Maurice godfather

Maurice Pate (born October 14, 1894 in Pender , Nebraska, † January 19, 1965 in New York ) was an American businessman and benefactor. He founded the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) together with Herbert Hoover in 1946 and was its first chairman from 1946 until his death in 1965.

The former second UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld once said when he spoke about the United Nations : "The work of UNICEF is at the heart of the matter - and at the heart of UNICEF is Maurice Pate." The work of UNICEF is the heart of our concern - and the heart of UNICEF is Maurice's godfather. ”).

The co-founder Herbert Hoover called him in the introductory speech at a UNICEF dinner "the most effective human angel I know" (roughly: "the most effective human angel I know"). Godfather was recognized worldwide for his services on behalf of children and starving people.

Maurice Pate (center) with Danny Kaye and Princess Astrid of Norway

Early years

He was born in Pender, Nebraska , to Richard E. Pate and Rachel Davis Godfather, to both parents of Welsh ancestry. He was the oldest of seven children, three of whom died in childhood. His family moved to Denver , Colorado when he was three years. He graduated from East Denver High School in Denver in 1911 before going to Princeton University . In Princeton, he was a member of the Phi Beta Kappa fraternity , was a member of the Red Cross committee and graduated with honors in mathematics and physics in 1915.

After graduation, he worked at First National Bank in Hartley, Iowa , where his uncle was chairman until the United States entered World War I. With some persuasion, Herbert Hoover was able to convince him to work for his Belgian charity , which resulted in a lifelong friendship and cooperation. He then served with the American Expeditionary Corps in the 29th Engineer Regiment in France. After the end of the war, he helped the administration of the American Relief Organization organize and manage aid deliveries for the care of more than one million Polish children.

He then went back to Europe and worked for Standard Oil of New Jersey in Poland in the finance and sales sector from 1922 to 1927 . In 1927 he married the Polish celebrity Jadwiga Mankowska and did business in the import and banking sector. He finally returned to the United States in 1935 as a seasoned investment banker and businessman. His wife was not happy in the USA, however, so the divorce followed in 1937 and Jadwiga returned to Poland, but the two remained friends until their death in 1960.

UNICEF

After the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, Godfather became head of the Commission for Polish Aid Deliveries, later he joined the Red Cross and became the director responsible for the delivery of aid for prisoners of war in Asia and Europe .

In 1946 and 1947, he and Herbert Hoover conducted food supply surveys - 38 countries in 76 days - and then the two planned to found UNICEF.

He joined UNICEF immediately after it was founded in January 1947 and became the first director, with the condition that the organization served all children, including those from the formerly hostile countries, regardless of race or political origin.

At first it was the main task of the organization to protect the children in Europe, which was destroyed after the war, from disease and famine.

Growing concern about the care and survival rates of children in developing countries, whether due to illness or hunger, led to the decision to continue the organization in 1953. Under the leadership of Godfather, UNICEF developed programs for better and affordable health care for mothers and children as well as health care initiatives.

Great strides have been made in the fight against malaria , tuberculosis , whooping cough and diphtheria . Vaccinations, rehydration for diarrhea and breastfeeding for young children were supported and introduced into the public health system.

His idea of ​​having celebrities advertise the concerns of his organization helped Danny Kaye to success in 1954 , who was Pate's seat neighbor on a transatlantic flight and was made by him the first UNICEF ambassador .

Late years and death

Godfather received honors and awards for his humanitarian work, he received awards from the governments of Poland , Belgium , the Netherlands and Ecuador , he received an honorary doctorate from Denison University in 1956, and in 1958 he was awarded an honorary doctorate from Princeton University. In 1959 he was honored with the Albert Lasker Public Service Award , and declined a nomination for the Nobel Prize on the grounds that the work of the entire organization should be recognized and not a single person.

In 1961, a year after his former wife Jadwiga died, godfather Martha Lucas married, she was chairwoman of Sweet Briar College and Radcliffe College, she worked for the United Negro College Fund and the national selection committee for Fulbright students and she was involved in similar activities like godfather in UNICEF. So the two not only had complementary activities, but could also travel together most of the time.

On January 19, 1965, just a few months before he was about to retire, Godfather succumbed to a heart attack unexpectedly, and he died in Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan . When he died, UNICEF had launched more than 550 long-term programs for hunger and health, and helped over 55 million children in 116 countries. Nine months after Godfather's death, UNICEF was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The UNICEF Maurice Pate Leadership for Children. was founded in his honor in 1965, it honors extraordinary and exemplary achievements for UNICEF on a national, regional and global level.

Others

Pates organization, the Maurice Pate Institute for Human Survival , donated 40 hectares of land to the Mayana Sutra and Tantra Center of Connecticut (today: Do Ngak Kunphen Ling) in 1997.

literature

• Horton, Richard (2004). UNICEF leadership 2005-2015: a call for strategic change [electronic version]. The Lancet , 364, 2071-2074.
• Schott, TE (1981). Godfather, Maurice. In The Dictionary of American Biography (Supplement Seven 1961-1965, 599-600). New York : Charles Scribner's Sons .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Maurice Pate . Do Ngak Kunphen Ling Tibetan Buddhist Center for Universal Peace. Archived from the original on June 26, 2007. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved July 11, 2010. 
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Scope and Content Note . In: Maurice Pate Papers - Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum . National Archives and Records Administration. Archived from the original on June 13, 2002. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved July 11, 2010. 
3. ↑ Biography of Maurice Pate . In: Maurice Pate Papers 1904-1985 . Princeton University . Retrieved on July 11, 2010.  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ ^{a b} Alexander Leitch: Maurice Pate . In: A Princeton Companion . Princeton University Press. 1978. Retrieved July 11, 2010.
5. ↑ Maurice Pate biography . In: About UNICEF: Who we are . United Nations. Retrieved July 11, 2010.
6. ↑ Unicef ​​ambassador. From Audrey Hepburn to Robbie Williams , Spiegel Online May 14, 2006 [1]
7. ^ 1959 Albert Lasker Public Service Award . Lasker Foundation . Archived from the original on July 16, 2010. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved July 11, 2010. 
8. ↑ Aase Lionaes: Nobel Peace Prize 1965 - Presentation Speech . December 10, 1965. Retrieved July 12, 2010.
9. ^ Nobel Peace Prize Laureates . In: nobelpeaceprize.org . 2010. Archived from the original on October 12, 2008. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved July 23, 2007. 
10. ↑ UNICEF Maurice Pate Leadership for Children Award (PDF; 14 kB) UNICEF . December 2006. Retrieved July 12, 2010.