Picture of longevity
for the Moegerles

By Diane Prokop
Times Staff Writer

Spending her days at Moegerle’s Paints is more than a business for Eleanor Houck and her daughter Christine. It’s a family tradition, a way of life.
In 1938, Eleanor Houck’s father, Karl Moegerle, opened Moegerle’s Paints at 7237 Rising Sun Ave. As a maler, or painter, trained in craftsmanship and tradition, Moegerle left his native Germany and came to this country during the Depression.
As bad as life was here during those desperate times in the 1930s, it was much worse in Germany, Christine Houck said.
"When things were bad here, people were starving there," she said.
According to Eleanor Houck, as a guild maler in his homeland, her father learned every aspect of painting, from signs to houses. After his arrival here, he worked as the head painter at Willow Grove Park — the venerable Montgomery County amusement park that closed in the mid-’70s — did sign painting and accepted commissions to do oil paintings.
While Houck’s father worked at the amusement park, her mother ran the family business, which originally sold house paint and art supplies.
"I was underfoot all the time and worked here as a kid," Houck recalled.
In those days, turpentine and paint thinners, such as linseed oil, didn’t come in individual containers. It was Houck’s job to fill bottles with the flammable liquid from big drums in the basement.
"Nobody thought anything about it. I used to love the smell of linseed oil," she said.
Eleanor Houck grew up in the Rising Sun Avenue store, and when she married her high school sweetheart, Buddy Houck, the couple lived in an apartment above it. Christine Houck now lives in an apartment next door to the business.
She appreciates her family history in the Burholme building; she also treasures some of the paintings done by her grandfather — who died in the mid-1950s — that decorate her walls.
In the beginning, Moegerle’s Paints didn’t offer picture framing. Karl Moegerle made his own frames, though, for his own paintings. Today, framing is the largest part of the family business.
Early big-box retailers, such as Hechinger’s, put an end to the house-paint part of the business. But customer needs for other services — such as framing — enabled the business to adapt.
"The business determined itself," Christine Houck said. "We spent all our time framing."
The mother and daughter are happy things worked out as they did, because framing pictures is their favorite aspect of the family business.
"It’s not like a drugstore where people are sick and come in to buy medicine," Eleanor Houck said. "People come in here with a picture. This is an uplifting thing. You can’t not enjoy it."
Christine, a third-generation Moegerle, feels the same way.
"People bring their memories back — things from all around the world. That’s what’s nice about it," she said. "Every day changes so you can’t get bored."
Passersby might know the business by its window, which provides a view of a variety of paintings, many by local artists.
While a wide array of artwork is displayed upstairs at the store, a gallery also features paintings by Victor Mordasov, who donated a portrait of George Washington to George Washington High School, former Burholme resident Rob Lawlor and Philadelphia firefighter Capt. Dave Sweeney, whose rendition of the Chestnut Hill trolley is popular with customers.
Last week, the work of another artist was returned to the family. In 1945, Gertrude Kusmaul received the gift of an original painting from Karl Moegerle himself as a thank you to her for helping him with some government paperwork.
The 16- by 20-inch oil painting of a white vase filled with daisy-like flowers hung in the home of Kusmaul’s parents home until 1985, when she moved into Pilgrim Gardens, a retirement community near the store, and had it prominently displayed in a hallway. With the apartment complex undergoing renovations, Kusmaul wanted to return the painting to the family, a suggestion she made to Christine Houck at a recent Burholme Civic Association meeting. She and Kusmaul are active in the Burholme Town Watch organization.
The Houcks met with Kusmaul at Pilgrim Gardens on Friday morning for the artwork exchange. They thanked her for the contribution.
"It’s very pretty and peaceful," Christine Houck said of the painting’s soft, muted colors.
Though she, her mother and sisters have other floral paintings by her grandfather, she has never see one quite like the painting that Kusmaul returned to the family.
For the next week or two, you can see the painting in the store’s front window. ••
Moegerle’s Paints is open on Tuesdays, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Wednesdays and Thursdays, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Fridays, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.; and Saturdays from 9 to 3.
Reporter Diane Prokop can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dprokop@phillynews.com