Wardrobe Trunk
date: label: Date made
content: ca. 1930
name: label: user
content: Isenbergh, Max
label: maker
content: Mendel Trunx
notes: label: Description
content: Promoting itself as “the Aristocrat of Luggage,” the Mendel-Drucker Company of Cincinnati, Ohio, manufactured this sturdy metal wardrobe trunk in the early 1930s for what it called the “class market.” Unlike traditional sea chests and footlockers, wardrobe trunks stood upright and opened vertically, permitting easy access to its contents. This trunk features an enclosed compartment for clothing on hangers, as well as several drawers for shoes, accessories, and folded items. It was also made with special gaskets, interior dust curtains, and sturdy bolts and locks to protect the owner’s expensive garments from moisture, soot, and theft.
label: Description
content: Max Isenbergh, a prominent Washington, D.C., lawyer, law professor, and patron of the arts, used this trunk for his extensive travels around the United States and across the Atlantic to Europe between 1934 and about 1960. The trunk bears several stickers from steamship and railroad companies. The outermost layer of stickers and its surviving tag document the trunk’s use on a November 1956 eastbound sailing of the SS <I>United States</I>. On this voyage, Isenbergh, his wife Pearl, and their three children relocated to Paris, where he was starting a new appointment as a special assistant for atomic energy at the American embassy. The family traveled in first class and brought this trunk and about two dozen other pieces of luggage for their stay in Paris, which lasted until 1961.
topic: label: Subject
content: Travel
label: related event
content: Postwar United States
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Domestic Life
label: See more items in
content: Clothing & Accessories
label: See more items in
content: Transportation
label: Exhibition
content: On the Water
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2006.0069.01
label: accession number
content: 2006.0069
label: catalog number
content: 2006.0069.01
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Trunk
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: paper (labels material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 105 cm x 58 cm x 58 cm; 41 5/16 in x 22 13/16 in x 22 13/16 in