After World War II, Pittsfield’s downtown (or up street, as we called it back then) was booming with over 100 stores and eateries on or adjacent to North Street.
It was a time of optimism and growing prosperity; closed stores were never vacant for long. Very few of the retail businesses were operated by or affiliated with national companies. In fact, even the larger department stores, like England Brothers, Rosenfield’s, Holden and Stone, and the Berkshire Hills Shop were local-family owned. Today, almost none of these retail businesses present 70 or 80 years ago remain in downtown Pittsfield.
One of the exceptions is a store that in four years from now will celebrate its 100th anniversary. That business is Carr Hardware at 547 North St.
Carr Hardware has always worked toward being the leading local retailer of traditional hardware, tools and plumbing, electrical, and paint supplies, plus much more. But the real success of Carr Hardware has been its personalized customer service for over nine decades. Staff members have always been available to offer expert advice to customers, and create a sense of community within the store.
Very few members of younger generations know anything about Samuel “Sam" Carr, for whom Carr Hardware is named. As a youngster in the 1950s, I got to know Sam as he was somehow related to me. He and his family members were at many our family events and reunions.
It wasn’t until the 1980s when I began doing genealogical research that I learned more about Sam’s history and our relationship. Sam’s mother, Marie, was a sister to my great-grandmother Cecille, which makes Sam and I first cousins twice removed.
The sisters were two of 12 adult Dawidoff siblings who immigrated to the U.S. from Latvia in the 1890s. Six of the siblings settled in the Berkshires, and all of them operated businesses in the area as well as many of their adult children doing the same.
Sam, born in North Adams in 1901, was one of the first of several Dawidoff children born in the Berkshires — and the first to own his own business.
At the age of 8, Sam Carr was destined to become a businessman. He already had a North Adams newspaper route with 50 customers. In 1918 he graduated Drury High School, and despite his mother’s push for him to study to be a dentist, the young man went to work in a North Adams hardware store.
He used some of his weekly pay to subscribe to a hardware trade magazine and enjoyed reading each issue cover to cover to learn about items, their uses and value.
Sam’s parents, David and Marie (Dawidoff) Carr, moved to Pittsfield in 1922 where the dad opened David Carr’s dry goods store. The small shop was at 161 Seymour St., and the Carr family resided in the apartment upstairs.
Sam was not interested in working in the family business, and thus took a job as a clerk with Berkshire Hardware at 156 North St. After a few years he went to work for an aunt and uncle, the Kolmans, who ran Berkshire Wallpaper and Paint Store at 439 North St. A few years later in 1928, the young man opened Carr Hardware at 413 North St., close to his relatives’ shop.
In the 1930s, Sam Carr began bringing family members into the business.
With Sam’s warm personality and caring customer service, his hardware store experienced early success. In the 1930s he began bringing family members into the business. Two of Sam’s sisters were responsible for managing the office and bookkeeping, and three brothers-in-laws served as department heads and managers.
As the business grew, Sam kept adding space, expanding to 415, 419 and 429 North St. In 1955 he made a major purchase of the former Sears, Roebuck and Co. store at 537-547 North St. and moved the business into it where it remains today. He had also acquired a warehouse with 10 acres on Wahconah Street.
Sam was well respected as a trustworthy merchant among his associates and even competitors throughout Berkshire County. He was frequently described as a “soft touch” for people in need of help.
He would often buy a meal or even a train ticket for someone. He never said no to a charity committee chair asking for the donation of an item for a fundraiser. To Sam it made no difference as to race or religion. All legitimate callers successfully got a donation for their causes.
In the late 1950s, when I was in Boy Scouts, our troop was led by Sam’s nephew, Burt Eyges. Sam would often lend the troop a store truck for our paper drives and outings. One time we did a major jar and bottle drive, and Carr Hardware bought hundreds of jars from our effort. The glassware was recycled to store nails, screws, washers, nuts and other hardware.
Over the years Sam received considerable recognition in the community for his generosity to all groups. Twice he received “Man of the Year Award” from Congregation Knesset Israel. He was very modest and would dismiss the honor by saying,” I only did what I was asked to do.”
He seldom could say no to anyone — including salesmen. Carr Hardware had a huge inventory of even the most obscure items purchased over the years from very convincing salespeople. Rarely did the store not stock an item that a customer wanted.
My favorite story of Sam is about those few times when he did not have what a frequent customer needed. He’d quickly have a stock boy exit out the back door and go down North Street to a competitor to buy the item.
The customer would believe the lad was out back searching in the store’s warehouse. Then when the employee came in the rear door with the item, Sam would sell it for less than his purchase price. Not losing a valued customer over lack of inventory was an important part of his belief in good customer service.
His interesting policy for pricing was all in his head, and his sharp memory proved to be consistent in relating the cost of unmarked hardware items. Despite the business workforce reaching 60 employees, Sam was always around to help when he heard the familiar call from customers and staff, “Hey, Sam!”
In 1962, Carr Hardware was purchased by a Boston group headed by Marshall Raser. Raser continued both the excellent service of the store and the tradition of a family business by bringing in his son, Bart, as a partner in 2000. The Raser duo have a lot to be proud of as the family that has operated Carr Hardware for the past 62 years.
Today, national chains like Home Depot and Lowes have captured and dominated the hardware market with huge stores and inventories. Online shopping like Amazon has added a new form of competition that has decimated the smaller businesses. Very few family-operated enterprises have survived such competitors.
Carr Hardware has not only beaten the odds, but has grown considerably under the Raser ownership. The company now has branch stores in Lee, Lenox, Great Barrington, North Adams and Avon, Conn.
After selling the business to the Rasers, Sam Carr, his wife of 30 years, Margaret (Hirsch), and his son David moved to Passaic, N.J., to be close to daughter Rachel Holland and her husband, Henry.
Sam died in 1994 at age 92; his wife, Margaret, had died four years earlier. I am still in touch with family members in New Jersey. None of them have pursued careers in the hardware business of the family patriarch, but they do appreciate the stories about Sam’s days at Carr Hardware in Pittsfield.
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