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Bernard Baruch

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1870-1965
US financier, political advisor, philanthropist

  1. Introduction
  2. Stories
  3. Biographical summary
  4. See also
  5. Further reading
  6. References

1. Introduction

Bernard Baruch (‘Ber-NARD Ba-ROOK’) was an American financier, political adviser and philanthropist. He made an early fortune speculating on commodities then joined President Woodrow Wilson’s Democrat administration. During World War I, he was Churchill’s US equivalent as head of munitions supply. He advised various presidents and government departments, notably Franklin D. Roosevelt in World War II, who used him as a communications channel with Churchill. He often sat on a park bench in Washington and New York to discuss political affairs with officials or passers-by, gaining the nickname ‘the park bench statesman’. His philanthropy benefited numerous educational, medical, political and other institutions.

2. Stories

  • Starting with very little, Baruch made his first million dollars by the age of thirty, many more millions after that, and then gave much of it away.
  • In his 1957 memoir, Baruch remembered his first meeting with Churchill over 40 years earlier ‘as though it had occurred yesterday’.
  • As well as being Churchill’s political eyes and ears in the USA, Baruch acted as his North American facilitator and unofficial financial advisor.
  • Churchill’s son Randolph suspected Baruch of putting surveillance on him while he was having a ‘flirtation’ with Baruch’s mistress.
  • Hard of hearing himself, Baruch gave Churchill a hearing aid, after Churchill’s supplier had been banned in case of Russian bugs.
  • Baruch’s father and daughter were leaders in their fields of public hygiene and equestrianism.
  • Baruch became known as the ‘park bench statesman’ for conducting discussions with politicians and any passers-by while sitting in a park near the White House.

Starting with very little, Baruch made his first million dollars by the age of thirty, many more millions after that, and then gave much of it away.

Baruch’s rapid success in the financial world was the result of several factors: his unusual ability with mental calculations; his careful study of the railroad network and commodity trading patterns; his dependability, geniality and imposing stature; and his mother’s early assistance. She found him his first two jobs in the stockbroking world, the first one with a stranger whom she met on a train.

He rose swiftly from office assistant to analyst to partner at Wall Street broker A. A. Housman (later Merrill Lynch and now Merrill). He bought a seat on the New York Stock Exchange and made a quick fortune from railroads and commodities, gaining the nickname the ‘Lone Wolf of Wall Street’ as an independent broker. Sometimes criticised for being a speculator, he pointed out that the word comes from the Latin speculari, meaning observe, and said that ‘[a] speculator is a man who observes the future, and acts before it occurs.’1

Churchill enjoyed retelling the story of one of Baruch’s early trades. He was speculating on a copper company and was about to sell when he received a message from his Jewish mother: ‘I hope you will observe the Day of Atonement’.2 He complied, deferred the trade and after the holiday discovered that the stock had skyrocketed. He sold at four times the price that he would have achieved, clearing US$700,000 (equivalent to US$22.1 million/£15.8 million today) at age 26.

Educational beneficiaries of Baruch’s later philanthropy included his alma mater, the College of the City of New York (class of 1889) which began as the Free Academy in 1847, the first US institution of higher education to accept students for no fee. Its business school became a separate institution, now called Baruch College, a flagship entity within the City University of New York. Baruch funded the medical speciality of ‘physiatry’ (physical medicine and rehabilitation) at various institutions, supporting the legacy of his physician father. He was also a key donor to Democrat coffers and contributed to numerous other projects that attracted his attention.

