CARL SCHRAYSSHUEN OF CARL-ART (and his friend Walter Lampl)
Once upon a time, not so very long ago, giants walked the earth. An amazing number of them worked in the American costume jewelry industry. One of these giants was Carl Schraysshuen.
If you’re wondering, "Carl Who???", you are not alone. But for those who study or collect vintage costume jewelry, this name may sound more familiar when you learn that Carl Schraysshuen (whose last name, according to his grandson, when said fast sounds much like a chicken sneezing) was half owner and managing partner of Carl-Art, a major manufacturer of quality costume and fine jewelry, from its founding in 1936 until his death in 1953.
Carl-Art 12K gold filled over sterling necklace. Note the flower finding patented by Carl Schraysshuen.
Carl was born in 1885 and raised in Pforzheim, a center of German jewelry production near the Black Forest. He attended school there at the jewelry "gymnasium." In 1904 or 1905 he left to seek his fortune in the Far East. His employer sent him to the Philippines where he worked in various aspects of the jewelry import/export business. Over the next several years the ambitious young Carl learned to speak seven Asian languages.
In 1914, however, romance carried him back to Germany and into a future different than he ever could have imagined. He had been corresponding with a beautiful young Pforzheim woman named Hedwig. When he returned to Germany to claim his bride, Carl had the poor luck and extraordinarily bad timing to arrive just as World War I erupted.
The intelligent and strapping 29 year-old was promptly drafted, given the rank of sergeant, and sent to the infamous Russian Front. He was off the field of battle before the first snow fell, but not because of any better luck than that which had already landed him in this unfortunate situation. Within weeks of his arrival he and his company were attacked. Most of his men were killed, and Carl was bayoneted 13 times, with 10 of those wounds involving various vital organs in his chest and abdomen. Despite his critical condition, Carl managed to walk 5 kilometers back to the German camp, where he warned them of the close presence of the Russian army, thus saving many hundreds of lives. For this tremendous act of strength and courage, he was awarded the Iron Cross.
Carl in his uniform, 1914.
He remained in a military field hospital at the front because his condition was too unstable for him to be sent to a safer and better equipped facility. Conditions were poor, and morphine was in short supply. Carl was expected to die soon so, rather than use up precious stores of morphine on someone whose condition had been declared hopeless, he was given a fifth of whiskey to drink daily to kill the pain. His wounds were cleaned every day, but otherwise he was given little care. Months later, in June of 1915, Hedwig risked her own life by boarding a train and traveling to the front to marry him as he lay on his deathbed.
Miraculously, Carl didn't die. He was discharged from the army and continued his slow recovery back in Pforzheim. In 1917 Carl and Hedwig married in the church, where he stood supported by two canes. In 1919 their first child was born, a boy they named Manfried. Sadly, due to post-war conditions in Germany, little Manfried died of yellow fever during a 1921 epidemic. In 1923 their daughter, Rosalie, was born.
Sometime before 1923, Carl began working for Speidel Brothers, a wholesale business specializing in the manufacture of chains, watchbands, and costume jewelry. He apparently impressed them very much and they offered to transfer him to their branch in the United States, Carl and Hedwig jumped at this opportunity. Carl’s military experiences, his slow and painful recovery from his injuries, their son’s death, and the economic hardships of Germany after the Great War made both of them more than ready to move on. Carl arrived in Providence, Rhode Island in 1923. Hedwig, little Rosalie, and Hedwig’s mother joined him a year and a half later.
The American branch of Speidel was struggling financially. New management was needed and they believed that Carl was the man for the job. It appears they were correct. Speidel's American business thrived under Carl's leadership. One of Speidel's most significant innovations during these years was a stretchy mesh watchband, patented under Carl Schraysshuen’s name in 1931. Carl did not receive any profits for this early precursor of their famous Twist-O-Flex watchband nor for any of the other eight innovations he patented for Speidel between 1925 and 1937. A 1933 document written in German, drafted by Speidel attorneys and signed by Carl, specified that any inventions by Carl Schraysshuen during the course of his employment belonged to the company.
Carl and Hedwig.
Disillusionment over having someone else’s company profiting from his best ideas could have been responsible, or maybe Carl was just ready to strike out on his own, but in 1936 when he was approached by Arthur Loercher to become equal partners in a new company to be known as Carl-Art, Carl was ready for the challenge. Like Speidel, Carl-Art was a manufacturing plant, as well as a wholesaler. Their three or four story building covered most of a block in the jewelry center of Providence, standing just a block away from the building owned by Carl’s previous employers. Carl-Art sold sterling, gold, and gold filled jewelry under their own name, and also manufactured for other jewelry companies.
Carl-Art craftsmanship is evident in this beautifully shaped hand-wrought sterling and rhinestone wirework necklace.
