In sharing email's over the past year, we felt that this Sell Cousin had an especially interesting story to tell. So we asked him to write it. "Charlie Sell", as he calls himself, has now written his story. It is such an intriguing autobiography, that we wish to share it with you, just as he wrote it. So here it is! CCC
"Had the Empire State Building been standing in 1920 I would have been born in its afternoon shadow. At age 5 months my mother took me to Portland, Maine via Eastern Steamship, the first leg of a life time 6 million mile journey. The following year the family moved to Detroit, back to New York City for the birth of my sister and thence to White Plains, NY where the late Dr. Sell had a 10 room summer home. In 1933 my parents split and father took us back to NYC to live with my grandmother in Dr. Sell's New York residence.
Manhattan was a great place to be a teenager in the 1930's. 5 cents would take you anywhere in the city from Coney Island to the far corners of the Bronx. Local movies were for double and sometimes triple features 10 cents, before noon Roxy and the Paramount, home of the big bands, were 25 cents and Radio City Music Hall was an "expensive" 35 cents. Even Central Park was safe at night!
In 1938 I graduated from George Washington High School with an academic diploma. Quickly learning that biology, chemistry and calculus were of little value during the great depression I went back to school at nights and earned a commercial diploma.
At the end of the third semester at NYU I enlisted in the army. The first 8 months were spent at Rutgers University studying electrical engineering. After basic training in Texas I was sent to the Signal Corp school in Ft. Monmouth, NJ for advanced courses. Shortly after returning to my outfit in Ft. Sam Houston, Texas I was accidentally run over by a jeep and spent 4 months in the Brooke General Hospital. With my career ended in the Signal Corp, I was assigned as a calculus teacher in OCS; an English teacher for Hispanics and Chinese and then to troop movements at the New York Port of Embarkation where I met many of the famous generals in WWII: Mickey Rooney, Clark Gable, Red Buttons to name a few.
Upon discharge I worked briefly for Western Electric and Union Carbide before joining Ruberoid for 20 years, eleven of which were as Director of Purchasing and Traffic. These were important functions at Ruberoid with purchasing accounting for 68% of the sales dollar and traffic for 50,000 carloads and 110,000 truckloads per year. To manage my functions at 53 mines and manufacturing plants spread all over the country required I travel every other week or about one and a half million air miles BEFORE frequent travel perks. During this period I found time to graduate from the College of Advanced Traffic enabling me to act as a Commerce Attorney before the Interstate Commerce Commission and the state Public Service Commissions. As such, I won 86 of the 88 cases some of which involved very large sums of money.
In May 1968 Ruberoid was bought by GAF, the German subsidiary of I. G. Farben, which had been taken over by our Government during WWII. At the time GAF was "managed" by unsuccessful political candidates appointed by the Justice Department. One month of this environment and it was resume time.
In August 1968 I accepted a position as Director of Distribution of the Cabot Corporation in Boston. This was a good move for me for many reasons. First and foremost, it was Boston where I met Peggy who has been my pride and joy for the past 28 years.
Cabot sent me to Harvard, the University of Wisconsin, and Stanford Graduate Business School for advanced courses. They also sent me to Holland to found a new subsidiary of which I was President for 5 years.
In 1977 I accepted a position with United Brands, which at the time had about 40 subsidiaries including Chiquita, John Morrell, and A&W root beer. Peggy and I were thrilled not only with the new opportunities afforded but also because UB had its roots in Boston for over 100 years and we wanted to stay in Boston. Unfortunately, the euphoria about staying in Boston did not last long. My first assignment was President of UB's trucking company in Sioux Falls, SD, which was bleeding red ink. Eight months later, with the trucking company in the black, I was transferred to UB's new corporate headquarters in NYC and elected Corporate Vice President of Purchasing, Traffic, Distribution (with some engineering responsibilities, as the Engineering Dept. was disbanded) and President of Maritrop Trading Corporation, UB's $185 million international trading company. Later, manufacturing responsibilities were added for plants in Panama, Honduras, Costa Rica, Colombia and the Philippines, which made 400,000 banana boxes every day six days a week.
Reporting directly to the Chairman of the Board, my assignments were interesting, many and varied. But it was my responsibilities that brought me in contact with many celebrities. I had lunch with President Nixon, breakfast with President Reagan, dined with Senators Kennedy, Brooke, & Brock Adams: Gov. King: many members of the House of Representatives; Mayors Lindsay, & Koch; Lord High Mayor of Southampton, England; Ambassadors; foreign Presidents; Vice Presidents and Senators. My daughters double dated with Lucy Johnson at Princeton. Lucy's date was Corky Cochrane, son of Steve Cochrane - hero of "Terry and the Pirates".
For Maritrop I traveled extensively behind the Iron Curtain during the worst era of the cold war. Passing thru Check Point Charlie was a nasty experience every time. Once a machine gun was put in Peggy's face and she was ordered out of the car. She refused! Fortunately we knew the right people and she was not shot. The KGB people who had the final say on all trades were very nice to us in East Germany, Poland and Czechoslavakia and we make trades valued in tens of millions of dollars.
Looking back, I had enough experiences to fill a book. However, some that stand out in my mind are winning a gold medal at the Leipzig Fair for innovative design of a freight car never before built; white-water rafting; kissing the blarney stone; sleeping in the Shah of Iran's bed; lunch with an Inca Chief. Being appointed Honorary Citizen of New Orleans by Mayor Morial and Ambassador at Large for the 1st Congressional District of Georgia By Rep. Elliott Hagan; President of the New England Chapter of the National Council of Physical Distribution Managment ( also taught courses at their National meetings); and becoming good friends with the Georgia Public Service Commission after ruling against me in an iron clad case I should have won "because I was a Yankee". My travels took me over 5 million air miles (89 trips to Europe alone); to the 6 continents and about 1/2 of all the countries in the world.
My interest in genealogy began recently when a daughter-in-law asked me to complete a book "Grandfather Remembers: Memories for my grandchild". The book had places for pictures, names and dates of my ancestors most of which were unknown to me. Accepting the challenge but limiting the scope to direct lineage for males and one or two generations for their wives (wives are much harder to trace because of name changes), I now have over 200 names in the computer. Learning for the first time that Grandfather Sell had a brother who in turn sired another branch of the family is thrilling. But despite my successes I still do not know the whereabouts of the current generation of this branch or how Aunt Jenny Sell fits into the family tree. We do know Aunt Jennie was married because we have letters addressed to her as Mrs. in Pottstown, PA and Delphos, Ohio. Dr. Edward Sell's mother-in-law lived with her in Delphos for many years and she was 103 when she died.
Most of the information needed to complete "Grandfather Remembers" is now available. However, some of the missing links continue to haunt and spur me on to additional research."
Charlie Sell clsell@netway.com