In his 1957 memoir, Baruch remembered his first meeting with Churchill over 40 years earlier ‘as though it had occurred yesterday’.3

Both were in Paris in 1918 during negotiations for the Treaty of Versailles, ending the war between Germany and the Allies. Baruch was ushered into Churchill’s hotel room, where Churchill was finishing dressing, and immediately began discussing the punitive nature of the treaty terms, to which both were personally opposed. Churchill turned from the mirror, where he was adjusting a tie, and said earnestly, ‘I was all for war when it was on. Now it is over, and I am all for peace.’4

They had already got to know each other well through numerous communications across the Atlantic while they were opposite numbers in munitions supply for the Allies. Baruch was proud of glowing praise from Churchill after the war who wrote that ‘It is my duty to record that no Ally could have been given more resolute understanding and broad-minded cooperation than the [UK] Ministry of Munitions received from the War Industries Board of the United States.’5

Baruch recalled that during the same visit to Paris, they were walking together in the Bois de Boulogne when Churchill raised his stick and pointed it towards the east, where the Russian Revolution had taken place the year before. ‘Russia, Russia,’ he growled. ‘That’s where the weather is coming from.’6

Baruch is sometimes credited with coining the term ‘Cold War’ in 1947. However, he was referring to US industrial relations and George Orwell had already used it twice in the context of confrontation between the Soviet Union and the West or Britain.* After Baruch’s speech, the term was popularised by others to apply to US-Soviet relations, particularly by Walter Lippmann in his book The Cold War (1947).

There are 12 recorded visits by Baruch to Churchill’s home, Chartwell in Kent, from 1926 to 1956. Their final meeting was on board Aristotle Onassis’s yacht Christina in 1961 on the Hudson River in New York during a huge storm, when Churchill was in his twilight years. There were eight foot waves on the Hudson but Baruch made it to the yacht on a police launch to see his friend one last time.

* Also, Don Juan Manuel, a thirteenth century writer, had referred to the coexistence of Islam and Christianity in medieval Spain as guerra fria (‘cold war’).

As well as being Churchill’s political eyes and ears in the USA, Baruch acted as his North American facilitator and unofficial financial advisor.

Baruch helped to organise Churchill’s three-month tour to Canada and the USA in 1929, arranging for him to meet various political, business and Hollywood dignitaries. They completed the last part of the journey together, between Chicago and New York, in Baruch’s private railcar.

Churchill’s final few days on that visit were somewhat traumatic. He had seen Baruch wheeling and dealing on the New York stockmarket and thought he would try it himself. Baruch introduced him to some brokers, including William Van Antwerp of the firm E.F. Hutton (now part of Morgan Stanley), through whom Churchill did a number of increasingly high value trades, initially making some healthy returns. In October 1929, stockmarket prices tumbled dramatically (‘the Great Crash’), and Churchill lost over US$75,000 (equivalent to US$1.1 million/£770,000 today). Baruch buffered Churchill by taking on some of his losses and by transferring at least one of his own wins.

On 29 October, ‘Black Thursday’, Baruch had more than forty bankers and financiers for dinner at his Fifth Avenue apartment in New York, with Churchill as guest of honour. One of them proposed Churchill’s good health, addressing the assembly as ‘Friends and former millionnaires’.7

Reciprocating Baruch’s hospitality, Churchill hosted him in the UK and introduced him to many of his UK friends. Together they went on travels through the English countryside to see Blenheim Palace, Oxford, Salisbury Plain and old battleships in Portsmouth.

Baruch was unwittingly associated with another Churchill disaster in 1931 when Churchill was crossing Fifth Avenue on his way to dinner with him and was run over by a car, ending up in hospital for eight days.

Baruch’s apartment contained many photos of Churchill and a Douglas Chandor portrait of him, purchased from the artist in 1946, the year it was painted. He paid US$25,000 (equivalent to US$335,000/£235,000 today), a record price at the time for a contemporary portrait. On his death, he gave it to the National Portrait Gallery in Washington where it remains. A Chandor portrait of Clementine is in the drawing room at Chartwell.

Randolph Churchill suspected Baruch of putting surveillance on him while he was having a ‘flirtation’ with Baruch’s mistress.

