A Proclamation and a Committee
On a Sunday evening in August 1864, work began on what would become the Jewish Hospital
October 7, 2015
On August 14, 1864, Abraham Sulzberger, an upholsterer who had emigrated from Germany two decades earlier, made a plea that would resonate long into the future.
Sulzberger, along with his friend Isaac Leeser – rabbi of the first Philadelphia synagogue, had become a strong advocate for a hospital to serve the Jewish community of Philadelphia. On this Sunday night, he poured out his heart at the annual meeting of a Jewish fraternal organization called B’nai B’rith, whose 1,000 members represented all of the city’s congregations and Jewish societies. A past president of the organization, Sulzberger was widely recognized for his scholarship and devotion to Jewish tradition.
His plea, delivered in a Bavarian accent, did its work. To Sulzberger’s delight, the organization agreed unanimously that the time had come to act.
It was formally recorded in the meeting notes from that night that “among other routine business exclusively belonging to the Order, a proposition was submitted to start a hospital within the limits or in the immediate vicinity of Philadelphia.”
Four days later, the committee of seven – all immigrants from the German states of Bavaria, Wuertemberg and Hess – put Sulzberger’s plea into a document (pictured below). The handwritten proclamation – original versions in both English and German sit in the Einstein archives – reads, in part:
“WHEREAS, a Jewish hospital has been found to be necessary in the cities of New York and Cincinnati, and in the large cities of Europe, and
WHEREAS, All the causes that make such an institution a necessity there, are in full operation here, and
WHEREAS, Within the last six months three Israelites of this city have died in Christian hospitals without having enjoyed the privilege of hearing the watchword of their faith and nation, and
WHEREAS, It reflects the greatest discredit on so large a Jewish population as that of Philadelphia to force friendless brothers to seek, in sickness and the prospect of death, the shelter of un-jewish hospitals, to eat forbidden food, to be dissected after death and sometimes even to be buried with the stranger. Therefore, be it
Resolved, That the District Grand Lodge No. 3, of the Independent Order of the Benai Berith, acting on that Benevolence and Brotherly Love, which are the motto of the Order, take immediate steps to secure the co-operation of all Jewish societies and individuals for the purpose of founding a Jewish hospital and be it further
Resolved, That the whole subject be and is hereby referred to a special committee of seven, to be called the Hospital Committee.”
Work on what would ultimately become the Einstein Healthcare Network had begun.
Source: Information about the meeting comes from Mankind and Medicine: A History of Philadelphia’s Albert Einstein Medical Center by Maxwell Whiteman.