Steve Israel with his daughter Cassidy

Great American Salvage has been out of business for quite a few years now, but it was one of the original biggies here in New York. Steve Israel started the business from his kitchen in Montpelier, VT in 1979 with Steve Tillotson. Gradually, the company expanded to four locations, including the massive shop at Cooper Square.

I recently met with salvage guru, Mr. Israel. The retired New York native now lives on a boat in Boston, but not for long. He’s moving down to Mexico in a few weeks. It’s clear that Israel’s passion is still salvage after all these years, but that never stopped him from pursuing other dreams. He started a brewery among other interesting projects.

But back to the salvage. What started out in his kitchen became a big business. Great American Salvage had their own demolition crews. They were able to dismantle buildings themselves and resell the historic details. They created special tools such as crowbars for carefully removing the materials. Ginormous objects were no problem. They just hired a crane to deal with it.

The salvage industry can range from small businesses recycling scrap materials to high end reuse of mansions. Steve Israel has done it all.