Table of Contents
Life Highlights

  • 1851 Born in Alzey, Germany, the son of a rabbi.
  • 1857 Adler's father moves the family to New York as he becomes the rabbi of Temple Emanu-El.
  • 1870 Adler receives A. B. from Columbia, and goes to Germany for further study but decides not to prepare for the rabbinate.
  • 1874 Adler teaches Hebrew and Oriental languages at Cornell University for two years before his "dangerous attitudes" prompt his departure.
  • 1876 Adler founds the New York Society of Ethical Culture at the age of 24.
  • 1878 Adler opens a free kindergarten to children of the working poor in New York and San Francisco.
  • 1877 Adler publishes first book, Creed and Deed.
  • 1902 Adler is appointed Professor of Political and Social Ethics at Columbia University.
  • 1904 Adler becomes first chairman of the National Child Labor Committee.
  • 1917 Adler and other colleagues serve on the Civil Liberties Bureau which later becomes the American Civil Liberties Bureau.
  • 1928 Adler named president of the Eastern division of the American Philosophical Association.
  • 1933 Adler dies at the age of 81.