0:01

Think of a pair of gloves that you own. Chances

0:03

are it was made in a faraway

0:05

place, and the production process probably included

0:07

a lot of machinery. But

0:09

there was once a time in the early 1900s

0:12

when gloves were handmade and made here in

0:14

the US. The capital of the glove industry

0:16

was Gloversville, a city in upstate New York.

0:19

Especially there, glove making was seen as

0:21

a craft. Those days, for the most part,

0:24

are long gone. Then

0:28

in 2001, a man whose entire life revolved

0:30

around the craft of glove making moved to

0:33

Gloversville. My name is

0:35

Daniel Stortow. I live in Gloversville, New

0:37

York, and I am

0:39

a glove maker and

0:41

a historian on the

0:43

history of the art of glove making. Daniel

0:46

is the owner of the Glove Museum,

0:49

a recreated 19th century glove making workshop

0:51

complete with sizing tools, cutting blocks, and

0:53

irons. A place that is part studio

0:56

and part exhibition space. Not

0:58

only does Daniel make gloves using tools from the 1800s,

1:00

but he's also the

1:02

owner of the world's largest collection of those

1:04

tools. He also owns over 10,000

1:07

pairs of gloves that span styles and materials

1:09

from all over the world, dating back almost

1:11

500 years. But

1:13

Daniel's story didn't begin in Gloversville. It

1:15

actually started in Toronto, then moved a

1:18

few other places before landing in the

1:20

city once nicknamed Uncle Sam's Glove Factory.

1:22

And once he got there, Daniel realized

1:25

how important it was to preserve the

1:27

legacy of his lifelong passion. My

1:35

name is Baudelaire and this is Atlas Obscura, a

1:38

celebration of the world's strange, incredible,

1:40

and wondrous places. Today,

1:43

we go to Gloversville, New York to hear

1:45

the story of a man whose passion fit

1:47

him like a glove. More after

1:50

this. Thanks

1:53

for watching. At

2:10

U.S. Bank, when we say we're in

2:12

it with you, we mean it. Not

2:14

just for the good stuff, the grand

2:16

openings and celebrations, although those are pretty

2:18

great, but for all the hard work

2:20

it took to get there, the fine-tuning

2:22

of goals, the managing of cash and

2:25

workflows, and decision-making. We're in to help

2:27

you through all of it, because together,

2:29

we're proving day in and day out

2:31

that there is nothing as powerful as

2:33

the power of us. Visit usbank.com to

2:35

get started today. Equal Housing Lender,

2:37

Member FDIC, copyright 2024, U.S. Bank. In

2:49

the years after the American Civil War, Gloversville,

2:51

New York, was an up-and-coming city. It

2:54

was famous for its glove industry, but being

2:56

that it was in the Adirondacks, the city

2:58

was also known for its lumber, furs, and

3:00

other forest products. And as immigrants from many

3:03

of Europe's glove-making centers found their way to

3:05

the city in upstate New York, the production

3:07

of gloves became the absolute focus. When

3:10

immigrants were coming to America, they were

3:12

landing in New York, New York City.

3:14

A lot of them were tailors and

3:16

dressmakers. They brought their shears with them.

3:20

They landed in New York, but by the time a

3:22

lot of them landed in New York, a lot of

3:24

the jobs were taken. So

3:27

they would say in New York, go

3:29

to Gloversville, they need sewers in Gloversville.

3:32

So the immigrants made their way to

3:35

Gloversville, and a lot of them were

3:37

sewers and cutters and table cutters, the

3:39

shears and all of that. According

3:41

to a local archive, by 1916, Gloversville,

3:44

a city a tenth the size of Boston,

3:46

had 216 glove

3:48

factories. In the 1920s, over a

3:51

quarter of the city's population of 25,000 people worked in

3:53

these factories. Gloversville would

3:55

ride this industry throughout the 1930s and 40s,

3:57

until in 1950, the

4:00

city was faced with the threat of cheaper labor

4:02

outside the US. At that

4:04

point, much of the equipment in Gloversville was

4:06

sent to places like Europe, where they made

4:08

high fashion gloves, and Southeast Asia, where they

4:10

made more common gloves. As a result, the

4:13

glove makers in Gloversville began to lose their

4:15

jobs. But

4:19

then in the 1960s, across the Atlantic Ocean

4:21

in Europe, gloves were just entering

4:23

the mind of a young Daniel Stordo. My

4:26

grandfather was a shoemaker, and

4:28

I was very close to my

4:30

grandfather. So I spent my summers in Italy,

4:32

where my grandfather had his

4:34

own atelier. He shoes

4:37

on his own, independent. And

4:40

there are traces of him throughout my

4:42

career, and the way I do things,

4:44

and the way I work. Though

4:47

Daniel and his parents lived in Toronto, he

4:49

would spend summers in Italy working with his

4:51

grandfather. There, Daniel learned how to work with

4:53

different materials. His family wanted him to get

4:55

into shoemaking, but it just wasn't for him.

