Organizations and Institutions

Minnie Dessau Louis

Minnie Dessau Louis was an essayist, journalist, and poet, but she is best known for her philanthropic work in the Jewish community, largely focusing on women and children. She devoted her life to teaching immigrant Jewish women multiple skills through the many and varied schools she ran and her involvement in the founding of the Hebrew Technical School for Girls and the National Council of Jewish Women.

Johanna Loeb

Johanna Loeb’s philanthropic work extended to both Jewish and secular charities, such as the Home for Crippled Children, the Jewish Consumptive Relief Society of Chicago, the Home for the Jewish Friendless, and Chicago’s first Jewish Community Center. Her career not only strengthened the safety net for the disadvantaged throughout Chicago, but also illuminated the limitations and the potential that women’s philanthropic groups had in Jewish American society’s previously male-dominated community organizations.

Sadie Loewith

Sadie Loewith was an early twentieth-century teacher, businesswoman, active Republican Party worker, chairperson, organizer, and politician of high repute.

Fannie Eller Lorber

When her community became a mecca for adults suffering from tuberculosis, Fannie Eller Lorber created a Jewish children’s home for those who had no one else to care for them. Lorber epitomized the volunteer spirit of urban Jewish women in the American West.

Frieda Lorber

Frieda Levin Lorber made a name for herself as a prominent lawyer in the mid twentieth century and helped other women rise in the profession in New York and worldwide.

Charlotte Lipsky

Charlotte Schacht Lipsky found an unusual balance between activism and pragmatism: on one hand, a follower of the revolutionary Emma Goldman, on the other, the owner of a successful interior decorating business. In her later years, she was involved in Hadassah and the Women’s American ORT, an organization that taught trade skills to Jews around the world.

Alice Springer Fleisher Liveright

Social worker Alice Springer Fleisher Liveright devoted much of her life to working for equal rights for women and African Americans, and for social welfare for children and poor adults. Passionate in her quest for social justice, she served as president of the Juvenile Aid Society, president of the Philadelphia Conference of Social Work, and as the Pennsylvania State Secretary of Welfare.

Irma Levy Lindheim

Irma Levy Lindheim was a colorful American Zionist millionaire, fund-raiser, and educator. Called “the grandmother” of the kibbutz for helping found and sustain multiple kibbutzim, Irma Levy Lindheim also made phenomenal contributions to fundraising and organizational efforts to create and maintain the fledgling State of Israel.

Ruth Lewinson

Born in 1895, Ruth Lewinson was one of the earliest female Jewish lawyers in the United States. In addition to her own private practice, she was active on multiple boards and committees as well as other organizations including charitable work.

Jennie Davidson Levitt

Jennie Davidson Levitt, daughter of Jewish philanthropists Saul and Mary (Cohen) Davidson, continued her family’s tradition of activism and philanthropy with her work for Jewish organizations. She helped rescue Jewish children during the war, and later lobbied for better medical and psychiatric services.

Adele Rosenwald Levy

Adele Rosenwald Levy used her affluence to promote public-spirited philanthropy and Jewish causes in the years surrounding World War II.

Florence Nightingale Levy

Florence Nightingale Levy’s most significant achievement was the founding of the American Art Annual in 1898. A comprehensive directory of the American art world, the Annual catalogued schools, associations, exhibitions, and artists nationwide. Levy went on to perform invaluable editing, organizing, and educational roles in the American art world for the next fifty years.

Sophie Szold with Daughters Henrietta, Rachel, Adele, and Bertha, 1899

Bertha Szold Levin

Bertha Szold Levin was a Baltimore educator, civic leader, and Jewish activist in the early twentieth century.

Jacqueline Levine

Jacqueline Levine is an outstanding example of female activist leadership in American Jewish life. Levine lent her voice to a stunning array of social justice causes, from civil rights to ending hunger to women’s leadership in the Jewish community.

Edith Altschul Lehman

Known to many as the cultured wife of one of New York’s most popular governors and senators, Edith Altschul Lehman was in her own right a passionate social activist and philanthropist. She funded endeavors from building schools in Israel to creating a children’s zoo in Central Park.

Adele Lewisohn Lehman

Adele Lewisohn Lehman was a significant figure in the history of New York City philanthropy who was primarily involved in causes benefiting disabled people and children. A donor and fund-raiser, she also served as an administrator or board member for many agencies, including the East Side Free School for Crippled Children and the New York Board of Charities.

Madeleine May Kunin

Madeline Kunin broke ground as the first woman governor of Vermont and the only woman to serve three terms as governor, before making history again as ambassador to Switzerland and facilitating compensation from Swiss banks to Holocaust survivors.

Sarah Kussy

Sarah Kussy was a founder and leader of a constellation of significant Jewish organizations, including Hadassah and the United Synagogue Women’s League. Through her many associations, Kussy worked to change the face of Jewish education, Zionist activities, and women’s participation in Jewish American communal life.

Mathilde Krim

Scientist and philanthropist Mathilde Krim made tremendous contributions to AIDS research and fundraising for those affected by the condition. She founded the American Foundation for AIDS Research in 1985 with Elizabeth Taylor and was also instrumental in oncology research and in Israel advocacy.

Matilda Steinam Kubie

Matilda Steinam Kubie directed her energies toward the support and growth of charitable institutions that sought to better the lives of those in the Jewish community. She helped many organizations extend their reach through her leadership and her savvy use of advertising.

Phyllis A. Kravitch

Phyllis A. Kravitch was the third woman circuit court judge in the United States. One of the first female trial lawyers in the South, Kravitch became the first woman president of the Savannah Bar Association in 1973 and served as the first woman superior court judge in Georgia. She also established a rape crisis center and shelter for women survivors of domestic violence.

Lonka Korzybrodska

Lonka Korzybrodska was an active member of He-Haluz, a resistance movement during World War II. She participated in missions until her capture and died imprisoned in Auschwitz in 1943.

Julia Koschitzky

An activist, philanthropist, and leader of Canadian and world Jewry, Julia Koschitzky was born in Cardiff, Wales, the daughter of Max Podolski and Elli (Moses) Podolsk. The family relocated to Canada in 1949, eventually settling in Toronto in 1956. Julia and her husband Henry Koschitzky became involved in communal leadership and philanthropy, specifically in Jewish education and social welfare, and she took on active roles in Jewish affairs both in Toronto and around the globe.

Marcia Koven

Marcia Koven was the founding curator of the Saint John Jewish Historical Museum, one of a number of museums dedicated to Jewish history in Canada’s Maritime Provinces. Her work inspired other Jewish museum projects in Atlantic Canada, and she held a number of other leadership roles related to Jewish life and history.

Rebekah Bettelheim Kohut

Rebekah Bettelheim Kohut made her mark on the American Jewish community in the areas of education, social welfare, and the organization of Jewish women. Grounded in her Jewish identity as the daughter and wife of rabbis, Kohut had a public career that paralleled the beginnings of Jewish women’s activism in the United States.

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