Bruce Alva Gimbel (July 28, 1913 – October 1980) was an American businessman and president of the

Gimbels Gimbel Brothers (known simply as Gimbels) was an American department store corporation that operated for over a century, from 1842 until 1987. Gimbel patriarch Adam Gimbel opened his first store in Vincennes, Indiana, in 1842. In 1887, the compa ...

department store.

Biography

Gimbel was born on July 28, 1913, to a

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

family, the son of Alva (née Bernheimer) and

Bernard Gimbel Bernard Feustman Gimbel (April 10, 1885 – September 29, 1966) was an American businessman and president of the Gimbels department store. Biography Gimbel was born to Jewish parents, Rachel (née Feustman) and Isaac Gimbel, son of Adam Gimbel, ...

. He had four siblings: twins

Peter Gimbel Peter R. Gimbel (February 14, 1927 – July 12, 1987) was an American filmmaker and underwater photojournalist. Biography Born in New York City, he was the son of Alva (née Bernheimer) and Bernard Feustman Gimbel and heir to the Gimbels depar ...

and David Gimbel; and twins Hope Gimbel and Caral Gimbel. His sister Hope was married and divorced from art collector David M. Solinger and mother of photographer Lynn Stern. His sister Caral was married and divorced from

Edward Lasker Edward Lasker (born Eduard Lasker) (December 3, 1885 – March 25, 1981) was a German-American chess and Go player. He was awarded the title of International Master of chess by FIDE. Lasker was an engineer by profession, and an author of ...

, son of

Albert Lasker Albert Davis Lasker (May 1, 1880 – May 30, 1952) was an American businessman who played a major role in shaping modern advertising. He was raised in Galveston, Texas, where his father was the president of several banks. Moving to Chicago, he be ...

; and baseball superstar

Hank Greenberg Henry Benjamin Greenberg (born Hyman Greenberg; January 1, 1911 – September 4, 1986), nicknamed "Hammerin' Hank", "Hankus Pankus", or "The Hebrew Hammer", was an American professional baseball player and team executive. He played in Major Leagu ...

before settling down with World War II hero Joseph M. Lebworth. In 1935, he graduated from

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

. Gimbel ferried planes during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

before working for the family company, the only child of Bernard to do so, as vice president of sales in 1946.

Career

Gimbel worked up through the ranks and in 1953, his father retired and he became president of Gimbels which had at the time over $300 million in sales 15 stores and 20,000 employees. Faced with declining sales at its downtown stores, he expanded the chain into the suburbs and using a newly established network of local buying offices in France, Italy, Spain, Germany and England, he stocked his stores with foreign manufactured copies of name brand merchandise. Both tactics worked for a time but facing the new economic reality, in 1965 he closed

Saks Fifth Avenue Saks Fifth Avenue (originally Saks & Company; Colloquialism, colloquially Saks) is an American Luxury goods, luxury department store chain headquartered in New York City and founded by Andrew Saks. The original store opened in the F Street and ...

's 34th street flagship store and soon after, in 1968, he forced his cousin, Adam Long Gimbel (husband of Sophie Gimbel), who operated the 31 store Saks Fifth Avenue chain, to retire. In 1972, he established a Gimbels store for $30 million on the

Upper East Side The Upper East Side, sometimes abbreviated UES, is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 96th Street to the north, the East River to the east, 59th Street to the south, and Central Park/Fifth Avenue to the wes ...

thinking that he could capture the neighborhood's wealthy residents; the store was a failure. In July 1973, Gimbels was purchased for $205 million by Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corporation, the country's third‐largest tobacco company. He retired in 1975. In 1986, the Gimbels brand was retired.

Personal life

Gimbel married twice: first to Doris Asiel with whom he had a son, Robert B. Gimbel, and then to Barbara Poulson with whom he had a son, John B. Gimbel. He also adopted a daughter, Judith C. Gimbel, who married architect Benjamin Mendelsund, with whom she had a son, graphic artist

Peter Mendelsund Peter Mendelsund is a novelist, graphic designer known for his book and magazine covers, and the creative director of ''The Atlantic''. Mendelsund has been described by the ''New York Times'' as "one of the top designers at work today" and "the be ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gimbel, Bruce Alva 1913 births 1980 deaths 20th-century American Jews Gimbel family American retail chief executives 20th-century American businesspeople Yale University alumni