Family Ties: CANCO Resident’s Grandparents Met on the Factory Floor
By Jon Whiten • Aug 12th, 2010 • Category: Blog, News
An interesting press release coming from Journal Square’s CANCOlofts this week features 35-year-old Jersey City native Tami Wisniewski, who bought a one-bedroom condo at the former American Can Co. factory site last fall.
Wisniewski was of course familiar with the landmark industrial building overlooking the Pulaski Skyway, and she knew her grandmother was one of about 3,000 people who worked there during World War II.
But it wasn’t until she was looking at condos there that she learned — via her mother — that her grandmother had actually met her grandfather there during the war. Her grandmother, Agnes Hudak, worked on what was known as the “milk line,” where cardboard milk cartons were made. Her grandfather, Donald Diego, was a mechanic at the factory.
“If it weren’t for American Can, my grandparents would never have met, my mother would never have been born and I wouldn’t be here today,” Wisniewski says in a release.
The 1 million-square-foot, five-tower industrial Art Deco factory — designed by Albert Kahn — was in operation from 1920 until the mid-1970s.
“The American Can Co. is a symbol of the industrial heritage of Jersey City,” CANCOlofts sales and marketing head Jodi Stasse says. “We are proud of our role in restoring a building that has played such a critical role in the lives of so many.”
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Jon Whiten is the founding editor of the Jersey City Independent; he now works for a public-policy nonprofit in Trenton.
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