Best of Bob
By Robert A. Cohn

Losing a Patriarch: 
Let’s Build on His Legacy

May, 2009

 When I interviewed Isadore E. Millstone in December 2006, just weeks before his incredible 100th birthday, we spent much more time than was required for what turned out to be an article that filled two full pages in the December 27, 2006 edition of the St. Louis Jewish Light.

May 3, 2009 Grand Opening of the JCC Staenberg Complex

There were more than four lengthy  sessions and 12 hours of audio tapes when we “finished” the interviews.  He said to me,  “Bob, I know you have way more material than you need for this story.  But you can use the rest of this when the time comes.”

That time seems to have come now.  The entire St. Louis Jewish community, indeed all of Greater St. Louis, has been in shock since media reports that Mr. Millstone, now 102, and who had just spoken without notes and in apparent good health and spirits at the dedication of the magnificent new Staenberg Family Complex at the Jewish Community Center on May 3, had “gone missing” on Saturday, May 14. 

A car belonging to Mr. Millstone’s caregiver was found near the Daniel Boone Bridge, where eyewitnesses reported seeing an “elderly man” jumping off of the bridge.  All indications seem to confirm our deepest fears that Mr. Millstone is no longer with us.

Millstone's 100th Birthday Celebration at United Hebrew in 2007

We have been distressed and saddened to learn that Mr. Millstone had been in chronic and often severe pain since suffering a shoulder injury at a birthday celebration in January 2008. A family spokesperson told media that he had suffered “anxiety” since that injury.  Beyond those facts, at this writing, no remains have been found. We can only pray for an outcome that could bring some closure to his family, friends and the entire community.

Whatever the circumstances of what was probably the end of Mr. Millstone’s life, we prefer to concentrate on his truly unparalleled 102 years of visionary, compassionate, dynamic and creative life.

Isadore Erwin Millstone was born in his beloved St. Louis in 1907, when Teddy Roosevelt was in the White House.  How appropriate!  I. E. Millstone and Theodore Roosevelt shared numerous traits:  both were born leaders; both had incredible vision--Theodore Roosevelt acquired millions of square miles of unspoiled land for our National Parks System, and people felt he was foolish to do so.  I. E. Millstone, overcoming the resistance of “doubters and naysayers,” purchased and donated the original 108 acres at Lindbergh and Schuetz  for what is now the Isadore E. Millstone Jewish Community Campus.

The Millstone Campus includes not only the original Wohl Building of the JCC, but the state-of-the-art, magnificent new Staenberg Family Complex, made possible largely through the leadership, vision and generosity of Michael Staenberg.  It is both poignant and incredibly fitting that Mr. Millstone’s last public address to our community was his stirring and inspirational remarks at the official May 3 dedication of the Staenberg facilities.  Staenberg remarked that Mr. Millstone was an “incredible mentor and role model” through the entire process.  Staenberg added that Mr. Millstone could relate to people of all ages and backgrounds. 

As the line from Rudyard Kipling’s immortal poem “If” says, Mr. Millstone could indeed “walk with kings and never lose the common touch.”  His charities included his beloved alma mater of Washington University to which he contributed the Millstone Pool and the Millstone Plaza at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, countless scholarships, and support for the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, The Technion, and the Jerusalem Campus of the Hebrew Union College.

I.E. Millstone Jewish Community Campus

Mr. Millstone was a life member of United Hebrew Congregation, where his father, Louis Millstone served for many years as executive director.  His father-in-law, Louis Gollin set up the Gollin Family Foundation, which Mr. Millstone managed. 

Mr. Millstone, along with the late Alfred Fleishman, senior partner and co-founder of the public relations firm of Fleishman-Hillard, and the late Melvin Dubinsky, head of Jack Dubinsky & Sons Real Estate Co., were affectionately called our “Three Patriarchs” in tribute to their pioneering and sustained support for the State of Israel. 

Mr. Millstone, along with the distinguished American Jewish architect Louis I. Kahn and other engineers, architects and builders, went to Israel in its founding days to help construct sturdy housing for the 800,000 immigrants from Arab and Muslim lands as well as Holocaust survivors from the DP camps who poured into the tiny new state, even during its War of Independence.

Back in 1992, Mike Litwack, a past president of Jewish Federation, went to the “Gallery of Past Presidents Portraits” in the Jewish Federation Kopolow Building Board Room to see when “Izzy Millstone was President.”  To his astonishment, Litwack discovered that Mr. Millstone had been offered the presidency of the Jewish Federation numerous times, but always turned it down. He preferred to support whoever was in office and not to seek any kovod for himself. 

As a result, Mr. Millstone was named the first and only Honorary President of the Jewish Federation of St. Louis, which has properly called him the “singular” and most admired and respected member of our Jewish community. 

Whatever the circumstances of Mr. Millstone’s last hours, let us focus on his unparalleled record of generosity, leadership and vision –, a Legacy that we can build upon towards the future that he always had uppermost in his brilliant mind.

God speed, Isadore Millstone; you will be remembered for a blessing and we promise to continue your work.

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During his 40-plus years in the Jewish journalism biz, Bob Cohn has met and seen them all! Now he's Editor Emeritus of the Jewish Light and sharing four decades years of amazing stories and memories with us on jewishinstlouis.org.  E-mail questions or comments to: admin@jewishinstlouis.org