Friends and family recognized Otto Huber’s rare ability to blend the old world with the new. He was one of the first businessmen to offer state lottery tickets. “Otto’s Lotto,” they called it.
Despite achieving international acclaim selling European goods online, Otto Huber refused to automate orders because he feared it would dampen his relationship with customers.
Whether Christmas Eve or a Sunday, the family disregarded store hours and opened their doors to shoppers in need of specialty items.
“When you give something to somebody sometimes you get more in return,” said Thomas Huber, who returned full-time to the store in 1994 after the Northridge Earthquake and death of his mother. “Otto got more by giving.”
The son of a winemaker and county governor, Otto Zoltan Huber was born Sept. 12, 1932, in Lenti, Hungary. Otto played the accordion at weddings before taking a job in Heviz, where he met a young woman he swore to marry.
When communists invaded his homeland, Otto supplied arms to Hungarian freedom fighters before fleeing to Austria. He was taken in by a congregation as a Hungarian refugee.
From there he negotiated a trip across the Atlantic Ocean aboard the Queen Mary, landing in New Jersey and taking a job in a furniture factory. He moved to California in 1958 and was granted American citizenship in 1963.
In that time he exchanged letters with the young woman he pledged to marry.
“Irma waited nine years for me to return, as the Communists kept her there,” Otto told the Burbank Leader in 1990.
In 1965, he returned to Hungary, married Irma, and returned home six months later.
Along with their son, Thomas, and daughter, Anita, the family bought a grocery store at the corner of Clark Avenue and Brighton Street.
