The Pickle Man

Another Lepkoff picture, another mystery solved. I showed this picture to Alan Kaufman of the Pickle Guys and he said, "That's Max Hollander and he's still alive!. His place was on Essex" Here's more on the history of LES pickles from a 1996 Times' article:
As recently as 20 years ago, Essex Street between Grand and Hester Streets had four pickle stores. Today, only one remains: Essex Street Pickles, and it is being renovated, modernized. A concrete floor is replacing the wooden one. But the "Please Keep Your Hands Out of Barrels" sign is staying put.

"This is the last place," said Richard Young, who grew up in the neighborhood during the Depression and made a pickle pit stop last week on the way to his midtown apartment. "In the old days you had pickle men selling pickles out of pushcarts."

After World War II, as many Jews moved from the Lower East Side, local demand for pickles ebbed. Now Essex Street Pickles has 8,000 mail-order customers from Florida to California. "So many displaced New Yorkers miss pickles," said Tim Baker, 33, who runs the store. "People kept asking, 'Would you mail it to me?' And I kept asking, 'Would you pay for it?' Finally a customer sent me a check for a couple of hundred bucks and said, 'Send me pickles.' " Some neighborhood newcomers are pickle aficionados. "The Chinese people are great customers," Mr. Baker said. "They love pickled products. And we have plenty of Spanish-speaking customers."

Essex Street Pickles is rooted firmly in the dynastic tradition of Lower East Side pickledom. It all began when Izzy Guss arrived from Russia around 1910 and landed a job at Hollander Pickles, then opened his own store, Guss's Pickles, nearby. Next, Mr. Guss's former son-in-law opened the Pickle Man. Then came May 2, 1982 -- the day that was, to pickle eaters, what the handshake on the White House lawn was in the Middle East. Hollander and Guss's Pickles joined forces to become Essex Street Pickles. Mr. Baker is the son of the business partner of the husband of Louis Hollander's granddaughter.

"Crossing Delancey," a romantic comedy about a pickle man, was filmed there in 1988. The brine -- water, salt, garlic and spices -- is still made with Izzy Guss's Russian recipes. But wooden barrels have given way to plastic, which is cheaper and easier to clean. And the Health Department ruled that pickle men must wear plastic gloves. "I feel like a doctor in these," Mr. Baker said. The store is closed on Saturdays for the Jewish Sabbath, but lines stretch around the block on Sundays. Some people set up lawn chairs outside before Jewish holidays, when Essex Street grinds horseradish to order. "When you get a sandwich and a pickle, the pickle is the main course," said Yochonon Pivovoz, who has lived in the neighborhood all his life. "The sandwich is just a side dish." MICHAEL COOPER

A follow up:
In 2002, Tim Baker sold his ownership of Guss Pickles to Andrew Leibowitz.
The Guss Pickles trademark now belongs to Crossing Delancey Pickle Enterprises Corporation. The headquarters is now in Cedarhurst, NY. Andrew Leibowitz is the CEO of the company. They maintain a factory in the Bronx and a farm located in New Jersey. The offical website is gusspickles.com.
The Manhattan store has been granted permission to also use the name, but it is a separate business to the Cedarhurst business