Phyllis Karp, 89; 'Grand Dame Of Fourth Street' (Cincinnati)
Bill Schenley
Photo:
http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2003/08/17/karp_zoom.jpg
FROM: The Cincinnati Enquirer ~
By Robin Buchanan and Rebecca Goodman
Known as the "Grande Dame of Fourth Street,"
Phyllis Tennenbaum Karp worked at the Main
Auction Gallery - an antiques store owned by her
family - for some 60 years.
From her office in a loft that overlooked the sales
floor, she presided over the business, advising her
son, J. Louis Karp, and grandson, Jonas Karp,
on how to maintain a thriving business as times
changed downtown.
Retirement was out of the question for Mrs. Karp,
who was still working at the gallery when she died
Saturday morning at her apartment at One Lytle
Place downtown. She was 89.
Mrs. Karp was an advocate for downtown. She
lobbied for panhandler restrictions and to keep the
original doors at Union Terminal when it became
the Cincinnati Museum Center.
Every spring, she displayed her cherished Reds
memorabilia collection - dating to 1928 - in the
auction gallery's window. Each piece came with
a story, such as the baseball signed by
Ted Kluszewski. The Reds first baseman tossed
the ball over the rail outside the clubhouse to
Mrs. Karp saying, "Here ya go kiddo," she told
the Enquirer.
She donated hundreds of items to the Cincinnati
Reds Hall of Fame and Museum, becoming its
first major donor, according to executive director,
Greg Rhodes. Her gifts form the heart of the
museum's "Baseball Heaven" room.
"She was a huge fan and it meant a lot to her to
have her memorabilia preserved and on display"
Rhodes said. "She represented to us how a lot
of the fans feel about the Reds. The history she
brought to the exhibit is very special. She was a
sweetheart."
A native of Cincinnati, Mrs. Karp graduated from
Walnut Hills High School and attended the
University of Cincinnati. She worked at her
family's store - Tennenbaum Furniture - which
dated to the 19th century. It became Main Auction
Gallery when she married Gilbert Karp. He died
about 15 years ago.
In 1962, she fought to keep the building, which
the city wanted to tear down.
"I went on a rampage," she told the Enquirer in a
2002 interview. "I called all nine city council members
every day. I wrote them letters every day. I even got
our customers to march on City Hall one Tuesday.
After a while, Jay (her son) saw Pete Strauss (then a
city councilman) at a party and he told Jay, 'Tell your
mother whatever she wants, we'll give her. Just get
her off our backs.'"
In 2002, Mrs. Karp and her son, J. Louis Karp,
were a recipients of the Downtown Achievement
Award for their "outstanding contribution to the
vitality of downtown."
She was preceded in death by a daughter
Lea Rabenstein two years ago.
In addition to her son, survivors include: a daughter,
Mimi Atik, of Israel; three sisters, Natalie Alpert, of
Israel, Judith Barron, of Mason, and Bash Zimmerman,
of New York. 11 grandchildren; and four
great-grandchildren.
The funeral was this morning at Weil Funeral Home,
8350 Cornell Rd. Burial will be at Love Brothers
Cemetery in Price Hill.
---
On the auction block: a lost Cincinnati
FROM: The Cincinnati Enquirer (August 17th 2003) ~
By Cliff Radel
Who will buy her memories? What price will
they pay for her hometown treasures?
Phyllis Karp asked these questions as she sorted
through her collection of Cincinnati memorabilia.
Come Tuesday, inside her family's 121-year-old
Main Auction Galleries, her son, Jay, will bang
down the gavel on her entire collection.
Going once, going twice, going three times, sold to
the highest bidder will be items with Cincinnati ties.
Some predate Phyllis Karp's July 15, 1917 birthday.
Others, such as a mug commemorating the Reds
winning the pennant in 1970, are of a much more
recent vintage.
Each piece comes with a memory.
"And, thank God, at my age, I can remember them
all," the 86-year-old Karp said as she sat in her
catbird's seat on the balcony overlooking the auction
house's main floor.
She looked at her treasures, arrayed in display
cases, and told their stories.
Wiedemann's Bohemian Beer in a miniature bottle.
Cap still intact. Contents still bubbly.
"That's my favorite. As a little girl, I liked holding it
and seeing the beer inside," she said.
A dance card from an 1892 charity ball at Music
Hall. "My mother went to those functions, always
got a program, always kept it." The card contains
24 spaces - still blank - to record a lady's dance
partners. The slim pencil, attached by an even
slimmer thread, remains sharp.
Werk's Tag Soap. One dirt-brown bar. In its original
wrapper. "My brother-in-law bought that company.
He didn't keep it. But I kept the soap." It was good
for treating poison ivy."
Aug. 15, 1945 edition of The Cincinnati Enquirer.
For four cents inquiring minds could read the stories
under the banner headline: "War Ends As Japan
Quits."
On that day, Karp, married with one child and one
more on the way, went to work at her father's
furniture store. "I picked up the paper. Oh, what a
wonderful day it was."
Karp loves Cincinnati. She's proud of her
hometown. As long as she can remember, she has
been collecting, saving and preserving mementos of
the Queen City. And the Reds in particular.
The home team will receive the bulk of her extensive
collection of Reds souvenirs.
"I'm donating them to the ball club's museum," she
said. "But I love my Reds so much, I had to put a few
items related to them in the auction."
She's parting with these collectibles because she feels
they need a new home.
"When I had a 10-room house, I had the collection
on exhibit. I could see it every day," she said. "But,
since I moved downtown to One Lytle Place 21
years ago, most of the items have been in boxes.
"I've loved these things. Now, someone else can
love them."
Remnants of Another Era
Some of the pieces are related to still-thriving
businesses. A 1915 Rookwood ashtray made for
Western-Southern Life Insurance. A bar of Procter
& Gamble's White Soap.
But, many of the names on the items in the collection
belong to stores and buildings from a long-lost
Cincinnati.
A 1915 calendar still in its leather binding from the
Cincinnati Coffin Co. A thermometer compliments
of Tennenbaum Bros. Furniture. Decorative boxes
from Rollman's, Shillito's, Pogue's.
Karp smiled as she picked up the box from Pogue's.
"My wedding dress came from Pogue's," she said.
"That was the epitome of a cultured downtown
department store."
The collection includes a wealth of small, ornate,
coin banks from defunct savings institutions such as
the German National and the Pearl Market Bank.
The latter coin bank, in the shape of a barrel, boasted
that the Pearl Market was paying an interest rate of
4 percent.
"I'd take half that right now from my bank," Karp
quipped.
A water jug engraved, "Hotel Sinton, 1928" stood
next to a ceramic bottle that once held Christian
Moerlein's Old Jug Lager Krug Bier.
"I remember these things with nostalgia," Karp said.
"And with a pain in my heart for what has happened to
downtown Cincinnati. We were so proud of our city.
We loved Cincinnati.
"Now, the pride is gone. The love is gone. It hurts
me. It's like a family destroyed in a war."
Karp plans to be on hand for Tuesday's auction.
"If," she said, "the Lord spares me for another day."
She will see her old friends leave in the hands of new
owners. She swears that will not be too tough to
take.
"I've enjoyed every minute I've been around these
things," she said. "But I've had this collection for so
long. It's time to move on."