Albert Richard

Albert Richard Company (c. late 1920s - c. 1955) began as a division of the Fried-Ostermann Company of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Fried-Ostermann was a glove manufacturer, and in the late 1920s, decided to diversify their production and opened a division to produce outerwear, which they called Albert Richard. Albert Richard produced leather jackets, mackinaws, overcoats, and sportswear and would soon become more profitable than the glove-making part of the company. Before World War II, Albert Richard advertising focused on health and sports, and received endorsements from college football players. From about 1938 to 1950, Albert Richard partnered with F. E. Cheeseman to published a series of poster size college football maps, which bore advertisements for the company’s jackets on the verso. After the outbreak of World War II, Albert Richard began manufacturing flight jackets for the military under the name of their parent company Fried-Ostermann. Leather jackets, overcoats, and similar products were heavily advertised by Albert Richard during the war. They also gave their jackets model names like ‘Spitfire’ and ‘Meteor’. During the war Albert Richard also gave away wall-sized posters depicting various American military aircraft. Fried-Ostermann sold Albert Richard to the Drybak Corporation of Binghampton, New York in 1952. Daybook began manufacturing Albert Richard clothing in 1953 at a factory in New Jersey, with plans to move production to New York by 1954. However, in 1955, Drybak bought the Martin Mfg. Co. of Martin, Tenessee, closed their operations in Binghampton and moved to the plant in Tennessee, where labor prices were lower.