Adolph Held, long identified with the Jewish Daily Forward and for more than 30 years national chairman of the Jewish Labor Committee, died today at 84. He had served the Jewish community in many capacities.
Mr. Held, who came to the United States in 1892, had served as city editor of the Forward, a Yiddish-language daily newspaper, from 1908 to 1912, and was general manager twice, from 1912 to 1917 and from 1962 until his retirement at the end of 1967. He also served as the paper’s business manager and was president of the Forward Association. Mr. Held also had been chairman of radio station WEVD here.
He had a second career in banking and labor. He served as president of the Amalgamated Bank from 1925 to 1945 and was for many years director of the health and welfare department of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, a post to which he had been invited by former president David Dubinsky. Mr. Held was a director of Hias (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) in Europe from 1920 to 1925, helping many thousands of Jews to emigrate to the United States after World War I. He served as a member of the presidium of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, and was a vice chairman of the World ORT Federation. He also served the Joint Distribution Committee. Mr. Held died at the Workman’s Circle Home and Hospital for the Aged in the Bronx. Services were being arranged today.
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.
