Elizabeth Milbank Anderson
Encyclopedia
Elizabeth Milbank Anderson (1850–1921), philanthropist and advocate for public health and women's education, was the daughter of Jeremiah Milbank
(1818–1884), a successful commission merchant, manufacturer and investor, and Elizabeth Lake (1827–1891). Anderson established in 1905 one of the first foundations funded by a woman, the Memorial Fund Association (renamed the Milbank Memorial Fund in 1921), with gifts of $9.3 million by the time of her death. Anderson in her lifetime supported a wide range of health and social reform efforts during the Progressive Era, from tuberculosis and diphtheria eradication to relief work for European children following World War I, for which she was made in 1919 a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor by the French government.
's sanatarium for the tubercular at Saranac Lake, New York, where from 1893 until her death she underwrote the operating costs of his laboratory for the investigation of the treatment of tuberculosis. Anderson's later gifts to improve public health included provision in New York City of a model public bath (1904); the establishment through the Children's Aid Society
of the Chappaqua (NY) Home for Convalescent Children (1909); the operating funds, with Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, for the Home Hospital for the Tubercular (1912); and in 1913 the establishment of the Department of Social Welfare at the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor (a predecessor of today's Community Service Society of New York
). The latter department funded public school lunches in New York City for 25,000 school children, provided funding for increased school-based medical inspections
, supported installation of school drinking water fountains and improved ventilation. It also provided public "comfort stations" (bathrooms), public laundries, and in a tenement section of the city, a Food Supply Store which sold good quality food at cost. The department also performed the groundwork which led to the establishment and funding of community health centers, including the Mulberry Street, Columbus Hill and Judson Health Center
s, all in New York City (1918–1921). In 1916 Anderson gave $100,000 to Lillian Wald
's Henry Street Settlement
and joined its board of directors, and separately became the lead donor to the city's Department of Public Charities' Children's Home Bureau, which outplaced orphans from institutions to families. From 1914-1920, Anderson was the largest donor to Clifford Beers's National Committee for Mental Hygiene (today's Mental Health America) where she was particularly concerned for the treatment of returning World War I veterans with "shell-shock."
In the political sphere, Anderson used her influence with New York Senator Elihu Root
to help push through passage in 1912 of the bill establishing the United States Children's Bureau
(folded into the Federal Service Agency in 1946).
In the field of women's and African-American education, Anderson was an initial supporter of Clara Spence in creation of the Spence School
(New York, 1892), whose first graduating class included Anderson's daughter Eleanor. Anderson also refinanced and rebuilt Greenwich Academy
1914-1917 (Greenwich, CT). In higher education Anderson provided "Milbank Agricultural Hall" to Tuskegee University
, Alabama (1909); $50,000 in her will to Fisk University
, Nashville, TN (1921) and from 1896 until her death was the largest benefactor of Barnard College
, where she served as Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees from 1899-1921. Separately, in the field of human rights, Anderson provided $100,000 in funding to open in 1905 and support until her death the Harlem office of the Legal Aid Society
.
(mabcnyc.org). Anderson, like her father, was a devoted church-goer who abstained from consumption of alcohol or participation in the conspicuous social events of her day. Educated by private tutors, Anderson traveled in Europe and became interested in art, as was her father who collected art of the Barbizon School
. On June 15, 1876 she married Abraham Archibald Anderson (1846–1940), a portrait artist who was the son of Dutch Reformed Church Reverend William Anderson (1814–1887) and Sarah Louise Ryerson (1818–1907), a descendent of Marten Reyerszen, Brooklyn magistrate in 1679.
Anderson's father, Jeremiah Milbank
, was a successful wholesale grocer, speculator in Texas territorial bonds, manufacturer and railroad investor. His most successful business efforts were the New York Condensed Milk Company (1857, renamed the Borden Company in 1899) and the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway (1876) where he was a member of the executive committee of the Board of Directors. Milbank was a trustee of the baptist Rochester Theological Seminary (University of Rochester
) and owned a box at the Metropolitan Opera. The city of Milbank, South Dakota
(1880) was named in his honor. At the time of his death in 1884, his fortune was estimated at $32 million, one-half of which he left to his son Joseph and the remainder to Mrs. Anderson and her daughter, Eleanor Milbank Anderson (1878–1959).
(1859–1926) created a Broadway theatre on a lot Anderson owned at 124 West 43rd Street, New York City. "Henry Miller's Theatre
", between Broadway and 6th Avenue in midtown-Manhattan, was designed in the neo-classical style by architects Paul R. Allen and Ingalls & Hoffman and was named for actor-producer Henry Miller. The original theatre had 950 seats. It opened on April 1, 1918 with the play The Fountain of Youth. It was the first air-conditioned theater in Manhattan, and reflected Anderson's special interest in mechanical ventilation.
