Samuel Rubel (1881-1949) was an American millionaire immigrant from

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

Life and career

In the 1920 U. S. Census his occupation was described as "Coal Miner & Ice Retailer." Rubel emigrated to America in 1904 from Riga, Latvia, at the age of 23. Rubel started his career selling coal and ice with a horse-drawn wagon in the tenements in the East New York section of

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

. Rubel became the head of the Pocono Mountain Ice Company based in

Hoboken, New Jersey Hoboken ( ; Unami: ') is a city in Hudson County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 60,417. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program calculated that the city's population was 58,690 i ...

, which became the leading ice company in the

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

and

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

area, buying up many of the smaller ice companies. Beginning in the 1930s with the advent of

refrigeration The term refrigeration refers to the process of removing heat from an enclosed space or substance for the purpose of lowering the temperature.International Dictionary of Refrigeration, http://dictionary.iifiir.org/search.phpASHRAE Terminology, ht ...

, the harvesting of the ice from lakes became less and less profitable. Eventually, the ice companies folded, and Rubel switched his focus to other fields (such as brewing). In 1946, Rubel's mansion in

Roslyn, New York Roslyn ( ) is a village in the Town of North Hempstead in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. It is the Greater Roslyn area's anchor community. The population was 2,770 at the 2010 census. History Ros ...

was destroyed by fire. Rubel died on April 29, 1949. He was president of the Ebling Brewing Company at the time of his death and his net worth was estimated at $8,000,000. Rubel was a supporter of the Boy Scouts of America. Samuel Rubel donated a large tract of land around Stillwater Lake in Pocono Summit, PA to the Bethlehem Area Council; the land was presented to the Scouts on May 27, 1949. The land, which is now known as

Camp Minsi Minsi Trails Council is a council of the Boy Scouts of America that serves Scouts of eastern Pennsylvania's Lehigh Valley and Pocono regions as well as parts of western New Jersey. The council serves five counties in Pennsylvania: Lehigh, North ...

, is still in use by the Boy Scouts today.Camp Minsi History
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Personal life

Samuel Rubel married Dora Nachumowitz; the couple had two daughters.

Death

Obituary from

the New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

(April 30, 1949):

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rubel, Samuel Ice trade American brewers Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States 1881 births 1949 deaths 20th-century American philanthropists