I.B. Kleinert Rubber Company Factory
Introduction
Text-to-speech Audio
The four-story brick building on the corner of 127th St. and 20th Ave. in College Point was constructed for the India Rubber Company in 1889. India Rubber was a manufacturer of hard rubber items, founded by local businessman and German-born industrialist Conrad Poppenhusen. Later, the building housed the Hard Rubber Comb Company and the I.B. Kleinert Rubber Company. A "ghost" sign reading "FACTORY A, I. B. KLEINERT RUBBER CO." can still be seen on the west side of the building. The building features 12-foot-tall ceilings and offers about 42,000 square feet of rentable industrial space. One of the current tenants is the Scarfand Co., a seller of ladies' scarves and other accessories.
Images
1915 newspaper ad for Kleinert's "Tupair Brassiere Garment Shield" (I.B. Kleinert Co.)
![Sleeve, Publication, Book, Poster](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_5161_1915%20NY%20newsppr%20ad%20kleinerts%20Tupair%20brassiere%20shields.jpg)
1910 magazine ad for rubber diaper cover, Kleinert's Baby Pants (I.B. Kleinert Rubber Co., New York)
![White, Sleeve, Font, Poster](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_8754_1910%20mag%20ad%20kleinert's%20baby%20pants.jpg)
Kleinert Rubber Factory complex on 1903 Sanborn map (Vol. 5 p. 18)
![Map, Font, Rectangle, Handwriting](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_1136_Kleinert%20factory%20on%205th%20ave%201903%20map%20sanborn%20v5%20p18%20LOC.jpg)
1889 trademarked label for "The Gem" Dress Shield, made by Kleinert Rubber Works in College Point (I.B. Kleinert)
![Rectangle, Font, Bathroom, Emblem](https://storage.googleapis.com/clio-images/medium_9008_trademark%20registration%20image%20dress%20shields%201889%20kleinert%2C%20LOC.jpg)
Backstory and Context
Text-to-speech Audio
The first hard rubber goods factory in College Point was built by German immigrant businessman Conrad Poppenhusen in the mid-1850s. College Point was heavily dominated by industrial development by the last quarter of the nineteenth century and employed many German-Americans, Major employers were the Conrad Poppenhusen Enterprise Works, Hugo Funk Silk Mill, the Germania Ultra Marine Works, and the I.B. Kleinert Rubber Company.
Isaak B. Kleinert founded the rubber company bearing his name in 1869 in College Point. The I.B. Kleinert Company received a number of patents for rubber items, including one in 1869 for dress shields for blocking underarm sweat. The company improved the product many times, including a patented "seamless stockinet" dress shield n 1894. Their trademarked label for a rubber dress shield in 1889 called "The Gem" was "nainsook covered" and made at their factory in College Point (see the image below). They also manufactured corsets, brassieres, shower caps, and rubber pants for babies to wear over diapers. During World War II, the company made rubber life rafts for the U.S. military, for airmen who needed to ditch their planes into the ocean.
The I.B. Kleinert Company offices were in Manhattan at 725 Broadway in 1902 when they filed plans with the city for a new rubber factory building elsewhere in Queens, which became known as "Factory F". The old street names adjacent to their older factory building ("Factory A") in this Clio description were 5th Ave. to the south (now 20th Ave.) and N. 18th St. to the west (). By 1903, there were three buildings in the factory complex (see the Sanborn map image below). The main factory building was mostly four-story, with a well and tank in the interior courtyard. A one-story brick building where oil was stored was to the northeast of the main building and west of the Long Island Rail Road corridor. To the east of the main building, west of the railroad corridor was a two-story brick structure with a one-story wooden north wing. The wing held a finishing shop; the second floor of the brick part of the structure including sleeping quarters for machinists. The brick portion of the structure is still standing but the wooden wing and oil storage shed are gone and replaced with a parking lot.
Kleinert's is still a company, selling to stores and offering mail order to consumers; they incorporated as Hygienics Industries in 2003. They specialize in accessories to combat excessive sweating and incontinence. They still have a factory, but it is now located in Elba, Alabama.
Sources
Anonymous. Manufacturers. American Machinist. April 10th 1902. 537 - 538.
Binder, Frederick M. Reimers, David M. All the Nations Under Heaven: An Ethnic and Racial History of New York City. New York, NY. Columbia University Press, 1995.
Department of the Interior. U.S. Patent Office. Annual Report of the Commissioner of Patents for the Year 1894 . Washington, DC. Government Printing Office, 1895.
Forgotten New York. College Point, Queens, Forgotten New York. May 5th 2006. Accessed June 16th 2022. https://forgotten-ny.com/2006/05/college-point-queens/.
I.B. Kleinert. Trademark registration No. 17,222 for label for rubber dress shield "The Gem", Library of Congress Prints & Photographs . November 26th 1889. Accessed June 16th 2022. https://www.loc.gov/resource/trmk.1t17222/.
Kleinerts. About Us, Kleinerts.com. January 1st 2021. Accessed June 20th 2022. https://kleinerts.com/pages/about-us.
Lederer, Victor. Poppenhusen Institute. College Point. Images of America. Charleston, SC. Arcadia Publishing, 2004.
LoopNet. 127-03 20th Ave., College Point, NY 11356, LoopNet. January 1st 2022. Accessed June 19th 2022. https://www.loopnet.com/Listing/127-03-20th-Ave-College-Point-NY/6333921/.
Von Skal, George. Illustrated History of the Borough of Queens, New York. New York, NY. F.T. Smiley Publishing Company, 1908.
White, Norval. Willensky, Elliot. Leadon, Fran. AIA Guide to New York City. Edition Fifth. Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 2010.
New York Times (New York, NY), October 13th 1915, p. 7
Google Books: Woman's Home Companion, April 1910, p. 49
Library of Congress (LOC): https://www.loc.gov/item/sanborn06198_005/
Library of Congress (LOC) Prints & Photographs Division: https://www.loc.gov/resource/trmk.1t17222/