Irvin Ferdinand Westheimer (September 19, 1879 – December 31, 1980) was an American businessman and social reformer, who is best remembered for being the founder of the

Big Brothers Big Sisters of America Big Brothers Big Sisters of America is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose mission is to "create and support one-to-one mentoring relationships that ignite the power and promise of youth". Adult volunteers are matched with children from ag ...

Biography

Westheimer, an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

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man,

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

er and

philanthropist Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...

from

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, began the Big Brothers movement on July 4, 1903, when he discovered a young boy rummaging through a

garbage Garbage, trash, rubbish, or refuse is waste material that is discarded by humans, usually due to a perceived lack of utility. The term generally does not encompass bodily waste products, purely liquid or gaseous wastes, or toxic waste produc ...

pail outside the rear entrance to his office. Westheimer befriended the boy, who had no father, and began to urge his close friends to get involved as "big brothers" with other young boys from fatherless homes. In 1908, Mrs.

Cornelius Vanderbilt Cornelius Vanderbilt (May 27, 1794 – January 4, 1877), nicknamed "the Commodore", was an American business magnate who built his wealth in railroads and shipping. After working with his father's business, Vanderbilt worked his way into lead ...

learned of the Big Brothers movement and organized the first "Big Sisters" program in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. The two organizations came together in 1977, and merged to become known as the Big Brothers/Big Sisters of America.

Honours

Westheimer was honored by his native city of

Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

as one of its most important people of the century in 2000. He died at the age of 101.

References

External links

* 1879 births 1980 deaths American centenarians Men centenarians Businesspeople from Cincinnati American social reformers {{US-business-bio-1870s-stub