Jewish Welfare Board Opens Three-day Conference in Chicago Tomorrow

Jewish community leaders from all parts of the country will meet at the Hotel Stevens here at a three-day conferences opening this Friday, to plan and discuss the National Jewish Welfare Board program of service to the armed forces and to the Jewish Y’s and centers of the country. Frank L. Well, of New York, president of the Board, announced today.

The conference takes the place of the annual meeting of the Board, which was discontinued in 1942 for the duration. Mr. Weil explained and participation is limited to 40 or 50 of the top leadership in army and navy and Jewish center work. The Jewish Center Division and the Army and Navy Division will hold separate sessions to discuss current plans and needs.

“We have built up, for service to the armed forces, a loyal and devoted group of volunteer workers,” Mr. Weil said. “It is part of our responsibility that the organization we have built up does not disintegrate at the end of the war, but is kept intact for service to the communities of the country.”

Governor Dewey of New York yesterday signed a bill changing the name of the Jewish Welfare Board to the National Jewish Welfare Board, to eliminate possible confusion between its work and the Jewish Welfare Funds, it was disclosed in connection with the conference.

The Board, with which are affiliated thirty-seven national Jewish organizations and 550 Army and Navy committees throughout the country, is the representative of the Jewish community in the United Service Organizations. It also acts as the church body in recruiting rabbis for service as chaplains in the armed forces and serves men in the armed forces by printing and distributing Jewish prayer books and other religious material and arranging for religious services.