Warburg

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Felix M. Warburg

Bettmann/Corbis

Warburg, a family whose members were eminent in banking, philanthropy, and scholarship.

Presumably of Italian origin, they settled in the German town of Warburgum (from which the family derived its name) in 1559. Subsequently, branches settled in Scandinavia, England, and the United States. Simon Elias Warburg (1760–1828) founded the first Jewish community in Sweden; his grandson Frederik Elias Warburg (1832–99) was the cofounder of the Central London Electric Railway. The Copenhagen branch assumed the family’s original name, Del Banco.

Moses Marcus Warburg (d. 1830) and his brother Gerson (d. 1825) founded in 1798 the bank of M.M. Warburg & Co. of Hamburg. Among their descendants were five brothers, grandsons of Moses M., of whom four were bankers: Max M. Warburg (1867–1946), financial adviser to the German delegation to the Paris peace conference in 1919; Paul Moritz Warburg (1868–1932), member of the U.S. bank of Kuhn, Loeb and Co. and of the Federal Reserve Board; Felix Moritz Warburg (1871–1937), partner in Kuhn, Loeb and Co.; and Fritz Moritz Warburg (1879–1964). Felix M. was a supporter of adult education and Jewish theological schools and was active in other philanthropic organizations. James Paul Warburg (1896–1969), son of Paul M., was a banker and economist, member of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s original “brain trust,” and author of several books.

Among the scholars were Emil Warburg (1846–1931), a physicist; Karl Johan Warburg (1852–1918), a Swedish historian of literature and member of Parliament; Otto Warburg (1859–1938), a botanist and supporter of Jewish colonization and agricultural work in Palestine; Aby Moritz Warburg (1866–1929; brother of the four banker-brothers named previously), a historian of Renaissance art; and Otto Heinrich Warburg (q.v.; son of Emil).

Among those active in social and community service were Frieda Schiff (Mrs Felix M.) Warburg (1876–1958) and her sons Frederick Marcus Warburg (1897–1973), investment banker and president of the 92nd Street Young Men’s Hebrew Association in New York City; Gerald Felix Warburg (1902–71), prominent cellist and patron of music; Paul Felix Warburg (1904–65), financier and philanthropist; and Edward Mortimer Morris Warburg (1908–92), a philanthropist and patron of modern art, as well as a collector.