Sweet Auburn: The Magazine of the Friends of Mount Auburn Mount Auburn as a Mosaic of American Culture | страница 4

The Mugars and the Kepeses were immigrant families
who came to the United States at different times
from different countries and made their mark on
the Boston area.
Members of the Mugar family in Boston, 1908. Young Stephen Mugar is
second from the left in the bottom row. Photo courtesy of the Mugar family.
Dedicated to Education and Philanthropy:
The Mugar Family, Founders of Star Market
Watertown, Mass.
Stephen (1901-1982), Lot #10213, Almy Path; and John
(1914-2007), Lot #11000, Willow Pond Knoll
The Mugar family introduced many innovations now con-
sidered essential in the American grocery shopping experience
through their popular Star Markets; they have also been
generous and creative philanthropists in Massachusetts and
the nation for decades.
Stephen Mugar was born in Kharpert, Turkey, of Ar-
menian descent. He came to America as a young child. In
1916, his father, Sarkis, bought a small store at 28 Mount
Auburn Street in Watertown, the very first Star Market.
When Sarkis died as a result of an auto accident in 1922,
Stephen took over the store. His young cousin John, whose
parents were born in Kharpert, started working at the store
after school. Other than college at Tufts and Navy service
in WWII as a Commissary Officer in Okinawa, John was
with Star until his retirement as Chairman in 1978. They
lived by the motto: “Take extra good care of the customer,
and the customer will take care of you.” They were soon
successful, opening stores in Newtonville and Wellesley in
1932 and 1937, respectively.
Star Market led the way in packaging meat in cellophane
to retain its freshness; using stronger paper for grocery
bags; popularizing unit pricing; and, in 1948, cooking with
a “radar range,” as the first microwave ovens were called.
They also brightened up their stores by decorating them
with vivid colors rather than the standard white tile. They
2 | Sweet Auburn
improved the lot of their workers, providing employee
benefits that included profit-sharing and time off to pursue
education.
Through the decades, the Mugars also aided many Arme-
nian causes, including the Armenian Library and Museum
of America, now housed in The Mugar Building, named
in recognition of the family’s generosity. Stephen Mugar’s
Mugar Foundation donated funding to the Watertown
Public Library for an exhibit describing the Armenian
diaspora and the immigrants’ subsequent success in America.
He gave generously to libraries at Boston University and
Northeastern University. A building at Tufts University’s
Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy is also named for him.
Stephen Mugar’s daughter, Carolyn, serves as Executive
Director of Farm Aid, which raises funds to promote
family-owned farms in America, and founded The Armenia
Tree Project, which works on reforesting that country, with
John O’Connor, her late husband, who is also buried at
Mount Auburn.
John Mugar’s son, Martin Mugar of Durham, N.H., says
of his childhood, “We grew up on Lovell Road, off Com-
mon Street, which is off Mount Auburn Street. My father
worked nearby in the market offices, across from Mount
Auburn Cemetery, where one of the first Star Markets is
also located. My mother loved the Cemetery for its nature,
the trees, flowers, and birds. Later, when I came back to
Boston after graduating from college and living in Europe,
I walked in Mount Auburn a lot.”
For the last three generations, the Mugars have been a
powerful presence. Their generosity has extended worldwide,
yet the roots of their family legacy are locally situated in
Watertown, the final resting place of their innovative
patriarchs.
Embracing Nature and Technology:
Gyorgy (1906-2001) and Juliet (1919-1999)
Kepes, Artists
Lot #12104, Oxalis Path
Throughout his long career, Gyorgy Kepes
wrestled to reconcile the seemingly
conflicting forces of nature and technol-
ogy, art and science. The Hungarian-born
Kepes studied painting and photography
in Budapest and architecture in Berlin,
with Laszlo Moholy-Nagy of the Bauhaus
School. Immigrating to America in 1945,
he began teaching at MIT, in its School of
Architecture and Planning.
He founded MIT’s
Above, right: “Terra Magica” by Gyorgy
Center for Advanced Visual
Kepes circa 1969, 38”x38”, oil paint and
sand.
Studies in 1967 because
Above: Monuments of Gyorgy and Juliet
he felt that “scientists and
Kepes at Mount Auburn created by their
artists have lost the abil-
grandson, sculptor Janos Stone.