Morris Schrage

Morris Schrage (born December 27, 1930 in Łódź ; † October 7, 2011 ), also Morris or Morrie Sage , was a Polish-American entrepreneur and music producer .

Life

Morris Schrage was born into a wealthy and large Jewish family in Łódź. His father Michael Schrage ran a rubber factory in Lodz. When the German invasion of Poland began in 1939, Michael Schrage decided to leave Poland. The family emigrated to Cuba . Morris had an older brother named Harry and a sister Betsy. After the decision to emigrate, the family survived; numerous relatives fell victim to the Holocaust .

The family settled in Matanzas , Cuba, where the father opened a shoe factory and sold sneakers under the brand name "Yumuri". Morris and his older brother Harry worked in the family business, which ensured them a good income and made life as playboys possible. Morris and his brother were regulars in the most exclusive nightclub and brothel in Havana , the "Casa Marina", in which several Cuban music groups, mostly trios, performed. With the “Trio Zamora” and the “Trio Melodicos” they recorded numerous pieces of music in a makeshift studio at home in Matanzas in 1958. Harry Schrage had bought the equipment for it on several trips to Miami. The brothers spent several weeks driving the musicians from Havana to Matanzas (a two-hour drive each).

In 1960 the Schrage family fled Cuba after Fidel Castro's Cuban revolution . Morris Schrage settled in Los Angeles , where he started working as a car salesman. His older brother Harry Schrage became an employee of Boeing in Seattle, but died in 1973 at the age of 46. In 1965 Morris Schrage began working for Hull-Dobbs Ford, and in 1969 he opened his own company “Universal City Datsun” in North Hollywood, which sold Datsun cars .

In 1970 he and his company, later called "Universal City Nissan", settled on Cahuenga Boulevard near Universal Studios and within sight of the major Hollywood Freeway .

His three sons Michael, Joseph and Leonard entered the business; when he passed away in 2011, the company had six branches, annual sales of approximately $ 700 million, and nearly 1,000 employees. The company now sells Nissan , Infiniti , Toyota and Mercedes-Benz vehicles . Many of his former employees later set up their own companies. In 2009, Schrage was named one of the 50 “All Time Most Visionary Auto Dealers in the United States” by the American “Automotive News Magazine” for its innovative corporate management and advertising.

Schrage was married to Helen Schrage and they lived in Encino near Los Angeles. The couple had three sons together, a daughter and eight grandchildren, and another daughter died at a young age before her father.

Edition of the Lost Cuban Trios of Casa Marina

In 1999, Morris Schrage received the tape recordings from his brother Harry's widow, which they had made in Cuba at the time. In 2010 he finally released the recordings, which are of astonishingly good technical quality, on the label "Ahinama Music" (also written: Ahi-Namá) of his friend Jimmy Maslon under the title "The Lost Cuban Trios of Casa Marina" was the best-selling CD in Amazon's Latin Music Charts.

literature

• Booklet of the CD The Lost Cuban Trios of Casa Marina , 2010, AHI-1068

Web links / sources

• Obituary for Morris Schrage in the Los Angeles Times, accessed December 24, 2012
• Daily News report, October 14, 2011, accessed December 24, 2012
• Report in the California New Car Dealers Association Bulletin, accessed December 24, 2012
• Obituary for Morrie Sage by Universal City Nissan, accessed December 24, 2012

Individual evidence

1. ^ "It starts with two jewish boys who fled from the Nazis, settled in Cuba and fell in love with the island ...", in: Liner notes on the CD Lost Cuban Trios of Casa Marina
2. ↑ all information in this paragraph is based on the booklet of the CD "The Lost Cuban Trios of Casa Marina".
3. ↑ The company's obituary probably erroneously also mentions 1955, see archived copy ( memento of the original from December 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . 
4. ↑ see the company's homepage under Archived Copy ( Memento of the original from January 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.