An AEU Leader, Jone Johnson Lewis, will introduce us to some sisters who are not very well-known, but whose lives include some inspiring lessons about living an ethical life.

These sisters were among the many children of Dr. Jakob Joseph Goldmark and Regina Wehle, who came to America after the failure of the Austrian Revolution of 1848 in which Dr. Goldmark had played a major role.

Helen Goldmark Adler was not just the wife of Felix Adler (founder of the first Ethical Culture Society) but did her own work on child development and is credited with seriously reducing the infant child death rate in New York City through her work.  Alice Goldmark Brandeis was married to the jurist Louis Brandeis and she herself worked for often-controversial social reforms. Pauline Goldmark was an early social researcher and activist on behalf of women workers.  Josephine Goldmark worked against child labor and for the minimum wage. Josephine and Pauline were also key in developing a ground-breaking Supreme Court brief for their brother-in-law Louis Brandeis.  (A brother was the engineer who designed the locks for the Panama Canal.)

Come hear more about these sisters and consider how their interconnections with others helped to create some key social reforms in American history.  You’ll get a taste as well about what the Ethical movement was like in earlier days and how it inspired some of these actions.

Perry Beider will be on the piano.