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Victor Leon Maison

My family became involved in Bamboo and Rattan Works when my great great grandfather, Victor Leon Maison, came to American after leaving France sometime before 1888. When he arrived in America, he came with little money and he did not speak a word of English.

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Trying to find a place of employment to start his new life, he took the little amount of money he had and traveled around New York eventually meeting a man named John Deltour. Mr. Deltour, a fellow Frenchman, gave my great great grandfather a job working at his factory, J. Deltour Bamboo Works, in Greenwich Village, New York .

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Eventually, John Deltour decided to retire and move back to France. He sold the business to my great great grandfather for $800. At this time, this was a considerable amount of money. Seeing an opportunity to have better labor, expand, and pay fewer taxes, my great great Grandfather moved the business from Greenwich to Hoboken, New Jersey. As the company began to expand, the name was changed to Bamboo and Rattan Works, and eventually, in 1923, it changed from a proprietorship to a corporation .

The business first started with the production of man-made furniture and other products, but eventually progressed into selling just the raw materials, including bamboo and rattan poles and matting as it still does today. The move from selling furniture into raw materials occurred due to the vast amount of time and skilled craftsman needed to produce the furniture.

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