Henri Landwirth (March 7, 1927 – April 16, 2018) was a hotelier, philanthropist, and a Holocaust survivor. He was the founder of

Give Kids The World Give may refer to: making someone get or receive something from someone Places * Give, Denmark, a small town ** Give Municipality, a former municipality Music * ''Give'' (Balkan Beat Box album), 2012 album by Balkan Beat Box * ''Give'' (The Bad ...

and Dignity U Wear. Landwirth was born into a Jewish family in

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

, in northern

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

, in 1927. His father was a diamond-cutter. During World War II, Henri and his family were separated and were prisoners in the Nazi death and labor camps. Henri spent the years between ages 13 and 18 in Nazi camps, including Auschwitz and Mauthausen. Both of his parents were killed in the camps, but Henri and his twin sister, Margot, survived. After the war, Landwirth made his way to America. Landwirth was drafted during the Korean War, and used the

G.I. Bill The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for some of the returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s). The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, bu ...

to take a course in hotel management while working the night desk at Manhattan's Wellington Hotel. He first worked 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 ...

and then in 1954 became manager of the Starlite Motel in Cocoa Beach, Florida. In 1969, he opened a Holiday Inn franchised hotel in Orlando. Subsequently, Landwirth co-owned a number of hotels in the Central Florida area, including the hotel that is now known as the Seralago Hotel & Suites Main Gate East.The history of ''Seralago Hotel & Suites''
at SeralagoHotel.com In the 1980s Landwirth started offering free hotel rooms to terminally ill children for the

Make-A-Wish Foundation The Make-A-Wish Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in the United States that helps fulfill the wishes of children with a critical illness between the ages of and 18 years old. Make-A-Wish was founded in 1980 and headqua ...

. After a child died before travel arrangements could be made, he made a “vow that no child in need would ever be failed again,” and in 1986, Landwirth founded Give Kids The World, a nonprofit resort that provides vacations to children with critical illnesses and their families. Landwirth wrote a memoir, Gift of Life in 1996. The movie ''Borrowing Time'' made in 2006, followed Landwirth as he sought to grapple with his past, and featured some of the people who knew Landwirth including

John Glenn John Herschel Glenn Jr. (July 18, 1921 – December 8, 2016) was an American Marine Corps aviator, engineer, astronaut, businessman, and politician. He was the third American in space, and the first American to orbit the Earth, circling ...

. Landwirth died on April 16, 2018, at the age of 91.

References

1927 births 2018 deaths People from Antwerp Belgian philanthropists Belgian Jews Belgian emigrants to the United States American people of Belgian-Jewish descent Mauthausen concentration camp survivors Auschwitz concentration camp survivors 20th-century philanthropists {{activist-stub