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Herman Myers was born May 18, 1824, in Cassel (formerly of the Kingdom of Hesse), Germany. His mother died when he was scarcely six years old, leaving his father, then a poor struggling farmer, with five small sons and a daughter to support. In his youth young Myers was apprenticed for four years to the trade of a dyer and colorer which he learned thoroughly. While still a very young man he was drafted into the German army to serve in the Kingdom of the then Hessian Prince, who was ruler of the city of Cassel and its surrounding country. Young as he was he rose rapidly as an officer, and by reason of his fine soldierly qualities within a short time was selected and became Guard of Honor to the reigning prince at the Palace of Williamshohe in Cassel, then quite an honor and distinction. (This was the same palace where in later years Napoleon III was confined.)
After five years of army service he emigrated alone to America, hoping thereby to better his condition as well as that of his father and brothers. Coming directly to Albany after landing on American soil, a poor lad with but eleven dollars left in his pockets on arriving in the capital city, but with health, indomitable will, and energy, he at once began business life in a very small way, making Albany his permanent home. Not more than six months had elapsed after his arrival when he visited Fulton county, N. Y., where he really laid the foundation of his future standing and success. Within a few years thereafter Mr. Myers opened a jewelry store at 386 Broadway, Albany. He began on a small scale, gradually increasing his stock until before his retirement in 1860, he had one of the largest wholesale and retail jewelry establishments in the city.
No man is better known by the older inhabitants of Fulton county even to this day than Herman Myers. There he is loved, honored, and respected. And during the fifteen years he was engaged in the jewelry business not a single month passed but he visited the people of that county, and especially the cities of Gloversville and Johnstown, where his name for honesty and integrity had become so well known and established that it was then a well-known saying " that no jewelry store could then exist there, for Herman Myers sold three-fourths of all the goods in his line purchased in Fulton county." No sooner had Mr. Myers laid the foundation of a competency here than he at once sent to Europe for his father, four brothers and sister. He started all his brothers in business for themselves, and also several distant relatives, whom he brought from his old German home, one of whom now ranks among the foremost of all merchants in New York city.
Retiring from active business in 1860 it was not until 1865 that Mr. Myers again embarked in business, associating with him a Mr. Busley in the wholesale manufacturing of ladies shoes, under the firm name of Busley & Myers, with a factory at Nos. 13 to 25 Church street Albany. Mr. Busley attended solely to the manufacturing and Mr. Myers to the buying, selling and financial part; and for a period of seven years their factory was one of the largest here, making on an average two thousand shoes per day. In 1872 Mr. Myers finally retired from all active business and has since devoted all his time to his real estate. He now ranks among the large owners of real estate in the capital city.
in 1854 Mr. Myers was married to Sophie Kohn, a native of the well-known Kohn family of Bamberg, Bavaria. They have an only son, Max Myers, the well-known lawyer of Albany.
Never accepting nor holding any office, though often requested so to do in financial institutions in which he is a stockholder, Mr. Myers's counsel and advice are constantly sought. As a judge of real estate he has no peer. Herman Myers is the very epitome of a self-made and self-educated man. Belonging to no societies or clubs except the Masonic order and also a life member of the Littauer Hospital of Gloversville, Fulton county, he loves his adopted home and its institutions and is ever ready to assist in doing what good he can to all, irrespective of creed or sect, in his quiet unobtrusive way. One thing can also truthfully be said of him: To Herman Myers alone belongs the chief honor of the possession by its congregation of the new beautiful Jewish Synagogue on Lancaster street,erected at a cost of over $180,000. As chairman of the purchasing and building committee he selected and bought the church lot, selected the architects, and was instrumental in the erection of the temple, than which no finer one can be found in New York State.