In March 1931, Clementine marked a section of a letter to Winston as ‘Private’. She said that ‘I think there is a froideur on Mr Baruch’s part towards Randolph, caused I imagine by the Rabbit [Randolph] having a flirtation with a lady whom Mr Baruch considers as his property – Randolph thinks Mr Baruch had them followed!! Anyway […] he [Baruch] complained to the Lady who reported the matter to Randolph […] I will tell you the rest when we meet, meanwhile please burn this portion of my letter’.8

Clementine does not name the Lady, but it seems to have been Clare Brokaw (née Boothe), later wife of Churchill’s friend Henry Luce, owner of Time-Life. Clementine continued that ‘Mr Baruch promised to meet us here & make our visit pleasant but he did not turn up – in fact he rather let us down – He is a curious old Boy rather revengeful – Randolph describes him in Yankee slang as a “cagey old Bird”.’9

Clare told her biographer that when she, Baruch and Randolph were all staying at Chartwell a few months later, she was in bed alone in the darkness when someone came into the room and tripped over the coal scuttle. She turned on the light and was surprised to see that it was Baruch; she had been expecting Randolph.

Only two weeks before Clementine’s letter about Baruch, she had written to Winston that Randolph was madly in love with an American woman called Kay Halle. Baruch assisted with a background check on her, with positive results, perhaps partly with the motivation of redirecting Randolph’s interest.

Ten years earlier, Baruch had become embroiled in another Churchill family matter. Clare Sheridan, Churchill’s cousin, had moved to New York to escape being shunned in the UK after mingling with Trotsky and other Bolsheviks in Russia. Baruch responded to Churchill’s request to assist but found her troublesome and overwhelming. The contact also led to speculation about an affair which he flatly denied.

Hard of hearing himself, Baruch gave Churchill a hearing aid, after Churchill’s supplier had been banned in case of Russian bugs.

Baruch’s hearing in his right ear was damaged from a baseball injury at college, ending his hopes of a military career, and it declined further in older age, together with the hearing in his other ear. He wore a prominent hearing aid before switching to a subtle device with microphones embedded in his glasses. He would often switch it off when he was tired, bored, or did not want to hear what was being said.

He empathised with Churchill’s increasing deafness from the early 1950s and gave him a device to use. Churchill wrote to Clementine while on holiday on the French Riviera in 1956 that ‘I am wearing Bernie’s hearing-aid every day when in company and I find it a great relief. It is complete and in perfect order and I think I shall get used to the habit of using it. I quite agree that it is a necessity.’10 However, he ended up disliking it, and very few photographs show him with any form of hearing assistance.

Churchill’s doctor Lord Moran first noticed his hearing loss during a telephone conversation in 1944. It became problematical during his 1951 election campaign but improved a little afterwards, suggesting fatigue as a temporary contributor. He had a hearing aid supplied by a company called Multitone but avoided wearing it. By 1955, he was often withdrawn from mealtime discussions.

Multitone invented the first adjustable volume hearing aid and was a pioneer of the pager/bleeper. It was founded in 1931 by Joseph Poliakoff, a Ukrainian telephone engineer who had fled Stalin’s Soviet Union to the UK in 1924. In 1953, the company’s Russian connections were deemed a security threat, including the possibility of its devices being used as surveillance bugs. Churchill’s Multitone hearing aid was banned, accompanied by a government tender for the ‘Provision of a hearing aid for Sir Winston Churchill’,11 kept confidential for 26 years. The replacement device did not impress Churchill and it was only Baruch’s friendship that prompted him to make an effort, although short-lived, with an alternative.

Baruch’s father and daughter were leaders in their fields of public hygiene and equestrianism.

Baruch’s father Simon arrived in South Carolina in 1855 at age 15 from Prussian Poland. He trained in medicine and became a Confederate field surgeon in the Civil War, treating the wounded at Gettysburg and elsewhere. He became increasingly interested in hygiene, hydrotherapy and balneotherapy (bathing in mineral waters or mineral-rich mud). He was impressed by the public bath system in Germany during a visit in the 1880s, believing a similar approach could help prevent cholera and typhoid in poor, cramped communities in New York city.

