Maurice Wertheim

Maurice Wertheim (born February 16, 1886 in New York , † May 27, 1950 in Cos Cob , Connecticut ) was an American banker and philanthropist .

Maurice Wertheim as co-director of the Theater Guild (1923) (third from right)

Life

Maurice Wertheim came from a wealthy Jewish family in New York. In 1906 he earned a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in 1907 from Harvard University . In 1907 he became vice president of the United Cigar Manufacturing Company, headed by his father Jacob Wertheim. When the father retired from the business in 1913, Maurice also left the company. In 1915, Wertheim joined the investment bank Hallgarten & Company . In 1927 he went into business for himself and founded his own investment bank, Wertheim and Co. He was also a member of the board of directors of various other companies, including the Underwood Typewriter Company , the Cuban Atlantic Sugar Company, the Hat Corporation of America and the Bond Stores Company.

His great fortune allowed Wertheim to do a variety of philanthropic activities. He was particularly committed to the arts, educational institutions, environmental protection, chess and Jewish-American issues. He has served on the boards of trustees of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of New York, the American Wildlife Foundation, and Mount Sinai Hospital . He was also a co-founder of the New York Theater Guild . When the liberal magazine The Nation ran into financial difficulties during the Great Depression , Wertheim saved it from being discontinued and acted as its publisher from 1935 to 1937.

During the Second World War , Wertheim was a member of the War Production Board and the Board of Economic Welfare. As president of the American Jewish Committee from 1941 to 1943 he endeavored to reconcile representatives of conflicting tendencies. In 1947 Wertheim donated an area of ​​over 700 hectares on the south coast of Long Island to the USA , which is now designated as a nature reserve under the name Wertheim National Wildlife Refuge .

Maurice Wertheim died of a heart attack on May 27, 1950 at the age of 64 at his country estate in Cos Cob, Connecticut. He bequeathed the Maurice Wertheim Collection, an important collection of paintings by French Impressionists , to the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University .

Private

Maurice Wertheim was married three times. The first marriage to Alma Morgenthau, a daughter of Henry Morgenthau senior , had three daughters, including the journalist and historian Barbara Tuchman .

literature

• Barksdale, Jay: Maurice Wertheim . Portrait on the New York Public Library website. June 18, 2010.
• Fogg Art Museum (ed.): Degas to Matisse. The Maurice Wertheim Collection. Edited by John O'Brian with a foreword by Barbara Wertheim Tuchman and Anne Wertheim Werner. HN Abrams, New York 1988.
• M. Wertheim This. Long a financier. Obituary in the New York Times . May 28, 1950. p. 44.
• Ronall, Joachim O .: Wertheim, Maurice. In: Encyclopaedia Judaica . 2nd edition. Macmillan, Detroit et al. a. 2007. Vol. 21, p. 15.