Editor's note: Sherman Ray's tailoring skills saved his life. Originally published in the January 15, 2012 issue of This Land, Michael Berglund's stunning profile of Ray, a Polish Jew who survived the Holocaust, is the story of an ordinary man braving extraordinary circumstances.
When I walk into Ray’s Tailor Shop, I immediately notice the ordered disorder of the two-room store. Directly in front of me, too near the front door, sits a table stacked with files and mail and a small radio propped up on a box. Towards the back of the room, I see a fabric-draped Singer sewing machine, circa 1950--the first sewing machine, I later learn, that Sherman Ray purchased when he arrived in Oklahoma City from Germany. Next to the changing room, a small step stool is positioned between three large mirrors. The last table I see is loaded with scraps of tweed, herringbone, and different varieties of worsted wools. And sitting on the table, in the middle of the material, is Ray, who when I enter is negotiating a thimble and needle to add a scrap of cashmere to a blazer.
He runs the thimbled hand over impeccably slicked back hair and looks me over through large-framed glasses that magnify his eyes, which knowingly search for details that often go unnoticed in casual conversation: Does one shoulder hang slightly lower than the other? Does my neck crane forward to make my spine curve? Does a 30-year habit of standing into my left hip make the left leg slightly shorter? All of this occurs instantaneously as I introduce myself. He’s not sizing me up for a mano a mano fistfight. He’s measuring me.
I tell him that I’d like to have a suit tailor-made and that I was interested in gray tweed or a suit with a similar texture. He tells me that he stopped building suits because of the amount of energy it takes, but he’d be happy to alter a suit for me. He chuckles and riffles through a manila folder full of photos, newspaper articles, letters, and trinkets. Ray pulls out artifacts that show me the man he has become: champion weightlifter, avid rower, accomplished tailor.
“I’ll tailor the suit so good for you, it’ll fit you like a glove,” Ray says in a thick Polish accent.
I ask him what kind of suit I should get and he sets down his folder and takes his measuring tape from around his neck and guides me so that my back is facing him.