The theatre had its first major hit with Noel Coward's The Vortex in 1926. Following Miller's death that same year, the theatre was managed by Gilbert Miller
, his son, who purchased the Klaw & Erlanger interest and paid 25% of the gross take of each play he produced to the Milbank Memorial Fund, Anderson's legatee. From the 1930s through the late-1960s, the theater enjoyed significant success, with performances by Helen Hayes, Leslie Howard, Lillian Gish, Douglas Fairbanks, and Ruth Chatterton. The theater is now operated by the Roundabout Theatre.
Anderson lived in California for part of each year beginning in 1906 at 350 South Grand Ave. in Pasadena, then in Los Angeles in 1907 when she built a home at 671 Wilshire Place. Her vacation residence (1912) at 2300 East Ocean Beach Boulevard is now the Long Beach Museum of Art
.
Anderson died in New York City of pernicious anemia on February 22, 1921, and was interred in the Milbank Mausoleum, Putnam Cemetery
, Greenwich, CT. She was survived by her husband, A. A. Anderson, artist (1846–1940); her daughter, Dr. Eleanor A. Campbell (Eleanor Milbank Anderson Tanner Campbell, M.D.) (1878–1959); and a granddaughter, Elizabeth Milbank Anderson, II (née Elizabeth Milbank Tanner)(1905–1930). Her primary philanthropic legacy in public health is the work carried on today by the Milbank Memorial Fund.
Jeremiah Milbank
Jeremiah Milbank American businessman, was a successful dry goods commission merchant, speculator in Texas territorial bonds, manufacturer, and railroad investor. His most successful business efforts were the New York Condensed Milk Company which he co-founded with inventor Gail Borden and the...
(1818–1884), a successful commission merchant, manufacturer and investor, and Elizabeth Lake (1827–1891). Anderson established in 1905 one of the first foundations funded by a woman, the Memorial Fund Association (renamed the Milbank Memorial Fund in 1921), with gifts of $9.3 million by the time of her death. Anderson in her lifetime supported a wide range of health and social reform efforts during the Progressive Era, from tuberculosis and diphtheria eradication to relief work for European children following World War I, for which she was made in 1919 a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor by the French government.
Advocacy for public health
Anderson's recorded public health benefactions began with her initial gift in 1891 to Dr. Edward Livingston TrudeauEdward Livingston Trudeau
Edward Livingston Trudeau, M.D., M.S., D. Hon., was an American physician who established the Adirondack Cottage Sanitarium at Saranac Lake for treatment of tuberculosis.-Biography:...
's sanatarium for the tubercular at Saranac Lake, New York, where from 1893 until her death she underwrote the operating costs of his laboratory for the investigation of the treatment of tuberculosis. Anderson's later gifts to improve public health included provision in New York City of a model public bath (1904); the establishment through the Children's Aid Society
Children's Aid Society
__notoc__The Children’s Aid Society is a private charitable organization based in New York City. It serves 150,000 children per year, providing foster care, medical and mental health services, and a wide range of educational, recreational and advocacy services through dozens of community centers,...
of the Chappaqua (NY) Home for Convalescent Children (1909); the operating funds, with Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, for the Home Hospital for the Tubercular (1912); and in 1913 the establishment of the Department of Social Welfare at the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor (a predecessor of today's Community Service Society of New York
Community Service Society of New York
The Community Service Society of New York is an independent, nonprofit organization established in 1939. Originally formed as a charity providing direct assistance to the poor, its mission has evolved include research and advocacy as well as legal and informational support services for other...
). The latter department funded public school lunches in New York City for 25,000 school children, provided funding for increased school-based medical inspections
School health services
School health services are services from medical, teaching and other professionals applied in or out of school to improve the health and well-being of children and in some cases whole families...
, supported installation of school drinking water fountains and improved ventilation. It also provided public "comfort stations" (bathrooms), public laundries, and in a tenement section of the city, a Food Supply Store which sold good quality food at cost. The department also performed the groundwork which led to the establishment and funding of community health centers, including the Mulberry Street, Columbus Hill and Judson Health Center
Judson Health Center
Judson Health Center, founded in 1921, was an early New York City Community Health Center inspired by the Rev. Alonzo Ray Petty of the baptist Judson Memorial Church located at 55 Washington Square South. Petty appealed to fellow baptist and physician Eleanor A...
s, all in New York City (1918–1921). In 1916 Anderson gave $100,000 to Lillian Wald
Lillian Wald
Lillian D. Wald was a nurse; social worker; public health official; teacher; author; editor; publisher; activist for peace, women's, children's and civil rights; and the founder of American community nursing...
's Henry Street Settlement
Henry Street Settlement
The Henry Street Settlement is a not-for-profit social service agency in the Lower East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City that provides social services, arts programs and health care services to New Yorkers of all ages. It was founded in 1893 by Progressive reformer Lillian Wald.The...
and joined its board of directors, and separately became the lead donor to the city's Department of Public Charities' Children's Home Bureau, which outplaced orphans from institutions to families. From 1914-1920, Anderson was the largest donor to Clifford Beers's National Committee for Mental Hygiene (today's Mental Health America) where she was particularly concerned for the treatment of returning World War I veterans with "shell-shock."
In the political sphere, Anderson used her influence with New York Senator Elihu Root
Elihu Root
Elihu Root was an American lawyer and statesman and the 1912 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He was the prototype of the 20th century "wise man", who shuttled between high-level government positions in Washington, D.C...
to help push through passage in 1912 of the bill establishing the United States Children's Bureau
United States Children's Bureau
The United States Children's Bureau is a federal agency organized under the United States Department of Health and Human Services' Administration for Children and Families. Today, the bureau's operations involve improving child abuse prevention, foster care, and adoption...
(folded into the Federal Service Agency in 1946).
Advocacy for women's and African-American education
Spence School
The Spence School is an American all-girls independent school in New York City, founded in 1892 by Clara B. Spence.-Overview:Spence has about 688 students, with K-4 representing the Lower School, 5-8 representing the Middle School, and 9-12 representing the Upper School. Lower school average class...
(New York, 1892), whose first graduating class included Anderson's daughter Eleanor. Anderson also refinanced and rebuilt Greenwich Academy
Greenwich Academy
Greenwich Academy is an independent, all-girls preparatory day school in Greenwich, Connecticut. Founded in 1827, it is the oldest girls' school in Connecticut. Greenwich Academy's motto is Ad ingenium faciendum, "Toward the Building of Character."...
1914-1917 (Greenwich, CT). In higher education Anderson provided "Milbank Agricultural Hall" to Tuskegee University
Tuskegee University
Tuskegee University is a private, historically black university located in Tuskegee, Alabama, United States. It is a member school of the Thurgood Marshall Scholarship Fund...
, Alabama (1909); $50,000 in her will to Fisk University
Fisk University
Fisk University is an historically black university founded in 1866 in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S. The world-famous Fisk Jubilee Singers started as a group of students who performed to earn enough money to save the school at a critical time of financial shortages. They toured to raise funds to...
, Nashville, TN (1921) and from 1896 until her death was the largest benefactor of Barnard College
Barnard College
Barnard College is a private women's liberal arts college and a member of the Seven Sisters. Founded in 1889, Barnard has been affiliated with Columbia University since 1900. The campus stretches along Broadway between 116th and 120th Streets in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough...
, where she served as Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees from 1899-1921. Separately, in the field of human rights, Anderson provided $100,000 in funding to open in 1905 and support until her death the Harlem office of the Legal Aid Society
Legal Aid Society
The Legal Aid Society in New York City is the United States' oldest and largest provider of legal services to the indigent. It operates both traditional civil and criminal law cases.-History:...
.
Early life
Anderson was born in New York City on December 20, 1850, and was raised in a conservative Baptist family closely associated with the Madison Avenue Baptist ChurchMadison Avenue Baptist Church
Madison Avenue Baptist Church was first chartered in 1848 as Rose Hill Baptist Sunday School and Church, on East 30th Street between Third and Lexington Avenues. Rose Hill was a house church with twelve members...
(mabcnyc.org). Anderson, like her father, was a devoted church-goer who abstained from consumption of alcohol or participation in the conspicuous social events of her day. Educated by private tutors, Anderson traveled in Europe and became interested in art, as was her father who collected art of the Barbizon School
Barbizon school
The Barbizon school of painters were part of a movement towards realism in art, which arose in the context of the dominant Romantic Movement of the time. The Barbizon school was active roughly from 1830 through 1870...
. On June 15, 1876 she married Abraham Archibald Anderson (1846–1940), a portrait artist who was the son of Dutch Reformed Church Reverend William Anderson (1814–1887) and Sarah Louise Ryerson (1818–1907), a descendent of Marten Reyerszen, Brooklyn magistrate in 1679.
Anderson's father, Jeremiah Milbank
Jeremiah Milbank
Jeremiah Milbank American businessman, was a successful dry goods commission merchant, speculator in Texas territorial bonds, manufacturer, and railroad investor. His most successful business efforts were the New York Condensed Milk Company which he co-founded with inventor Gail Borden and the...
, was a successful wholesale grocer, speculator in Texas territorial bonds, manufacturer and railroad investor. His most successful business efforts were the New York Condensed Milk Company (1857, renamed the Borden Company in 1899) and the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway (1876) where he was a member of the executive committee of the Board of Directors. Milbank was a trustee of the baptist Rochester Theological Seminary (University of Rochester
University of Rochester
The University of Rochester is a private, nonsectarian, research university in Rochester, New York, United States. The university grants undergraduate and graduate degrees, including doctoral and professional degrees. The university has six schools and various interdisciplinary programs.The...
) and owned a box at the Metropolitan Opera. The city of Milbank, South Dakota
Milbank, South Dakota
Milbank is a city in Grant County, South Dakota, along the South Fork of the Whetstone River. The population was 3,353 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Grant County. In 1925 The American Legion Department of South Dakota established a new program for high school aged youth that grew...
(1880) was named in his honor. At the time of his death in 1884, his fortune was estimated at $32 million, one-half of which he left to his son Joseph and the remainder to Mrs. Anderson and her daughter, Eleanor Milbank Anderson (1878–1959).
Other activities
In 1918, with the financial support of Anderson and partner Klaw & Erlanger, Henry Miller (actor)Henry Miller (actor)
Henry Miller was an English-born American actor, director, theatrical producer and manager.Born as John Pegge in London, Miller's parents immigrated to Canada where he started acting as a juvenile. He became the leading man in Charles Frohman's stock company in New York City's Empire Theatre in 1893...
(1859–1926) created a Broadway theatre on a lot Anderson owned at 124 West 43rd Street, New York City. "Henry Miller's Theatre
Henry Miller's Theatre
The Stephen Sondheim Theatre, formerly Henry Miller's Theatre, is a Broadway theatre located at 124 West 43rd Street, between Broadway and 6th Avenue, in Manhattan's Theatre District.-History:...
", between Broadway and 6th Avenue in midtown-Manhattan, was designed in the neo-classical style by architects Paul R. Allen and Ingalls & Hoffman and was named for actor-producer Henry Miller. The original theatre had 950 seats. It opened on April 1, 1918 with the play The Fountain of Youth. It was the first air-conditioned theater in Manhattan, and reflected Anderson's special interest in mechanical ventilation.
The theatre had its first major hit with Noel Coward's The Vortex in 1926. Following Miller's death that same year, the theatre was managed by Gilbert Miller
Gilbert Miller
Gilbert Heron Miller was an American theatrical producer.Born in New York City, he was the son of English-born theatrical producer Henry Miller and Bijou Heron, a former child actress. Raised and educated in Europe, he returned home to follow in his father's footsteps and became a highly...
, his son, who purchased the Klaw & Erlanger interest and paid 25% of the gross take of each play he produced to the Milbank Memorial Fund, Anderson's legatee. From the 1930s through the late-1960s, the theater enjoyed significant success, with performances by Helen Hayes, Leslie Howard, Lillian Gish, Douglas Fairbanks, and Ruth Chatterton. The theater is now operated by the Roundabout Theatre.
Anderson lived in California for part of each year beginning in 1906 at 350 South Grand Ave. in Pasadena, then in Los Angeles in 1907 when she built a home at 671 Wilshire Place. Her vacation residence (1912) at 2300 East Ocean Beach Boulevard is now the Long Beach Museum of Art
Long Beach Museum of Art
The Long Beach Museum of Art is a museum located on Ocean Boulevard in the Bluff Park neighborhood of Long Beach, California. The museum occupies the historic 1912 Elizabeth Milbank Anderson house and carriage house and a new two-story pavilion, and includes oceanfront gardens. The museum is open...
.
Anderson died in New York City of pernicious anemia on February 22, 1921, and was interred in the Milbank Mausoleum, Putnam Cemetery
Putnam Cemetery
Putnam Cemetery is a non-sectarian cemetery located in Greenwich, Connecticut. It is affiliated with adjacent Saint Mary's Cemetery, which is a Catholic cemetery. The cemetery is located in a quiet residential neighborhood and is the final resting place of several notable people...
, Greenwich, CT. She was survived by her husband, A. A. Anderson, artist (1846–1940); her daughter, Dr. Eleanor A. Campbell (Eleanor Milbank Anderson Tanner Campbell, M.D.) (1878–1959); and a granddaughter, Elizabeth Milbank Anderson, II (née Elizabeth Milbank Tanner)(1905–1930). Her primary philanthropic legacy in public health is the work carried on today by the Milbank Memorial Fund.