Local Jewry gathered at the Jewish Children’s Home here this week to help usher in the eightieth year of that institution’s existence. The public observance of this Home’s anniversary, stretching down from pre-Civil War days, seems to have become a tradition within this charming Jewish community.
It was during a yellow-fever epidemic in 1854 that a mass meeting of New Orleans Jews was held for the purpose of creating a separate organization for the “support of the widow and the orphan”. At present the Home is devoted to the field of child care only. However, between that time and this there has been a period of steady development and expansion, marked especially by its decoming affiliated in 1875 with the Seventh District of the B’nai B’rith and the creation in 1902 of the Newman Manual Training School as an adjunct of the Home.
The cornerstone of the present Home, situated on St. Charles Avenue, one of the world’s most beautiful thoroughfares, was laid on Thanksgiving Day, 1886, the building being constructed at a cost of $100,000.
Dr. J. W. Newman is president of the Home and Harry L. Ginsburg the superintendent. One hundred and twenty-five children are housed within it at present, under supervision of a permanent trained staff of ten. There is no rigid routine, emphasis being placed by the management on attention to the particular character and needs of each child and development of a feeling of responsibility in each.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
