CHAPTER 3:
MILO KLEINBERG, DESIGNER
Kleinberg’s talent for networking seemed to come as naturally to him as his talent and eye for design. The Jewish immigrant community in New York, many of them German-speaking, was rife with people who had come before him, seen the same struggles and overcame them. Many were a generation older and beginning to reap the rewards of so much hard work in their new home. One of those was an architect by the name of Max Gerstl. Gerstl was an immigrant like Kleinberg, but he was somewhat older, established professionally and a Czech. He was an architect who, back in his native Prague, specialized in the design of retail stores and was very well known. Now in New York, his growing firm needed help, so he placed a want ad in one of the many, many newspapers published in the city at the time. Kleinberg happened to see it, contacted him, and was immediately summoned for an interview. Gerstl saw the boy’s talent in just a few rough drawings
and wanted to hire him on the spot. The salary was $90 a week, a modest sum, but a far cry from the returns on selling handkerchiefs stoop-to-stoop or the profits from being a soda jerk at the Majestic Hotel. Kleinberg accepted the position and, along with the paycheck, got a marvelous start at designing, as well as everything else that went along with the trade—surveying, drafting, sketching, and calling on clients. On his first day, the newly minted professional took his place at a desk in the small office in a walk-up at 145 West 18th Street, was issued the tools of his trade, a triangle and a T-square, and wasted no time getting to work. He was Gerstl’s only employee. “I took the job and learned everything I could from him,” he recalls. Kleinberg designed for all the firm’s clients from the very beginning, in addition to selling and networking, which was also part of the job. Gerstl had a small but thriving firm whose contacts for design jobs came from working with real estate brokers around Manhattan, like Cross and Brown. They called him in to design their MILO KLEINBERG, DESIGNER
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