John Dorrance Jr. was the Chairman of the Campbell Soup Company. He loved playing Santa Claus for a group of his friends. One year he give Driway gabardine coats lined in nutria as his gift from Santa. When the coats were ready they were gift boxed and loaded into our company station wagon. My brother Jimmy, who is more than a decade younger than I am, delivered the packages to Camden, N.J. He was a 16 year old junior in prep school. He never fully recovered from the experience. To start with he was nervous because he had never driven that far solo. When he got to the Campbell’s offices he was escorted to Mr. Dorrance’s office. To a nervous wide-eyed 16 year old the office seemed as big as a hotel lobby. There were seating areas with large sofas, coffee tables, and a potted tree. He thought Mr. Dorrance was nearly as powerful as the Pope ! He was asked how old he was and when he said he was 16 one of the secrtaries told him she was sure you were not permitted to drive in New York State at the age of 16. ( In Connecticut one got one’s license at 16. To drive from our Connecticut work rooms to New Jersey it was necessary to cut through New York.) By the time Jimmy got back to New Haven he was a basket case. Fast forward five years. Jimmy joined my dad and me at Chipp. When Mr. Dorrance was in town for any reason he would always stop in to visit with my dad. Whenever he walked through our door Jimmy would break into a sweat and disappear. When my father wasn’t there I would pass time with Mr. Dorrance. Jimmy never outgrew the intimidation of his “Delivery to Camden”. Nice for me- too bad for Jimmy. Mr. Dorrance was one of the truly gentle customers that we had. I do not recall his ever stopping in and leaving without ordering something. I never sold him anything. He bought because he liked what he saw.

My father told me he never wanted to do business with anyone who he thought was connected to “Organized Families”. One day a gentleman walked into our shop and said he wanted to have a few custom suits made.  He owned restaurants in Florida. He was accompanied by two beautiful young “nieces” and his driver, who looked like he was a former heavyweight boxer.  As was our practice with new customers, we said we would make one suit. He returned six week later for a first fitting and four weeks after the first fitting for a final fitting. In each visit he was accompanied by young “nieces”- different nieces for each visit.  After the final fitting he said how pleased he was, paid his bill, and ordered 3 more suits.  He arrived for the first fitting on the new suits-new “nieces” in tow. After the fittings he said he would be returning to New York in  4 weeks.  About a half hour after he left the shop we got a call from his driver.  He said our customer had left something in the fitting room and he was driving back to retrieve it. I went to the fitting room and there on the fitting room shelf was a roll of bills- five figures worth. My father asked me what I thought would have happened if some other customer had gone into that fitting room and taken the roll. He said we would have had to give the Restauranteur the money or we would have ended up directing fish traffic in the Hudson.  After we delivered the three suits we never heard from him again. I sure missed seeing his “nieces”.