A total of $1,875,000 was contributed here tonight to the research fund of the Weizmann Institute of Science, at Rehovot, Israel. The contributions were announced by Arthur B. Krim, chairman of the annual Weizmann Institute dinner, held at the Waldorf-Astoria, and Abraham A. Feinberg, president of the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute.
More than 1,500 guests attended the $250-per-plate event where the principal speaker was Dr. Jerome B. Wiesner, President Kennedy’s Special Assistant for Science and Technology: Dr. Wiesner was elected an honorary fellow of the Weizmann Institute.
President Kennedy, in a message to the dinner “warmly applauded” the honor bestowed by the Weizmann Institute on Dr. Wiesner. He emphasized that Dr. Wiesner has been his “good friend and trusted adviser” and said: “It gives me particular pleasure that Dr. Wiesner is receiving this honor not only for his formidable accomplishments in science, but also, in the tradition of Dr. Chaim Weizmann, for his work in the public service.”
In presenting Dr. Wiesner with a citation, Dr. Dewey D. Stone, chairman of the Institute’s Board of Governors, lauded him for his contributions “to the general science of communication in various systems, as well as of his unique role in forming the link between his fellow scientists and the governing bodies of this nation.”
In his address, Dr. Wiesner deplored “the desperate need for scientists and engineers in the United States, the inadequacy of public understanding in areas of science and technology” and what he called “the backwardness” of scientific education in the United States. Scientific and technologic education in the universities, he said, is “500 years behind the times.”
Mr. Feinberg announced that the family of the late Herman H. Taubman, of Tulsa, Oklahoma, has endowed a Chair of Applied Mathematics at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot. The following gifts were also announced: The Ullman Institute of Life Sciences donated by Mr. and Mrs. Siegfried Ullman of New York; the Esther and George Sagan Residence Hall for students of the Institute’s Graduate School in the Natural Sciences; the Louis J. Glickman Research Laboratory; the Lillian Persky Palais Fellowship; the Joseph C. Foster Research Grant; the Clara and Sam Silbert Research Fellowship; These gifts add up to $1,475,000.
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.
