Jack Harford Behar, also known as Jack Behar, lived at 32 Grosvenor Street in Mayfair, London. He was likely the brother of Victor Behar, owner of V. Behar, Limited.
He was Managing Director of Cardinal & Harford Ltd., whose London office was located at 108 High Holborn. By 1920, his company was heralded as “the largest concern of its kind in the world.”[1] In 1920, the firm took over all German interests of Persian rug production through the purchase of the world’s largest carpet works, located in Tabriz, for £500,000 ($2,500,000), outbidding U.S. and other interests. The previous German owners had spent 1.5 million in its development. Cardinal & Harford Ltd. secured the “implied protection of the British Government.” It planned to employ 24,000 workers, many of them British, and to modernize the firm by replacing camels with motor cars, establishing new rail and ship lines, and producing mass-produced carpets at a quarter of the usual prices.[2] Cardinal & Harford Ltd. also controlled the Levant Carpet Company at Istanbul, with a factory in Izmir operating 1,000 looms, as well as the Indian Carpet Manufacturers, Ltd., of Bombay, India, which operated 3,000 looms.[3]
J. A. Behar, who directed the London branch of Cardinal & Harford Company, arrived in New York in August of 1920 to set up the Breslin Brothers Company of 225 Fifth Avenue, New York City as the company’s sole selling agents in the U.S.[4]
In his last will, Jack Harford Behar directed that his funeral be “as simple as possible and without mourning or flowers.” He indicated that “no woman or child” attend the funeral, a possible indication that he had neither wife nor children. Perhaps expressing a fear of being buried alive, he ordered his “regular medical attendant” to confirm that he was indeed dead by “severing the main artery at my wrist.” Behar wished to be buried at the Liberal Jewish Synagogue Burial Ground “as near as is possible to the grave of my nephew the late Robert Behar.”
Behar’s will is key in determining his family tree. He appointed as Trustees and Executors of his will his nephews Maurice Edward Behar and David Behar, as well as his niece Denise Sarah Wilhelmina Georgina Ruby Rapp, in conjunction with his friend Alfred John Heald, a Chartered Accountant. Maurice Edward, David, and Denise were siblings and Jack Harford Behar hoped they would “continue and act as a united family,” a possible suggestion of family strife. He left all of his personal chattels to his nephews Maurice Edward and David. To his great-nephews Richard Victor Montague Edward Behar, Robin Nigel Behar, and Simon Behar, he left £750 each. To his sister Fanny Lewis, he left £300, which would pass to her daughter Primrose Goldwyn in case Fanny predeceased the testator. He left Denis Sarah Wilhelmina Georgina Ruby Rapp, Maurice Edward’s wife Eilleen Behar, and David Behar’s wife Anne £200 each “as a small token of remembrance.” The will also establishes that Behar had a brother named Isaac, whose daughter (Jack Harford Behar’s niece) was Lucy Lewis; that Behar’s nephew Maurice Edward Behar had a daughter named Edwina Behar; and that Denise Sarah Wilhelmina Georgina Ruby Rapp had two daughters named Laura Rapp and Jennifer Rapp.
One M. Behar, possibly Jack Harford Behar’s nephew Maurice Edward, was a director of Cardinal & Harford of London and Persia, with his office at 108 High Holborn in London, and also served on the board of V. Behar, Limited. Jack Harford Behar’s nephew, Robert Behar of 4 Kirklee-road, Kelvinside, Glasgow, was joint Managing Director of Cardinal & Harford.[5] Jack Harford Behar’s estate upon his death was worth £75,084. In addition to bequests to family and friends, he left £200 to his synagogue, located in St. John’s Wood, London N.W. He directed his trustees to pay £5,000 to “one or more charity or charities operating in the State of Israel.”[6]
Jack Harford Behar died April 8, 1967.
[1] “Cardinal & Harford, Ltd., Establish American Branch,” Price’s Carpet and Rug News IX: 2 (August 1920), 45.
[2] “British Buy Tabriz Carpet Factory,” IX: 1 Price’s Carpet and Rug News (July 1920), 35.
[3] “In America,” Dry Good Guided 46: 3 (September 1920), 12.
[4] “Sales Ahead of Last Year,” Dry Goods Guide 46: 2 (August 1920), 14.
[5] Thomas Skinner & Co., eds., The Directory of Directors (London: Thomas Skinner & Co., 1927), 111.
[6] U.K. Government Online Probate Search Service, Last Will and Testament of Jack Harford Behar, December 23, 1964.