Isidor Straus

Isidor Straus
Born	February 6, 1845(1845-02-06) Otterberg, Germany
Died	15 April 1912 (aged 67) RMS Titanic (sunk), Atlantic Ocean
Other names	Isadore Strauss
Occupation	Co-owner of Macy's department store
Spouse	Rosalie Ida Blun
Children	Jesse Isidor Straus Clarence Elias Straus Percy Seldon Straus Sara (Straus) Hess Minnie (Straus) Weil Hebert Nathan Straus Vivian (Straus) Dixon

Isidor Straus (February 6, 1845 – April 15, 1912)—a German-born American—was co-owner of the Macy's department store with his brother Nathan. He also served briefly as a member of the United States House of Representatives. He died with his wife, Ida, as a result of the sinking of the passenger ship RMS Titanic.

Early life

Isidor Straus was born in Otterberg county of Kaiserslautern, Germany. He was the first of five children of Lazarus Straus (1809–1898) and his second wife Sara (1823–1876). His siblings were Hermine (1846–1922), Nathan (1848–1931), Jakob Otto (1849–1851) and Oscar Solomon Straus (1850–1926). In 1854, he and his family immigrated to the United States and settled in Talbotton, Georgia where they opened a general store.

At the outbreak of the American Civil War Isidor volunteered for the Confederate States Army but his solicitude was refused as he was only 16 years old at the time. He spent the rest of the war working as a clerk in the store in substitution of an employee that had joined the army, and later served as representative of the family business in England.

Following the end of the war the Straus family moved to New York City, where Isidor and his brother Nathan set up their family crockery and glassware business in the R. H. Macy and Company department store.

Later life

In 1871, Isidor Straus married Rosalie Ida Blun (1849–1912). They were parents to seven children (one of whom died in infancy):

• Jesse Isidor Straus (1872–1936) who married Irma Nathan (1877–1970), and served as U.S. Ambassador to France, 1933–1936
• Clarence Elias Straus (1874–1876) who died in infancy
• Percy Selden Straus (1876–1944) who married Edith Abraham (1882–1957)
• Sara Straus (1878–1960) who married Dr. Alfred Fabian Hess (1875–1933)
• Minnie Straus (1880–1940) who married Richard Weil (1876–1918)
• Herbert Nathan Straus (1881–1933) who married Therese Kuhn (1884–1977)
• Vivian Straus (1886–1974) first married Herbert Adolph Scheftel (1875–1914) and second, in 1917, married George A. Dixon, Jr. (1891–1956)

The couple were inseparable, writing to each other every day when they were apart. He served as a U.S. Congressman from January 30, 1894, to March 3, 1895, as a Democrat. By 1896, the Straus brothers had gained full ownership of R. H. Macy & Co.

Death on the Titanic

The gravesite of Isidor Straus in Woodlawn Cemetery

Traveling from Germany back to the United States, Isidor and his wife were passengers on the RMS Titanic when, on April 14, 1912, it hit an iceberg. Their baby grandson, Stuart Scheftel, had caught a cold and been left behind in England with his nurse, or else he would have been on the ship with them. Ida reportedly would not leave Isidor and refused to get in a lifeboat. The officer filling up the boat told Isidor that he could get into the boat with his wife, but he refused to before younger men but instead sent his wife's maid, Ellen Bird, into the boat. Ida refused to board the half-full boat, saying "I will not be separated from my husband. As we have lived, so will we die, together." Isidor and Ida were last seen on deck sitting in deck chairs holding hands when a huge wave washed them into the sea. Both died on April 15 when the ship sank. Isidor Straus's body was recovered by the cable ship Mackay-Bennett and brought to Halifax, Nova Scotia where it was identified before being shipped to New York. He was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. Ida's body was not recovered. (Baby Stuart grew up to marry actress Geraldine Fitzgerald.)

The couple are portrayed in the 1953 film Titanic and the 1958 film A Night to Remember, in scenes that are faithful to the accounts just cited. In the 1997 film Titanic, the Strauses are briefly depicted comforting each other in their bed as their stateroom floods with water, along with a deleted scene showing Isidor (played by Lew Palter) attempting to persuade Ida (Elsa Raven) to enter the lifeboat.

Memorials

Isidor and Ida Straus Memorial, Upper West Side, Manhattan

The remains of Isidor Straus were recovered by the Mackay-Bennett and interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. His gravestone also serves as a cenotaph for his wife. There are three other memorials to Isidor and Ida Straus in their adopted home of New York City:

• A memorial plaque can be seen on the main floor of Macy's Department Store in Manhattan.
• The Isidor and Ida Straus Memorial is located in Straus Park, at the intersection of Broadway and West End Avenue at W. 106th Street (Duke Ellington Boulevard) in Manhattan. The park is one block from 105th St. and West End Avenue, where they resided (now the site of the Cleburne Building). An inscription reads, "Lovely and pleasant they were in their lives, and in death they were not divided." (2 Samuel 1:23)
• New York City Public School P.S. 198, built in Manhattan in 1959, is named in memory of Isidor and Ida Straus. The building shares space with another school, P.S. 77.

Straus Hall, one of Harvard's freshman residence halls in Harvard Yard, was given in honor of the Strauses by their three sons.

See also

• List of famous German Americans

External links

• Encyclopedia Titanica Biography of Isidor Strauss
• Isidor Straus at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Straus article at JewishEncyclopedia.com
• Straus Historical Society

Further reading

• Donald E. Wilkes Jr, Georgians on the Titanic (1994).

United States House of Representatives
Preceded by Ashbel P. Fitch	Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York's 15th congressional district 1894-01-30 – 1895-03-03	Succeeded by Philip B. Low