Sampson Simson

Sampson Simson (1780 - 7 January 1857) was an Orthodox Jewish American philanthropist most remembered as "the father of Mount Sinai Hospital."

Biography

Simson was born in Danbury, Connecticut to Solomon Simson. Some sources claim that his grandfather emigrated from Germany while others claim that both his father and his paternal grandfather were native New Yorkers. The Simson family had moved to Danbury during the American Revolution under the leadership of Gershom Seixas, who felt that Danbury would be a better place to live than Tory-controlled New York City. Due to the occupation, Congregation Shearith Israel was temporarily closed.

Simson studied law under Aaron Burr, attended Columbia College, Columbia University in New York City, and graduated in 1800 with a degree in law and was admitted to the bar in 1802, becoming one of the first Jewish lawyers in New York City. He was the first Jewish graduate of Columbia.

After a few years practice, however, Simson abandoned his law career and retired to his Yonkers farm to devote himself to charitable work. This was on account of his "distaste for an active public life" as well as an accident that left him disabled for a number of months. Other sources describe the "accident" as a "noctournal assault."

In 1852, Simson, along with eight other men representing various Hebrew charitable organizations, came together to establish the Jews' Hospital in New York, the institution that eventually in 1866 became Mount Sinai Hospital. Its location, West 28th Street between 7th and 8th Avenues in New York City, was on land donated by Simson; he served the first president of its board of directors and personally assumed many of the young hospital's financial burdens. The Jews' Hospital opened two years before his death.

That same year, Simson joined Samuel Myer Isaacs and Adolphus Simeon Solomons to help found the Beth Hamedrash Hagodol. However, the son of the Simon's niece Jochebed appealed the ruling, and the New York Court of Appeals overturned it, the difference between "charitable" and "benevolent" purposes.

Mount Sinai Hospital was recently ranked as one of the best hospitals in the United States by U.S. News & World Report.