MA: The Feuerstein Brothers
Dec 11: Fire burns down the hi–tech textile factory of Malden Mills in Lawrence, MA. Third–generation Modern Orthodox Jewish owners Moses and Aaron Feuerstein elect to use part of the insurance money to maintain all 3,000 local workers on–the–payroll with full benefits for six months while the factory is rebuilt.
The $25,000,000 outlay will come back to haunt the Feuersteins in the 2000s.
In any event, older brother Aaron recognized nationally at Clinton’s State of the Union Address (January 23, 1996), and awarded the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award, 1998.
From his base as an active member of the Young Israel of Brookline Synagogue, younger brother Moses Feuerstein, an early–on Jewish grad of Harvard Business School, for decades—personally and through surrogates—acts as a full–spectrum welcoming committee to many hundreds of Jewish college and grad–school kids parachuting–in to B.U., Harvard, MIT and Brandeis. White House–style “Private Dinners” for them included, for some at the Feuerstein’s Brookline residence. Jeans acceptable.