Mark Batshaw says his father was someone who when he saw something that needed fixing “had to fix it.”
Indeed, Manuel (Manny) Batshaw, who died July 18 at the age of 101, was an ardent social activist whose inquiry into conditions at juvenile institutions forever altered the landscape of youth care in Quebec.
A respected social worker and a pillar of the Montreal Jewish community, Batshaw was born in the city in 1915, the fourth and youngest child, to Jewish parents from Russia who had emigrated several years before his birth.
After studying social work at McGill University, Batshaw worked with shell-shocked soldiers sent home from fighting in World War II.
As a caseworker at the Baron De Hirsch Institute, the Jewish social services hub in Montreal, Batshaw met Mark’s mother, Rachel Levitt, a hospital social worker, while accompanying a client to the Jewish General Hospital.
They married in 1940 and Mark was born in 1945.
READ: REVERED COMMUNITY LEADER BATSHAW TURNS 100
In the years that followed, Batshaw worked his way up the ranks in the Jewish community service world.
From 1940 until 1968, Batshaw held the jobs of national field director for Young Judaea, settlement worker at Jane Adams House in Philadelphia, director of the Young Men’s Hebrew Association (YMHA) in Hamilton, Ont., executive director of the YMHA in Newark, N.J., and vice-president for research at the Jewish Welfare Board in New York City.
By the late 1960s, Batshaw had moved his family back to Montreal to take on the job of executive vice-president of Allied Jewish Community Services (AJCS), the forerunner of Federation CJA.
From 1968 to 1980, with Batshaw at the helm of AJCS, the Montreal Jewish community saw a number of changes, including the merging of Jewish agencies, the creation of Jewish Family Services, the opening of the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre and a large increase in funds raised by the Combined Jewish Appeal.
In 1975, the Quebec government asked Batshaw to investigate abuses in the province’s child detention system.
He formed the Batshaw Commission, a committee that submitted an 11-volume report featuring sweeping recommendations to reform the system.
It stressed improved treatment of youth, better training for child-care workers, that children not languish in institutions, and that rehabilitation, education and supports be emphasized for at-risk youth.
“We all know now that that’s the right way to do things, but 40 years ago, this was innovative,” said Batshaw’s son Mark, executive vice-president and physician-in-chief at the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C.
In 1992, Montreal’s Batshaw Youth and Family Centres, an amalgamation of several child welfare agencies, was named in his honour.
“Staff felt comforted knowing he’d be involved,” said Judy Martin, past president of the Batshaw Youth and Family Centres’ board of directors, who worked closely with Batshaw.
“He was a great mentor to many staff, who would call and ask his opinions about things… He’d encourage them to do research on best practices for youth protection… he was a huge advocate of staff having funds available to do research,” she added.
He was known for taking time to visit children in the centres.
“I found it most special to watch him talk to the children. Their eyes would light up,” Martin said.
Batshaw’s sense of compassion and commitment to helping others appears to be connected to struggles he had as a child.
He had a learning disability that made reading extremely difficult and didn’t initially have the grades to attend McGill, Mark said.
After completing two years at Queen’s University, Batshaw was able to transfer to McGill and get his BA. He subsequently earned the equivalent of what is today a master’s in social work.
“He knew he had to work harder than anyone else in order to achieve, and he was very open to people who had various disabilities,” Mark said.
Following his tenure at AJCS, Batshaw became an adviser on philanthropy and Jewish community affairs to prominent businessman and philanthropist Charles Bronfman.
“He was really interested in the Montreal Jewish community. It was hectic times [in the mid-1970s], with the [election of the separatist Parti Québécois] and the government changes, and he was a pillar of strength… I think he saw himself as the guardian of the Montreal Jewish community. There was a pretty good outflow of people from Montreal to Toronto, and Manny did everything he could to keep people here,” Bronfman said, adding that Batshaw was also passionate about Israel.
Batshaw worked with Bronfman until 1998, when he got a job fundraising at Mount Sinai Hospital, a position he held until his retirement at age 92.
Levitt died in 1989, and in 1990, Batshaw married Ruth Schlein, who passed away in 2006.
In addition to his son Mark, Batshaw leaves behind two stepchildren, six grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.
