Samuel Baron’s 106th Birthday
At a Bronx Jewish nursing home in 1934, Pathé films Samuel Baron’s birthday with cake, a brachah, and “Happy Birthday,” and he tells the interviewer he is 106.
British Pathé, “NEW YORKS - OLDEST MAN” (1934; asset 41708; Film ID 805.35). Sound newsreel, about 42 seconds. Pathé issued the item on 6 December 1934.
Cake, brachah, “Happy Birthday”
A bearded man stands before a large birthday cake, residents and visitors packed around him, late 1934, inside the Home of the Daughters of Jacob: New York’s first strictly kosher, Shabbos-observant Jewish nursing home, by then on its Bronx campus. An interviewer asks his age, and he answers that he is 106.
Asked what he thinks of President Roosevelt, he says Roosevelt is “a good man.” Under a Magen David banner and American flags he makes a brachah over the cake; the room sings “Happy Birthday,” and he eats while close shots show elderly people applauding.
Pathé sold that party as “New York’s oldest man.” Pathé’s paperwork note admits the item may belong to another issue; the surviving catalog still dates the year to 1934 and the issue to 6 December. The catalog never prints his name.
Samuel Baron, on paper
The man Pathé left unnamed was Samuel Baron. On Sunday, 18 November 1934, New York’s Jewish daily newspaper the Jewish Daily Bulletin reported that a surprise birthday party was being held that day for “Samuel Baron, 106, oldest resident at the Home of the Daughters of Jacob, 167th street and Findlay avenue,” given by the board of directors and its president, Mrs. Peter J. Schweitzer.
Two days later, under the headline “Reb Samuel Dances Jig on His 106th Birthday,” the Jewish Telegraphic Agency (JTA) wrote that the Sunday afternoon party had taken place at the home where he had lived for the past three years; that he was born in Wilno, Lithuania, in 1828; and that the centenarian “danced a jig to prove he is still spry and active.” Pathé issued its newsreel of that celebration on 6 December 1934.
The same home is on his death certificate. New York City death certificate no. 9783 records Samuel Baron’s death on 10 November 1938 at the Daughters of Jacob, 321 East 167th Street, Bronx. The form gives his age as 106 years, his residence as 137 Harrison Avenue, Brooklyn, his birthplace as Russia, his father’s name as Isaac Baron, and his mother’s maiden name as Sarah Rubrick.
He had been admitted to the nursing home on 17 November 1932, which matches JTA’s “past three years” as of the 1934 party. Burial followed the next day at West New Hempstead (the Spring Valley area), consistent with the Find a Grave memorial at Congregation Sons of Israel Cemetery, whose stone reads Shmuel ben Yitzchak and ages him at 105. No JTA death notice for him turned up in the 1938 archive search.
The ages that will not agree
The 106 he gave the interviewer will not sit still on paper. Pathé’s title claims 106 in 1934. JTA gives a Wilno birth year of 1828, which would make him 106 that November. The 1938 death certificate again says 106. The grave says 105.
In the Pathé stills and the video, Baron’s beard and mustache show clear patches of black hair, not only white. A man truly past 100 would not ordinarily keep that much dark hair in the beard. The sources leave the knot open. We do not know his true age.
Findlay Avenue
Home of the Daughters of Jacob (Jewish nursing home; later Triboro Center)
321 East 167th Street / Findlay Avenue, Bronx
40.83250, -73.91252
Street View near the Findlay Avenue facade of the former Home of the Daughters of Jacob. Founded on the Lower East Side in 1896 as New York’s first fully kosher, Shabbos-observant Jewish nursing home, the institution moved to this wheel-shaped Bronx campus in 1920.
The film and what followed
Baron lived another four years after the birthday. He died at the home in November 1938 and was buried in Rockland County.
Timeline
- 1896
- Home of the Daughters of Jacob founded on the Lower East Side as New York’s first strictly kosher, Shabbos-observant Jewish nursing home.
- c. 1890
- Samuel Baron’s death certificate implies about 48 years in the United States by 1938 (arrival around 1890).
- 1920
- The home moves to its Bronx campus at 167th Street, Findlay, and Teller Avenues.
- 1828 (claimed)
- JTA reports Baron born in Wilno (Vilna), Lithuania.
- 17 Nov 1932
- Baron admitted to the Daughters of Jacob (per death certificate).
- 18 Nov 1934
- Surprise 106th birthday party at the home (JTA); Pathé issues the newsreel as “New York’s oldest man” on 6 December 1934.
- 10 Nov 1938
- Samuel Baron dies at the Daughters of Jacob, aged 106 on the certificate (105 on the grave); buried the next day near Spring Valley.