42 Facts About Julius Rosenwald

1.

Julius Rosenwald was a Jewish American businessman and philanthropist.

2.

Julius Rosenwald is best known as a part-owner and leader of Sears, Roebuck and Company, and for establishing the Rosenwald Fund, which donated millions in matching funds to promote vocational or technical education.

3.

Julius Rosenwald was the principal founder and backer for the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, to which he gave more than $5 million and served as president from 1927 to 1932.

4.

Julius Rosenwald was born in 1862 to the clothier Samuel Rosenwald and his wife Augusta, a Jewish immigrant couple from Germany.

5.

Julius Rosenwald was born and raised just a few blocks from Abraham Lincoln's residence in Springfield, Illinois, during Lincoln's presidency.

6.

Additionally, Samuel Rosenwald served as the president of the B'rith Sholom synagogue of the Springfield Hebrew Congregation, where Julius received a Jewish education and learned lifelong lessons to shape his values.

7.

Julius Rosenwald had heard about other clothiers who had begun to manufacture clothing according to standardized sizes from data collected during the American Civil War.

8.

Julius Rosenwald decided to try the system but to move his manufacturing facility closer to the rural population that he anticipated would be his market.

9.

In 1890, Julius Rosenwald married Augusta "Gussie" Nusbaum, a daughter of a competing clothier.

10.

Julius Rosenwald and Weil was a principal supplier of men's clothing for Sears, Roebuck.

11.

Sears and Julius Rosenwald got along well, but Nusbaum, who was Gussie Julius Rosenwald's brother, was a problem.

12.

Sears and Julius Rosenwald bought him out for $1.3 million in 1903.

13.

Julius Rosenwald brought to the company a rational management philosophy and diversified product lines: dry goods, consumer durables, drugs, hardware, furniture, and nearly anything else a farm household could desire.

14.

The prosperity of the company and their vision for greater expansion led Sears and Julius Rosenwald to take the company public in 1906, with $40 million in stock.

15.

Julius Rosenwald turned to his old friend Henry Goldman, who was now a senior partner at Goldman Sachs, to handle the initial public offering of the stock.

16.

On January 2,1915, Julius Rosenwald was indicted in Chicago for a failure to file a personal property tax schedule.

17.

Julius Rosenwald declared this to be greatly excessive and additionally claimed that the stock of the New York company did not represent tangible assets.

18.

The indictment was quashed in March 1915 when Julius Rosenwald's attorneys convinced the Court that the section of law which provided for prosecution of such cases had been repealed.

19.

Julius Rosenwald was laid low during the post-World War I recession as a severe depression hit the nation's farms after farmers had over-expanded their holdings.

20.

Two years later, in 1924, Julius Rosenwald resigned the presidency, but remained as chairman; his goal was to devote more time to philanthropy.

21.

Julius Rosenwald had a simple philosophy when it came to philanthropy.

22.

Additionally, Julius Rosenwald was concerned about justice for all, and he believed that the plight of African Americans was deeply connected with the inequities faced by Jews throughout their history.

23.

Julius Rosenwald made common cause with Washington and was asked to serve on the board of directors of the Tuskegee Institute in 1912, a position he held for the remainder of his life.

24.

Julius Rosenwald endowed the institute to free Washington from fundraising and enable him to devote more time managing the institute.

25.

Julius Rosenwald became a member of the city's leading Jewish Reform congregation, Chicago Sinai congregation, soon after moving to Chicago.

26.

Julius Rosenwald donated generously to several Jewish community projects in Chicago and served as vice president of Chicago Sinai for many years.

27.

Julius Rosenwald provided funds to build six small schools in rural Alabama, which were constructed and opened in 1913 and 1914, and overseen by Tuskegee.

28.

The collaboration between Booker T Washington and Julius Rosenwald was the subject of the 2015 documentary Rosenwald, subtitled The Remarkable Story of a Jewish Partnership with African American Communities by writer, producer and director Aviva Kempner, which won Best Documentary Jury Award at the Teaneck International Film Festival and the Lipscomb University Prize of the Ecumenical Jury, Nashville Film Festival.

29.

Julius Rosenwald established his Rosenwald Fund in 1917 for "the well-being of mankind".

30.

Unlike other endowed foundations, which were designed to fund themselves in perpetuity, the Julius Rosenwald Fund was intended to use all of its funds for philanthropic purposes.

31.

Julius Rosenwald commissioned one of Chicago's largest philanthropic housing developments: the Michigan Boulevard Garden Apartments, at 47th St and Michigan Ave.

32.

Julius Rosenwald planned the development of 421 units to provide sound housing for African Americans and to relieve the tremendous overcrowding due to Chicago's pervasive racial segregation.

33.

Julius Rosenwald invested $2.7 million in the project, receiving only a 2.4 percent return during the first seven years.

34.

Julius Rosenwald went on to offer challenge grants to cities across the United States to build YMCAs for African Americans.

35.

Julius Rosenwald promised to give $25,000 to any city that could raise $75,000 to build a YMCA for African Americans.

36.

Between 1911 and 1933, Julius Rosenwald provided over $600,000 toward the building of 25 YMCAs in 24 cities across the United States, including one in Harlem.

37.

Julius Rosenwald encouraged Reshevsky to earn a university degree so as not to be completely dependent upon chess for his living.

38.

Julius Rosenwald gave $1000 grants to the first 100 counties in the US to hire County Extension Agents, helping the United States Department of Agriculture launch a program that was highly valuable to rural Americans.

39.

Julius Rosenwald was the principal founder and backer for the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, to which he gave over $5 million and served as the president.

40.

Julius Rosenwald died at his home in the Ravinia section of Highland Park, Illinois, on January 6,1932.

41.

Julius Rosenwald refused to be the source of biographies and did not want his name to be affixed on buildings or institutions.

42.

Julius Rosenwald even insisted that his generous philanthropic contributions be matched by others so that he would not be credited with the title of 'sole donor'.