Dignified ladies of Manhattan's first families have been going into Charles & Co. for decades to get the best in damson preserves and Cheddar cheese and other good things. Last week some of them went in to order the famous Charles fruit baskets for friends going off to sea. "Madam," said the clerks, "we have only a few left. We cannot promise." Charles & Co., last of Manhattan's big, elderly, fine-food shops, was selling out.
Upstairs, where Charles higher-ups work in offices as cluttered as the back rooms of country stores, President George...
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