Find is Earmarked for Hadassah; Judge Mack Establishes Prize in Philanthropist’s Honor
The sum of $100,000 was contributed to the United Palestine Appeal by Nathan Straus on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, according to an announcement by Herman Bernstein yesterday. The gift to the United Palestine Appeal was earmarked by Mr. Straus for the Hadassah Medical Organization and is to be administered by Miss Henrietta Szold, the American member of the Palestine Executive.
This gift of Mr. Straus’s makes the amount he has contributed to Palestine during his lifetime more than $1500,000, which includes a recent gift of $250,000 for a health center in Jerusalem and $75,000 for a health center in Tel Aviv.
Mr. Straus is honorary chairman of the New York United Palestine Appeal In his letter announcing the gift, be Started.
“It is a source of great satisfaction to my dear wife and myself to announce that on the occasion of my eightieth birthday I have given the Hadassah Medical Organization. In answer to the United Palestine Appeal, the sum of one hundred thousand dollars.
“It is to be used along the fines of my health and relief institutions in Palestine and is to be supervised and administered by Henrietta Szold, the American member of the Palestine Executive. She knows the true needs of Palestine and is pre-eminently qualified to judge how the money contributed by us on this special occasion can best be utilized.
“The ideal of a reconstructed Jewish Homeland has been one of my chief thoughts and concerns for many years. I could therefore find no better means of expressing my gratitude to God who has preserved me for eighty years than by making this gift to Palestine.
“Today I have received congratulatory messages on my birthday from people throughout the world. They have expressed their good wishes and the high regard which they have for my work. If the true friends of Zion would show their affection for me, and if they want to afford me genuine joy on my eightieth birthday they will intensify their aid in the cause of the rebuilding of Palestine.
“My wife and I have dedicated ourselves to the upbuilding of the Holy Land, and we have cooperated in its growth by every means possible, without distinction of race or creed. This gift of ours is but a further mark of the high place which Palestine holds in our hearts. I hope that my friends may be inspired to follow me and that they may make this year’s fund raising effort for Palestine the most successful in history. As honorory chairman of the United Palestine Appeal, no compliment would be more welcome and no testimonial more appreciated than a contribution in the cause of Palestine.
“May the achievements of the Jewish pioneers ever continue in the Holy Land, the cradle of civilization and of the three great religions.”
In honor of the eightieth birthday of Nathan Straus, Judge and Mrs. Julian W Mack have established a prize in the Jewish Institute of Religion. The prize is to be awarded for the best paper on any phase of the new life in Palestine, or on the work of the Hadassah, written by any present or former student of the institute under such rules and regulations as the institute may devise.
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.