He campaigned for the construction of free public facilities, against opposition because of the cost and a disbelief that people would want to wash. Between 1901 and 1914, New York opened fourteen bath houses which were used extensively. Looking back, he said that ‘I consider that I have done more to save life and prevent the spread of disease in my work for public baths than in all my work as a physician.’12

Bernard Baruch’s daughter, Belle, won over 50 sailing trophies by the age of 17 but made her name in the equestrian world, winning over 300 prizes internationally. In 1931, she competed against cavalry officers and professional riders in France, after which she sent a telegram to her parents: ‘One hundred nineteen entries Coup de Paris Trophy given by President of Republic. Stop. Souriant and I won being only perfect performance. Stop. Very happy. Love.’13

Baruch was keen on horses himself, owning a racing stable called Kershaw. The annual Bernard Baruch Handicap in Saratoga, New York, is named in his honour. Churchill also owned racehorses, but not until much later than Baruch.

During World War I, Belle was a Morse code instructor and worked with the Red Cross, developing a lifelong commitment to physical rehabilitation, partly inspired by her grandfather. After arthritis ended her horse riding, she gained a new pleasure in flying.

Her father bought Hobcaw Barony, a 16,000 acre (65 square kilometre) former rice plantation on the South Carolina coast which he used as a hunting retreat with his friends, including Churchill. Belle bought it in parcels from him and founded a conservation reserve. Today it is a research and education facility incorporating two university institutes studying coastal ecology, forest science and marine biology.

Baruch became known as the ‘park bench statesman’ for conducting discussions with politicians and any passers-by while sitting in a park near the White House.

Baruch was an advisor to various presidents, members of Congress and other government officials, although the role was difficult to define. American satirist Dorothy Parker said there were two things she could never figure out: the theory of the zipper and the precise function of Bernard Baruch. Baruch told a confidant, ‘They call me the “Adviser to seven Presidents”, almost none of whom ever took my advice.’14

Baruch would often sit on a bench in Lafayette Park, near the White House, sometimes in contemplation and at other times in discussion. Politicians or officials wanting some fresh air and debate would meet him at his bench, effectively his outdoor office. Baruch would also engage with anyone else who wanted to chat. He became well known for this habit and a commemorative bench was installed in the park in 1960 in honour of his 90th birthday.

When in New York, he would often sit in Central Park. There is a life-sized bronze statue of him on a bench in the lobby of Baruch College, New York. A similar life-sized statue on a bench is in Murrells Inlet, South Carolina, near Hobcaw Barony.

Sharon Amgott, aged three, was in Central Park in the late 1940s with her parents and elder sister. She wandered away, prancing back nonchalantly to her distraught parents after twenty minutes. They could not establish where she had been. Seventeen years later, they saw an announcement of Baruch’s death on television and the mystery was solved. On the screen was some archive footage of Baruch on his Central Park bench, chatting with Sharon.

Baruch recommended his routine to others: ‘In this hectic Age of Distraction, all of us need to pause every now and then in what we are doing to examine where the rush of the world and of our own activities is taking us. Even an hour or two spent in such detached contemplation on a park bench will prove rewarding.’15

