LEVITT

LEVITT , U.S. family of builders and philanthropists. abraham levitt (1880–1962), born in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Polish immigrants, was a real-estate lawyer for 27 years. In 1929 he founded the building firm Levitt and Sons, Inc., which pioneered in community planning, assembly-line techniques, and mass production. In the late 1940s the firm built three whole communities, all called Levittown, in Long Island, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. The family established the Levitt Foundation, Inc., to provide scholarships and donate funds to medical and welfare funds in 1949. Levitt was president of the Founders Society of the Albert Einstein Medical College at Yeshiva University and chairman of several fund drives for the uja. His son william jaird levitt (1907–1994), born in Brooklyn, was president of the family firm; shortly after its merger with International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation, he became chairman of the board of Levitt and Sons, Inc., and also of Levittown. During his presidency the firm began building houses in Europe. Levitt engaged in extensive civic and charitable activities. In 1973, together with Meshulam *Riklis, Levitt was appointed general chairman of a combined campaign of the United Jewish Appeal of Greater New York and the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies. Their aim was to raise $280,000,000, of which $30 million would be devoted to health, education, and social service projects in New York, and the balance to the emergency fund for Israel. This target was greatly increased after the Yom Kippur War. A younger son of Abraham Levitt was alfred s. levitt (1912–1966). He was associated with his father as vice president of Levitt and Sons, until 1954, when he organized his own firm, Levitt House Inc., based in Queens, New York. His sons john and andrew took it over in 1959. William Levitt sold Levitt & Sons to International Telephone and Telegraph in 1968. Levitt was one of the wealthiest men in America in the late 1960s; but by the time he retired in the late 1980s, he had lost most of his amassed wealth as a result of unsuccessful real estate endeavors.

add. bibliography:

H. Gans, The Levittowners: Ways of Life and Politics in a New Suburban Community (1967).