One of the companies that used these services was Walter Lampl. A particular flower finding, patented by Carl Schraysshuen in 1941, was frequently incorporated into Lampl’s silver, gold, and gold filled jewelry. According to Walter Lampl, Jr., war restrictions on metals created quality issues with Carl-Art’s gold filled items that Walter Lampl, Sr., always a perfectionist, simply couldn't accept. The composition of the brass used beneath the gold plating had changed, which caused bleed-through problems, so Lampl stopped ordering gold filled jewelry from Carl-Art until the war was over, though they continued to supply his company with sterling and gold jewelry. Walter, Sr. and Carl, both of whom were members of the Masonic order, remained good friends until Lampl's death in 1945.
Walter Lampl, Jr., who assumed management of Walter Lampl, Inc. after his father's death, continued to work closely with the Carl-Art company until Walter Lampl closed its doors in 1959. By his report, Carl was a pleasure to work with. He remembered with fondness Carl and his partner, Art, describing them both as very nice people. Walter, Jr.'s younger brother, Burt, laughed to recall that Carl and Art were oddly matched in size, as Carl was a very large tall man, and Art was much shorter. A picture of the partners at a party shows Art standing next to the diminutive Hedwig, the two of them quite close in height. Carl stands on the opposite side of the table serving punch. The perspective of the photo makes it hard to judge, but Carl is clearly the much larger man. Little is known about Art, as he is said to have been very quiet and no family members have yet come forward to discuss his history.
Carl's partner, Arthur Loercher, standing beside Hedwig, and Carl serving punch.
Both Carl and Art are reported to have been extremely honest and dependable. This is not surprising, since integrity was very important to Carl. He was fond of telling people, "14K means 14K, not 11-1/2!"
Carl-Art jewelry reflects that integrity through its purity of design. Carefully crafted in timeless styles, this is jewelry for the ages. It is interesting to note that the years immediately after World War II marked a flurry of design patent activity for Carl Schraysshuen. Three patents are known to exist under his name in 1941 (including the flower finding so popular with Walter Lampl). Then there was a pause in his patent applications during the war. But in1945 he patented four designs, followed by a remarkable 30 patents in 1946 alone, then four more in 1947, finishing off with a single patent dating to 1950. It is unknown why, after nearly 10 years in business with only a handful of design patents, Carl felt the need to protect his company this way, but it could well have been because of his previous experiences with personal calamity in the aftermath of another world war.
Sterling and lapis lazuli Walter Lampl brooch manufactured by Carl-Art, incorporating a carved stone imported by Lampl from China. This is another use of the signature Schraysshuen flower finding, this time in a piece bearing the Walter Lampl mark.
Anti-German sentiment was strong in the United States during World War II, and Carl's family suffered as a result of it. His brother, Adolf, managed another jewelry company in Providence. Adolf immigrated to the U.S. before World War I, and had long been a citizen. Carl had brought the rest of their immediate family to the U.S. during the 1930s and he had become an American citizen in 1929, just as soon as he qualified. Hedwig received her U.S. citizenship in 1933. The entire family’s commitment to their adopted country was deep and permanent. Adolf was stubborn in his refusal to discuss the difficult times he experienced during World War II until he was an old man. Then, when pressed by Carl's grandson to tell him about that time, finally said, "They tried to burn down my house every day."
Despite their loyalty to the United States, it was painful for the Schraysshuens to know that their relatives and friends back in Germany were suffering terribly during and after the war. Pforzheim, as a jewelry manufacturing center, was ideally suited to military production. Just as many U.S. jewelry factories were turned to wartime uses during the 1940s, it was the same in Pforzheim, which fell under heavy aerial bombardment by Allied forces on February 23-24, 1945. The town where Carl was born, raised, and educated was almost completely destroyed because of its converted jewelry factories and related industries. The death toll from those two days of bombing varies from 17,000 to 20,000, according to different historical sources. During the war, Carl refused to allow his Providence manufacturing plant to be turned to wartime production, saying he did not support Germany's actions or government, but that he would not make bullets that might kill his family and friends. After the war, Carl sent money to surviving family members in Germany to help them rebuild their lives.
Carl drove himself hard. The 1940 U.S. Census shows him reporting 60 hour work weeks and keeping up that pace 52 weeks a year. His appetites were as great as his intelligence, integrity, and ambition. He is said to have smoked as many as 12 cigars a day. He loved to eat, and that fact was reflected in his ample physique. The taste for liquor that may have begun with the whiskey used as a primitive analgesic in the German army field hospital continued throughout his life, partly because he continued to use it to deal with the chronic pain caused by those old war injuries. In November of 1953 he died, probably from a heart attack.
Hedwig inherited his 50% of Carl-Art, but sold it soon thereafter. The business continued in operation until at least 2004, under completely different management.
The more one studies the history of the Golden Age of American costume jewelry, the easier it is to understand the many factors that contributed to its greatness of style, quality, and design. Extraordinary minds and talents were drawn from richly diverse backgrounds and brought together in the melting pots of Providence, where base metals and glass were being transmogrified into wearable works of art. One of the magicians in this transformative process was the larger than life Carl Schraysshuen.
An earlier version of this article, written by Cheri Van Hoover, first appeared in Vintage Fashion and Costume Jewelry in 2004 and was used with permission on our previous website. It has been updated and adapted for use in this blog.
