Nostalgia Sunday – ATA for all

October 9, 2011 - 11:56 PM by Rachel Neiman

Years ago, had you grabbed any Israeli working man by the scruff of his hairy neck and peered at his collar, its very likely that what you’d see — after he’d stopped yelling and calmed down– would be an ATA label. Because for decades, the ATA Textile Company was, if you’ll pardon the pun, the very fabric of Israeli society. Everyone Israeli had a piece of ATA-produced clothing in their closet. ATA, an acronym for Arigim Totzeret Artzeinu, (Wovens Produced in Our Land) — the name says it all.

Even my sisters and I, the American-born daughters of an Israeli mother, were proud owners of ATA-wear — sturdy red polyester sweaters with blue, pink and white trim. (The amazing part, as far as I was concerned, was that you could go into the ATA store on Emek Refaim in Jerusalem and buy new buttons to replace the missing ones. Not buttons that looked sort of like the ones that were lost but rather, an exact match). And of course, when we joined the Israeli scouts, our khaki shirts were from ATA.

A new exhibit at the Eretz Israel Museum, ATA – Factory, Fashion and Dream, tells the story of the textile mill that at its apex was, as curators Monica Lavi and Eran Litvin put it, “a triad of Israeli market forces, crowned by the industrialists, the trade unions, and the [Socialist] government.”

Translated and adapted from the Hebrew, here’s a brief history from Wikipedia: In the spring of 1934, Czech industrialist Erich Muller purchased 110 dunam (approximately 27.5 acres) of land near the Arab village of Ata, located between Haifa and Acre, with the intention of setting up a textile factory. A well was dug for water and factory buildings ordered. The Muller family scouted the Zionist organizations for young people interested in coming to Palestine. Following a training period in textile work, the first group of workers arrived on December 31, 1934 and lived communally in a single barracks on the factory grounds until their residences were built.

By 1946, ATA had over 900 workers living in nearby Kiryat Ata, all enjoying social benefits such as housing, childcare, and subsidized groceries.

Upon the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 and with it, the Israel Defense Forces, ATA became the official supplier of uniforms to the IDF.
In the early 1950s, when austerity measures were enacted, ATA became a main supplier of clothes to the civilian sector as well. Families were issued ration books and clothing could be purchased from ATA stores with coupons.

Initially, ATA produced mainly khaki or dark blue work clothes which were the de rigueur items of apparel in the Socialist workers paradise (with, of course, a white shirt for the Sabbath). These included the kova tembel, the soft cloth cap that came to typify the Israeli sabra, and were generally purchased with coupons issued by one’s employer.

As Israel’s standard of living began to rise, so did its appetite for fashion. Along with the white shirt, ATA began producing gabardine trousers for men, also for nice occasions like the Sabbath, holidays or — in a bow to that bourgeoise institution — marriages. In another nod to changing times, in the late 1950s, ATA established a female apparel division, Splendid Model.

The exhibit looks at ATA as a reflection of the tensions in Israeli society: “Workers and fighters wore the ATA, as did as youth groups, while the urban and bourgeois preferred wearing more stylish and fashionable clothes.” ATA clothed the former group but was rejected by the latter.

But the real times a’changin’ for ATA were on the labor relations front. Although still run by the Muller family, ATA had not been a family-owned enterprise since 1948, when a sizable chunk of the company was sold to Africa-Israel Investments. In 1956, after manager Hans Muller announced layoffs and salary caps, ATA’s workers took actions which culminated, in 1957, in a long strike. Muller’s death in 1962 set off a chain of sell-offs, first to an investor group headed by one Tibor Rosenbaum, then to the Shoul Eisenberg group. In 1985, after another prolonged workers strike, ATA was closed and its properties sold to an investor group headed by Michael “Mickey” Albin. The Kiryon Mall stands on one site, a residential neighborhood stands on the other.

Exhibit curators Lavi and Litvin state that ATA “carved three symbols into the Israeli cultural memory: workers pride, workers struggle, and workers clothes.”

The factory closure was sad. I remember, in the mid-80s, as an overtired, overextended student lighting designer, traveling up to the Acre Fringe Theater festival and seeing the disused, abandoned knitting machines, twisted metal piled high against the factory perimeter fence that seemed to stretch for miles.

On the other hand, let’s not forget that ATA apparel in its Socialist heyday left much to be desired. This Wendy’s commercial from the mid-80s may give something of an idea — or at least a laugh. Enjoy.

Pictures of ATA clothing from the Beit Fisher Kiryat Ata Municipal Museum are available here. Also, take a minute to look at ATA-inspired fashion by designer Ilana Efrati, along with an essay entitled ATA and Us by historian Or Rosenbaum. And yes, that is a picture of your author in ATA red sweater, feeding the pigeons in Trafalger Square.

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