Emanuel Hettleman, a retired partner in a non-ferrous metals firm, died Wednesday of heart and circulatory ailments at his home in the One Slade Condominium. He was 81.

Services for Mr. Hettleman were being held today at Sol Levinson & Bros. Inc., 6010 Reisterstown Road.

He retired in the mid-1960s as a partner in K. Hettleman and Sons. Started by his father as a junk business, it became a company that bought, sold and processed metal other than iron or steel.

Mr. Hettleman was born in Baltimore shortly after his family moved here from Russia.

He was a 1920 graduate of City College.

A former president of the National Metal Dealers Association, he served on the boards of The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, Levindale, the Jewish Educational Alliance and the Jewish Historical Society.

His first wife, the former Sara Fox, died in 1973.

He is survived by his wife, the former Muriel Cherney Schloss; three daughters, Ann Kahan and Mary Jane Snyder, both of Owings Mills, and Burma Lee Cassidy of Rochester, Vt.; two sons, Kalman Hettleman of Baltimore and Daniel Schloss of Le Luc, France; 14 grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren.