Charles David Spivak (December 25, 1861 - October 16, 1927) was a Russian-born American medical doctor, community leader, and writer. He was one of the founders of the Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society in what is now

Lakewood, Colorado The City of Lakewood is the home rule municipality that is the most populous municipality in Jefferson County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 155,984 at the 2020 U.S. Census making Lakewood the fifth most populous city in Col ...

. He was the editor of ''The Sanatorium'' as well as the first editor of the ''Denver Jewish News'' (now known as the

Intermountain Jewish News The ''Intermountain Jewish News (IJN)'' is a weekly newspaper serving the Denver- Boulder communities and the greater Rocky Mountain Jewish community (Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, Utah, and Montana). The newspaper was founded in 1913 and had a ...

. With Yehoash, he is also the author of what was once the premier

Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ver ...

-English Dictionary.

Early life

Spivak was born Chaim Davod Spivakofsky on December 25, 1861, in the village of

Kremenchuk Kremenchuk (; uk, Кременчу́к, Kremenchuk ) is an industrial city in central Ukraine which stands on the banks of the Dnipro River. The city serves as the administrative center of the Kremenchuk Raion (district) in Poltava Oblast (pr ...

in the

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

(now

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

). In 1882, he and his friend

Victor Yarros Victor S. Yarros (1865–1956) was an American anarchist, lawyer and author. He immigrated to the United States with his friend Charles David Spivak in 1882. He was law partner to Clarence Darrow for eleven years in Chicago, husband to the femini ...

emigrated to the United States as political refugees.Dr. Charles Spvak
Jewish Museum of the American West. After working in New York City and Maine, Spivak moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1886. He studied medicine at Jefferson Medical School from 1887 to 1890 and later married a fellow Russian-Jewish immigrant, Jeannie Charsky, in 1893.Abrams, Jeanne (2009-05-31). Dr. Charles David Spivak: A Jewish Immigrant and the American Tuberculosis Movement. University Press of Colorado. ISBN 9780870819414.

Jewish Consumptive Relief Society

In 1904, the Spivak family moved to Denver for Jennie Charsky Spivak's incipient tuberculosis. Spivak practiced medicine in Denver and, in 1904, he became one of the founders of the Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society (JCRS)

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB) is an infectious disease usually caused by '' Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can also affect other parts of the body. Most infections show no symptoms, in ...

sanatorium A sanatorium (from Latin '' sānāre'' 'to heal, make healthy'), also sanitarium or sanitorium, are antiquated names for specialised hospitals, for the treatment of specific diseases, related ailments and convalescence. Sanatoriums are often ...

. He was the Director and Secretary of the JCRS hospital from 1904 until his death in 1927. He was also the editor of ''The Sanatorium'', a journal from the JCRS Press and Propaganda Committee that included reports from the JCRS, medical advice, human interest stories, poetry, and literature. The campus of the JCRS hospital which Spivak became the American Medical Center in 1954 and is now the home of the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design.

World War I Relief Work

In 1920, Spivak took a leave of absence from the JCRS to serve as a special U.S. medical commissioner in war-torn Europe. He was a representative of the Joint Distribution Committee and organized relief for Jewish refugees in Poland and Ukraine.

Personal life

Spivak was married to Jennie Charsky and the father of artist H. David Spivak (1893-1934), Deena Spivak, and Ruth Spivak. His wife, Jennie was also briefly the brother-in-law of

Jacob Marinoff Jacob Marinoff (3 December 1869 – 27 October 1964) was a Russian-born American Yiddish publisher and author. He was one of the founders of New York satirical weekly '' Der Groyser Kundes'' ("The Big Stick")''.'' He published three volumes of ver ...

. Spivak is also the great-grandfather of

MacArthur Fellows Program The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to between 20 and 30 ind ...

awardee,

Marla Spivak Marla Spivak (born 1955) is an American entomologist, and Distinguished McKnight University Professor at the University of Minnesota specializing in apiculture and social insects. Career and research Spivak graduated with a B.A. from Humboldt S ...

. and the great-great-grandfather of

David Spivak David Isaac Spivak is an American mathematician and senior scientist at the Topos Institute. He has worked on applications of category theory, in particular ologs and operadic compositionality of dynamical systems. He authored and coauthored th ...

. Spivak died on October 16, 1927. His will stated that his skeleton should be donated to science and the rest of his remains should be buried with patients: “That my body be embalmed and shipped to the nearest medical college for an equal number of non-Jewish and Jewish students to carefully dissect. After my body has been dissected, the bones should be articulated by an expert and the skeleton shipped to the University of Jerusalem, with the request that the same be used for demonstration purposes in the department of anatomy.” His skeleton is at the Hadassah Medical Center in Israel and other remains are buried at Golden Hill Cemetery in Golden, Colorado.

Family, Friends, and Associates

Family *

May Arno Schwatt May is the fifth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars and is the third of seven months to have a length of 31 days. May is a month of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, and autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. Therefore, May ...

Friends * Rabbi Charles Kauvar of the Beth HaMedrosh Hagodol-Beth Joseph * Rabbi William S. Friedman of the Temple Emanuel (Denver) *

Yehoash (poet) Solomon Blumgarten () (16 September 1872 – 10 January 1927), known by his pen name Yehoash (), was a Yiddish poet, scholar, and translator. Yehoash was "generally recognized by those familiar with iddishliterature, as its greatest living poet an ...

Associates *

John F. Shafroth John Franklin Shafroth (June 9, 1854February 20, 1922) was an American politician who served as a representative, member of the United States Senate, and Governor of Colorado. Early life Born in Fayette, Missouri, he attended the common schoo ...

Academic Research on Dr. Charles D. Spivak

*In 2009, Jeanne Abrams, Ph.D., published '' Dr. Charles David Spivak: A Jewish Immigrant and the American Tuberculosis Movement'' (2009) *In 2020, Thomas E. Keefe, Ed.D., published
This Day in RMCAD and the Historic JCRS , AMC Campus: A Diary of Care, Research, and Creativity
' (2020) *In 2022,

Gracie Daniels Gracie may refer to: Names * Gracie (name), a given name and a family name (includes a list of people with that name) * Gracie family, a Brazilian family known for their practice and development of martial arts * Hurricane Gracie, a 1959 Atlantic ...

published "A Blast the Past Past: RMCAD’s Campus History"

Legacy

*The University of Denver has a permanent online exhibit
Chasing the Cure
in which Dr. Spivak and the Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society feature prominently. *In 2019, Dr. Spivak and the Jewish Consumptives' Relief Society were featured in the "Lakewood: A 20th Century Journey" exhibition as part of Lakewood’s 50th Anniversary celebration *In 2022, The Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design hosted the descendants of Charles D. Spivak and H. David Spivak. Professor Thomas E. Keefe presented a lecture on the Spivak Family and H. David Spivak in particular. Wooley, Bob. (2022). Lakewood celebration honors Jewish Consumptives’ Relief Society founder’s family. ''Jeffco Transcript''. August 15, 2022. https://jeffcotranscript.com/stories/celebration-honors-jcrs-founders-family-on-historic-lakewood-campus,398912

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spivak, Charles 1861 births 1927 deaths Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States 20th-century publishers (people) Russian Jews American publishers (people) 20th-century American male writers American magazine founders Writers from Denver American writers of Russian descent Jewish Russian writers American people of Russian-Jewish descent Yiddish-language writers