"You Are My Children"

Hammacher Schlemmer, I love you--

You're like a sweetheart to me.

Hammacher Schlemmer, above you

No other firm e'er could be . . .

--The Little Show, 1929

Hammacher Schlemmer & Co. is a 104-year-old Manhattan store to which a Park Avenue dowager goes automatically if she wants a washboard, and to which an Indian prince once wrote for a bronco (he got it). For a price, its customers can get every nicety of modern living--from ten varieties of outdoor grills and 90 types of coffeemakers to rhinestone dog collars (for the cocktail hour) and bronze fig leaves (for statues).

Last week Mrs. Else Schlemmer, a small, soft-eyed woman in her 50s, who has run the store since her husband, William F. Schlemmer, died in 1945, called a special meeting of the staff. Standing beside a counter, she announced that she had made a new will. Among the principal beneficiaries: more than 100 employees. Said Mrs. Schlemmer: "I have no children. You are my children ... I have not only taken special note of you who have done an outstanding job for and with us for many years, but I have also taken this step to show my appreciation to many of the newer members of my family." Since Hammacher Schlemmer had some 200 employees, Mrs. Schlemmer had, in a way, set up a unique incentive plan. She declined to give employees' names or the size of the bequests. But speaking to a reporter later, she said: "There will be enough ..."

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