4:57

He couldn't stand the smell of the glue

4:59

involved in the process. But Daniel's

5:01

family wasn't just making shoes. Most of his

5:03

uncles and aunts were dressmakers and tailors, work

5:05

that involved long hours in front of a

5:08

sewing machine indoors. And

5:10

so I was the type of

5:12

child that I had a fear

5:14

of going outside. I was the

5:16

type of child that did not

5:19

associate with other children. I had

5:21

a fear of going to school. My

5:24

aunt would drag me to school every

5:26

morning, and I would run away

5:28

from school and run home. I had a very

5:30

difficult time. And so

5:32

I really enjoyed being around

5:35

my uncles and aunts that were dressmakers and tailors.

5:37

And I would always pick up the scraps. And

5:39

I was at the sewing machine at the age

5:41

of seven. And I loved it.

5:43

To me, that was my world, and nothing

5:46

else was going to change it. Turns

5:48

out when you're working with scraps of different

5:50

materials, like leather and suede, gloves are the

5:52

easiest thing to make. He made his

5:55

first pair at just nine years old. It

5:57

was a pair of mittens. And And

6:00

so I just

6:02

began, you know, learning, learning

6:05

it on my own. And my mother said to me when

6:07

she would come to the shop, you know,

6:09

you're all over the board. You

6:12

need to pick one thing and you need to do

6:14

it well. And I think

6:16

her thinking was, your grandfather picked

6:18

one thing, you pick one thing.

6:21

And when Daniel picked glove making, he really

6:23

poured himself into his craft. By

6:25

1970, at just 16, Daniel opened up a

6:28

store in Toronto. That same year, he

6:30

would begin taking buses from Toronto all the

6:32

way to LA. Generally,

6:35

I would leave Toronto when winter

6:37

hit. And I would

6:39

get on the Greyhound bus with the suitcase full

6:41

of clothes that I made and

6:44

accessories. And I

6:46

would travel to Hollywood. And

6:48

I was able to spend the whole

6:50

winter in Hollywood by going shop

6:53

to shop to shop, selling the things

6:55

that I made. Over

6:58

time, as he went shop to shop, Daniel's gloves

7:00

started to create a buzz because of how

7:02

unique they were and Daniel's incredible attention to

7:04

detail. I loved shape and form.

7:07

And whenever I would see a certain

7:09

shape or form out of work from

7:12

those artists, I would implement that into

7:14

a glove. So if I saw

7:16

a circle, I would make a circle glove. If

7:19

I saw like a curve, I would

7:21

incorporate that shape into the glove, all one piece. So

7:25

it attracted designers. It

7:27

would garner publicity. I would get, you

7:29

know, my gloves would be photographed in

7:33

Vogue magazine or Harper's Bazaar

7:35

magazine. This buzz led

7:38

to some exciting opportunities for the young Canadian

7:40

glove maker. So much so that in the

7:42

early 80s, Daniel moved out

7:44

to LA permanently. I made

7:46

gloves for a lot of

7:48

movies. I made gloves for

7:50

Carol Streep, Diane Keaton, Whoopi

7:52

Goldberg, Goldie

7:55

Hahn, Sylvester Stall,

7:57

a lot. You know, I made the Rocky gloves.

12:00

doll glove dye. It's

12:03

made out of steel rule, it's tiny,

12:06

it cuts out doll's gloves. So

12:09

people are fascinated by what

12:12

does it do, how does it do, and being

12:14

a glove maker, I could show them. Years

12:20

later in 2018, Daniel bought an

12:22

old children's glove factory in Glubbersville. He then

12:24

made it the new home of his own

12:26

personal collection and the materials and tools he

12:28

got from the locals. That

12:30

old children's glove factory is now the

12:33

Glove Museum. You know,

12:35

the first summer that I opened the Glove

12:37

Museum, I had over 10,000

12:39

visitors from all over the world. It

12:42

was a mind blow. I was

12:44

exhausted. A tour of

12:46

the museum that I gave, because

12:48

I handled everything of the museum,

12:51

was about four hours. People

12:54

are fascinated because

12:57

it's something you don't see every day. At

13:00

the Glove Museum, Daniel is constantly changing out

13:02

vintage glove catalogs in his own vintage glove

13:04

collection because there could never be enough room

13:06

for him to showcase it all at one

13:08

time. And to help bring in

13:11

the surrounding community, Daniel is starting to give

13:13

classes on the history of gloves and the

13:15

craft of glove making. But

13:17

you see, even that, the approach

13:19

is very different. Like my sculptural

13:21

gloves, it's a circle or shape

13:24

and form. I'm calling that the

13:26

geometry class. One

13:30

thing Daniel understands is that he found a

13:33

very specific passion. He could create a whole

13:35

outfit if he wants, and he actually does

13:37

do that from time to time. But what

13:39

he really loves is making gloves. What

13:42

he wants more than anything is for people to

13:44

accept and pursue their own passion, even

13:46

if the thing is as niche as his.

13:49

It's such an emotional thing

13:52

to show and to describe because

13:56

as I'm giving tours of

13:59

what this tool does,