Frieda Schiff

Frieda Warburg (née Schiff; February 3, 1876 – September 14, 1958) was a Jewish-American philanthropist and communal worker from New York. Life Warburg was born on February 3, 1876, in New York City, New York, the daughter of Jacob Schiff and Therese Loeb. A member of New York City's German Jewish elite, her father was a preeminent Jewish communal leader and head of the banking firm Kuhn, Loeb & Co., and her maternal grandfather was a founder of the banking firm. She had an opulent private education, although her formal education ended after she graduated from the Brearley School. Warburg participated with her husband Felix in numerous cultural and philanthropic undertakings he was associated with. Active in interests of her own, she served as president of the Young Women's Hebrew Association from 1928 to 1938. She was active in Hadassah, serving as honorary chairman of the building fund campaign of the Rothschild-Hadassah-University Hospital in Jerusalem. She was also honorary chairman of the Federation for the Support of Jewish Philanthropic Societies of New York City and chairman of the women's division of its 1930 campaign, honorary chairman of the Joint Distribution Committee, and an executive committee member of the Welfare Council of New York City. She regularly donated to various causes, creating a $500,000 fund for the Visiting Nurse Service of New York in 1924 and giving a $90,000 gift to the Jewish Theological Seminary of America to commemorate her father's 90th birthday anniversary in 1937. Warburg became vice-president of the Jewish Welfare Board in 1937, served as honorary vice-president of the Welfare Council of New York City from 1943 to 1945, and was an honorary president of the American Friends of the Hebrew University and an honorary vice-president of the International Youth Aliyah Committee. She created a $500,000 fund to support the Visiting Nursing Service of New York in 1924, and in 1951 she contributed $650,000 to the UJA for housing and educating new Israeli immigrants to Israel. She became a director of the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1938, like her father, husband, and brother before her. The first (and for much of her tenure only) woman director of the Seminary, she was consulted about their programs for women. In 1944, she donated her husband's mansion on Fifth Avenue to the Seminary. In 1947, they opened the mansion as the Jewish Museum.