3. Biographical summary

OccupationFinancier, political adviser, philanthropist
CountryUSA
CareerBroker (1891) then partner in A.A. Housman (later part of Merrill Lynch, now Merrill). Bought a New York Stock Exchange seat (1903) and formed his own investment company. Chairman, War Industries Board (1918). Presidential and government advisor (1916 to late 1940s), particularly to Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Philanthropist and thoroughbred racehorse owner.
Born1870 in Camden, South Carolina (four years younger than Churchill)
FatherSimon Baruch (1840-1921), physician, scholar, pioneer of hydrotherapy and free public baths in the USA
MotherIsabelle ‘Belle’ Wolfe (1850-1921), daughter of a cotton farmer
SiblingsSecond of four brothers:
1. Hartwig ‘Harty’ (Nathaniel) (1868-1953), actor, stockbroker
2. Bernard Mannes (1870-1965)
3. Herman (1872-1953), physician, ambassador to Portugal 1945-47 and Netherlands 1947-49
4. Sailing (1874-1962), banker, stockbroker
EducationCollege of the City of New York
SpouseAnnie Griffen (1872-1938), Episcopalian, m. 1897 until her death
RelationshipsVarious, including Clare Luce (wife of Henry Luce)
Children1. Belle (1899-1964), equestrian, charity worker, predeceased her father
2. Bernard Jr (1902-92), stockbroker, captain in navy reserve
3. Baby son (1903-03); died in infancy
4. Renee (1905-94), married Robert Samstag, banker
Died1965 in Manhattan, New York, aged 94 (five months after Churchill)
BuriedFlushing Cemetery, Queens, New York
ChartwellVisitors’ book: 12 recorded visits (1926-56)
Other ClubNo
NicknameBernie/Barney (Churchill); The Lonely Wolf of Wall Street; Grandfather of the Modern War Economy; The Park Bench Statesman
Height6’5” (1.96 m)

4. See also

Churchill’s finances

  • Bracken, Brendan
  • Camrose, Lord
  • Korda, Alexander

Churchill’s Jewish friends

  • Halle, Kay
  • Korda, Alexander
  • Reves, Emery
  • Sassoon, Philip

Churchill controversies

  • Financial affairs

5. Further reading

Bernard Baruch

  • Baruch, Bernard M., Baruch: My Own Story (Holt, 1957)
  • Baruch, Bernard M., Baruch: The Public Years (Holt, 1957)
  • Grant, James L., Bernard M. Baruch: The Adventures of a Wall Street Legend (John Wiley & Sons, 1997)

Baruch and Churchill

Baruch’s family

  • Miller, Mary E., Baroness of Hobcaw: The Life of Belle W. Baruch (University of South Carolina Press, 2012)
  • Ward, Patricia Spain, Simon Baruch: Rebel in the Ranks of Medicine, 1840-1921 (University of Alabama Press, 2014)

Churchill’s North American travels

  • Churchill, Winston S., ‘My New York Misadventure’, The International Churchill Society, 1932 (vehicle accident)
  • Tolppanen, Bradley, Churchill in North America, 1929: A Three Month Tour of Canada and the United States (McFarland, Incorporated, Publishers, 2014)

Clare Luce

  • Morris, Sylvia Dukes, Rage for Fame: The Ascent of Clare Boothe Luce (Random House, 2013)

6. References

1. Bernard Baruch, The Public Years (Holt, 1957), p. 31.

2. Bradley Tolppanen, ‘Great Contemporaries: Bernard Baruch’, The Churchill Project – Hillsdale College, 2016.

3. Baruch, The Public Years, p. 122.

4. Baruch, The Public Years, p. 71.

5. Baruch, The Public Years, p. 122.

6. Baruch, The Public Years, p. 112.

7. Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill: Volume 5: The Prophet of Truth, 1922-1939 (Houghton Mifflin, 1966), p. 350.

8. Winston S. Churchill and Clementine Churchill, Speaking for Themselves: The Personal Letters of Winston and Clementine Churchill, ed. by Mary Soames (Black Swan, 1999), p. 355.

9. Churchill and Churchill, p. 355.

10. Churchill and Churchill, p. 612.

11. Wayne Staab, ‘Churchill’s Hearing Loss’, Wayne’s World, 2014.

12. James Grant, Bernard M. Baruch: The Adventures of a Wall Street Legend (John Wiley & Sons, 1997), p. 11.

13. Mary E. Miller, Baroness of Hobcaw: The Life of Belle W. Baruch (University of South Carolina Press, 2012), p. [000].

14. Helen Lawrenson, ‘Bernard Baruch Was as Constant as the Northern Star’, Esquire, 1973.

15. Bernard Baruch, My Own Story (Holt, 1957), p. 267.