages; however, Majestic was not named in the article. It stated that Moosup Products Company was started two years earlier after moving there from New York, and mentioned a vice president named Leon Proujansky. It’s possible that the reporter who wrote the article was unaware of Majestic's stake in the Moosup Products Company, which, it appears, was eventually absorbed by Majestic. There is no evidence that Proujansky and Kasdan were partners. (We also found an online 1950-1951 book, "Decisions and Orders of the National Labor Relations Board, Volume 92," which lists labor disputes concerning Majestic and many other US companies that were resolved by the National Labor Relations Board.)

By 1944, Majestic was not only making “compacts and lipstick holders” (per an article in the Hartford Courant) but “wartime products,” including “incendiary bombs and wingtip floats.” The Plainfield history book says that Majestic was responsible for the manufacture of the bombs used by General James Doolittle in his famous 1942 raid.

In 1950, Majestic Metal Specialties had a judgment against it of nearly $95,000 by the War Contracts Negotiation Board. The article offers the vague explanation that it had to do with a government contract renegotiation, but it appears to have been settled by 1951, as it was announced that Majestic was making ailerons for US Navy P5M-1 Marlin “flying boats."

Amazingly, the Vintage Purse Museum found a Majestic aircraft part for purchase online and contacted its seller for some historical information. We asked if it was an old part. The customer service representative at the parts distribution company explained that when a company such as Majestic goes out of business, another aircraft parts manufacturer can acquire old spec sheets in order to continue making the part. Even though these airplanes are vintage, some are still in use, therefore they still require maintenance. The Vintage Purse Museum also contacted an aircraft museum in Tucson, Arizona. Its collections manager graciously said he would check their acquisitions to see if they had a Majestic part. We haven’t yet heard back, but will update this post if we do.

Majestic was best known for its compacts and purse accessories, but the company also made stunning handbags, including those that were a mix of Lucite and metal, as well as fabric, woven metal baskets and "cage" designs. The Bag Lady’s website references a 1950 trade publication’s announcement that Lily Morgan, formerly with Majestic, had joined Dorset Products. Dorset (AKA Dorset Rex and Dorset Fifth Avenue), like Majestic, made woven metal handbags. Both companies manufactured other types of purses and accessories, but Dorset is mostly known for its woven metal “basket” bags. A number of other companies made similar handbags. While there were fair codes of competition for handbag industry professionals starting in 1934 with the establishment of the National Recovery Administration (part of Roosevelt’s New Deal), there were always competing styles. With competition comes lawsuits. Majestic was sued in 1954 by Nadya Inc. over a “basket” patent, but the judge denied Nadya's motion. It then became part of legal history, as Nadya v. Majestic was cited numerous times over the years in subsequent unrelated industries’ patent, copyright and unfair competition disputes.

Majestic made purse accessories from the 1920s through the 1950s, but its heaviest newspaper advertising for compacts and cases appeared from about 1949-1954. (There were unrelated companies in different industries, such as radios and appliances, that used the name Majestic during this era.) The Majestic handbags that were made in the early- to late-1950s often came as a “carryall” or “fitted” (sometimes referred to as “fitted kit”) which meant that the purse included accessories such as a compact and comb.

Black fabric clutch with floral embroidery by Majestic. It's likely another of the company's line of "fitted carryalls" and originally came with accessories. From the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum.

22 Nov 1953, Sun The Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) Newspapers.com

In 1956, Majestic was congratulated publicly for its safety program. Just a year later there was an article in The Bridgeport Post that said Majestic would be leasing 300,000 square feet of its factory to Kaman Aircraft Corporation, manufacturer of military aircrafts. The article said the lease depended on the approval of Majestic’s creditors as it was undergoing reorganization under the National Bankruptcy Act.

Sadly, reorganization did not occur and Kaman took over the entire factory while Majestic Metal Specialties Inc. was liquidated, “piece by piece” (directly quoted from the newspaper liquidation notice) at public auction, Feb. 18-19, 1958. Although the company went out of business in 1958, we found a 1960 advertisement for Majestic loose powder compacts at the William H. Block Co. department store in Indiana. It’s possible that it was old inventory, but it could’ve been that someone purchased items from the company’s liquidation sale and sold it to the retailer.

Today, the old mill buildings on South Main St. in Moosup have fallen into disrepair, but Ms. Bergeron tells us that the historical society and the site’s owners are working toward restoring the property and revitalizing the area.

Ditta Kasdan's mother thinks Nathan may have ventured into tableware manufacturing after Majestic closed, but isn't certain. He did keep at his inventions, without commercial success, and lived with his wife in the same W. 86th St. apartment they'd had for many years. "My grandparents' apartment was a meeting place of Russian immigrants which included well known musicians, poets and writers. They were a stone's throw from Central Park where my grandfather, who was quite athletic, walked seven miles everyday," wrote Ditta Kasdan. "They also had a cottage in a place called Grenafelda* which was a community of Russian Jewish immigrants. We, on a few occasions spent time there in the summer. My grandmother remained in the same apartment after Nathan passed away until the end of her life." (*This likely refers to "Grine Felder," which, in Yiddish, means "Green Fields." "Grine Felder" was a 1938 Yiddish film based on an important work by playwright Peretz Hirshbein. The location Grine Felder, where the Kasdans had their cottage, was named for the film, and was a Catskills retreat for Jewish artists, businesspeople and intellectuals.)

Majestic Metal Specialties’ beautiful compacts, cases and handbags remain highly collectible. Adding to its remarkable history is its contribution to aeronautics. Museum or air show visitors may unknowingly be in the presence of a vintage airplane with parts made seventy years ago by the hardworking employees of the metal company founded by the innovative and artistic Nathan Kasdan.

Additional view of the Majestic handbags that appear at the top of this post. All from the collection of The Vintage Purse Museum. Scroll to the bottom of this post to see newspaper advertisements for similar Majestic bags.

A huge thank you from The Vintage Purse Museum to Ditta Kasdan and her mother, and to Ruth Bergeron, president of the Plainfield Historical Society. Other information was compiled from articles and advertisements in newspaper archive Newspapers.com and genealogy website MyHeritage.com, as well as The Bag Lady, and from documents and books found via Google searches. Article cWendy Dager/The Vintage Purse Museum. Please email vintagepursemuseum@gmail.com to request permission prior to reprinting this article or using photos from this website.