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Ira Hirschmann

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Ira Arthur Hirschmann (July 7, 1901 – October 9, 1989) was an American businessman and diplomat.

Biography

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Hirschmann was born into a wealthy family in Baltimore.[1] He attended Johns Hopkins University before starting work as an advertising and sales manager for L. Bamberger & Co.[1] Using his advertising experience, he eventually became the vice president of marketing for Bloomingdale's.[2] In 1935 he was elected as the vice president of Saks Fifth Avenue.[3] He resigned from the vice-president position in 1938.[4]

Hirschmann was an amateur pianist who studied with Artur Schnabel.[5] In 1936, Hirschmann organized a boycott of Wilhelm Furtwängler when he was proposed as a successor to Toscanini for the conductor of the New York Philharmonic.[6] After the war, he continued to criticize Furtwängler, arguing against Yehudi Menuhin's argument that Furtwängler had aided Jewish musicians.[7] Hirschmann founded the New Friends of Music in 1937, a group promoting chamber music in New York that sponsored performances by Rudolf Serkin and Adolf Busch, among others.[8] The group attempted to increase access to music with low-priced tickets and to show that there was "a large public for the best in music".[9]

In addition to his business and music interests, Hirschmann was active in politics. Hirschmann attended the Évian Conference but left early, describing it as "a facade behind which the civilized governments could hide their inability to act".[10] Hirschmann was appointed as the War Refugee Board's special attaché in Romania, where he convinced the Romanian government to allow the immigration 48,000 Jews from Transnistria into Romania.[11] He later served as special agent of the War Refugee Board in Ankara[12] In this post, Hirschmann assisted in the rescue of Jews from Eastern Europe, by pressuring governments to allow Jewish immigration through Turkey.[13] Using funds provided by the Joint Distribution Committee, Hirschmann hired ship captains to transport Jews from Romania to Turkey and provided them with travel visas.[14] In 1944, the year Hirschmann started work in Turkey with Laurence Steinhardt, 14,164 refugees were able to travel through Turkey to Palestine.[15]

Hirschmann was critical of Truman's policy towards post-war Germany, signing a statement in 1946 that accused his government of shielding Nazis from punishment for "hope of future gain and control of a base of operations in the dangerous game of power politics".[16] He was friends with Fiorello La Guardia, often accompanying him to performances at the New York Philharmonic.[17] Hirschmann used this connection for his diplomatic work, since La Guardia became head of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration in 1946.[18] Hirschmann supported the Bergson Group, which attempted to raise awareness about the treatment of Jews in post-war Europe.[19] He was a sponsor of the Cultural and Scientific Conference for World Peace held in New York in March 1949.[20] In 1951, he spoke as a representative of the State Department at the Zagreb Peace Conference, defending the government's policy in the Korean War.[21] In 1962, a group of New York businessmen tried to convince Robert F. Wagner to nominate Hirschmann as the Democratic nominee for mayor.[22] He was a sponsor of the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy, signing a 1963 advertisement in The New York Times asking the Senate to ratify the nuclear test-ban agreement proposed by Averill Harriman and Khrushchev.[23]

Bibliography

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  • Life Line to a Promised Land. Vanguard Press, 1946
  • Oil and Blood Don't Mix. Independent Citizens. Committee of the Arts, Sciences and Professions, 1946
  • The Embers Still Burn:An Eye-witness View of the Postwar Ferment in Europe and the Middle East and Our Disastrous Get-soft-with-Germany Policy. University of California, 1949
  • Caution to the Winds. D. McKay, 1962
  • Red Star Over Bethlehem: Russia Drives to Capture the Middle East. Simon & Schuster, 1971, ISBN 978-0-671-20849-3
  • The Awakening: The Story of the Jewish National Fund. Shengold, 1981, ISBN 978-0-88400-073-0
  • Questions and Answers about Arabs and Jews. Bantam, 1977, ISBN 978-0-553-11199-6
  • Obligato: Untold tales from a life with music. Fromm International Publishing, New York, ISBN 0-88064-154-1.

References

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  1. ^ a b Fowler, Glenn (October 10, 1989). "Ira Hirschmann Is Dead at 88; Executive and Leading Nazi Foe". The New York Times. p. 24.
  2. ^ King, Charles (2014-09-24). "Refugees of the Bosphorus". Slate. ISSN 1091-2339. Retrieved 2024-09-14.
  3. ^ TIME (1935-02-11). "Business: Personnel: Feb. 11, 1935". TIME. Retrieved 2024-09-14.
  4. ^ "Newspaper Promotion Review". Editor and Publisher. 71 (41): 37. October 8, 1938.
  5. ^ Morreau, Annette (2002). Emmanuel Feuermann. Yale University Press. p. 140. ISBN 0300096844.
  6. ^ Shirakawa, Sam H. (1992). The Devil's Music Master: The Controversial Life and Career of Wilhelm Furtwangler. Oxford University Press. p. 201. ISBN 0195065085.
  7. ^ "Furtwangler's Sympathies Subject of Controversy". Musical America. 65 (17): 3. December 25, 1945.
  8. ^ Lehmann, Stephen; Faber, Marion (2003). Rudolf Serkin: A Life. Oxford University Press. p. 84. ISBN 0195130464.
  9. ^ Thompson, Virgil (1948). The Art of Judging Music. Alfred A. Knopf. p. 14.
  10. ^ Feingold, Henry L. (1970). The politics of rescue: The Roosevelt administration and the Holocaust, 1938-1945. Rutgers University Press. p. 33.
  11. ^ Epstein, Eric Joseph; Rosen, Philip (1997). Dictionary of the Holocaust: Biography, Geography, and Terminology. Greenwood Press. p. 127. ISBN 031330355X.
  12. ^ Maga, Timothy P. (January 1983). "Operation Rescue: The Mefkure Incident and the War Refugee Board". American Neptune. XLIII (1): 31.
  13. ^ Shmidman, Michael A., ed. (2007). Turim : Studies in Jewish history and literature, presented to Dr. Bernard Lander. Vol. 1. Touro College Press. p. 128. ISBN 9780881259599.
  14. ^ Morse, Arthur D. (1983). While six million died : A chronicle of American apathy. The Overlook Press. p. 316. ISBN 0879511745.
  15. ^ Marrus, Michael Robert (1985). The unwanted : European refugees in the twentieth century. Oxford University Press. p. 274. ISBN 0195036158.
  16. ^ Raymond, Harry (January 28, 1948). "Says U.S. Policy Aids Nazi Return to Power". The Daily Worker. p. 10.
  17. ^ Kessner, Thomas (1989). Fiorello H. La Guardia and the Making of Modern New York. McGraw-Hill Publishing Company. p. 345. ISBN 007034244X.
  18. ^ Kahn, Arthur D. (April 1949). "Unfinished Business". Jewish Currents. 3 (6): 31.
  19. ^ Shephard, Ben (2011). The Long Road Home: The Aftermath of the Second World War. Alfred A. Knopf. p. 232. ISBN 9781400040681.
  20. ^ United States. Congress. Hearings, Prints and Reports 1951-04-01. Internet Archive. Superintendent of Government Documents. 1951-04-01.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  21. ^ Clarke, George (November 5, 1951). "Tito 'Peace Rally' Flops, Radicals Reject 'New Line'". The Militant. p. 3.
  22. ^ "Propose Hirschmann as Foe for Rocky". Kingston Daily Freeman. August 17, 1962.
  23. ^ Bouscaren, Anthony T. (1969). Left of Liberal. Twin Circle Publishing Company. p. 195.
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