Harry says that in the Yiddish phrase, he was a "mensh", a man of consequence, or as we might say today, a mover and shaker.No, not really. This is more accurate:
In Yiddish (from which the word has migrated into American English, although the use is still rare), mensch roughly means "a good person." A "mensch" is a particularly good person, like "a stand-up guy," a person with the qualities one would hope for in a dear friend or trusted colleague.