Like Amsterdam’s present mayor, Ann Thane, Marcus I. Breier never had run for elected office when he defeated a political icon in the mayoral election of 1963.

Breier, a Republican, handily defeated Democrat Arthur Carter who had served as mayor for ten years in the 1930s and 1940s.
And like Thane’s immediate predecessor, Joseph Emanuele III, Breier held two jobs while mayor. Mayor Emanuele taught math in the Fonda-Fultonville District while Mayor Breier operated a clothing outerwear company, Breier’s of Amsterdam, while serving as city chief executive.
Breier recalled he would work at City Hall in the morning and go to his clothing factory on Edson Street in the afternoon.
Today, Breier, who is 95, and his wife Eleanore Cramer Breier spend half the year in Doral, Florida, and half the year at their home on McClellan Avenue in Amsterdam. They also have a home in Northville.
There is another parallel between Mayor Breier and Mayor Thane—neither was born in Amsterdam. Thane was born in Willmington, Delaware. Breier was born in Brooklyn, went to Cornell University and Cornell Law School.
He practiced law for a year before joining the family men’s sports clothes business, named Marcus Breier & Son’s in honor of his grandfather.
The business had been based in New York City but was lured upstate to Amsterdam during the Depression. Benjamin Breier, Marcus’s father, established a manufacturing plant on Leonard Street in Amsterdam while the firm’s showroom was at the Empire State Building in Manhattan.
“Nothing was easy,” Marcus Breier recalled. “My father worked in Amsterdam all week and came home to New York City on the weekends. It’s impossible to know the sacrifices people made in the Depression.”
Benjamin Breier is credited in a 1940s Amsterdam Chamber of Commerce publication with being among the first to introduce lightweight wind and weather resistant jackets in America. The Breier brand name for these outer garments was Bantamac. The Bantamac jackets were used by the Army and Navy in World War II.
Ultimately, the future mayor took charge of the family business. Still later, the firm was sold and Breier started Breier’s of Amsterdam, also an outerwear maker.
Breier credited State Supreme Court Justice Felix J. Aulisi, a longtime friend, with encouraging him to enter politics.
“He put the bug in my ear,” Breier said.
During Breier’s term from 1964 through 1967, urban renewal began, the public safety building on Guy Park Avenue extension was started and Veterans Park on Locust Avenue was developed. Breier also convinced the then New York Central Railroad not to abandon Amsterdam when urban renewal claimed the former downtown station. The new station was built in the west end, but still in the city.
Amsterdam voters had approved a charter change in the late 1950s stipulating that a mayor could serve only one four-year term. Breier, therefore, was prevented by law from seeking a second term. Longtime public works official John P. Gomulka was elected mayor in 1967.
While Gomulka was in office, the city charter was changed again and Gomulka served three four-year terms, ending in 1979.
Breier went on to serve multiple terms on the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors including a stint as chairman.
Breier wrote a history of Amsterdam, available at the local library. He and his wife still play golf. He has three children—Robert, Richard and Joan—and several grandchildren.
It was during Breier’s term that I held my only job in city government, working as a laborer for the Amsterdam Department of Public works in the summer of 1964. It was the only time in my life that I worked hard for a living.