Lasker Home for Homeless Children

Architecturally, The Lasker Home for Children is an important example of urban Greek Revival architecture comparable to other noted Greek Revival buildings in Galveston. As a place of refuge for children since 1901, it still serves as a non-sectarian institution providing care, instruction, education, and maintenance for minority-age children. Organized as The Society for the Help of Homeless Children, the name of the Home was changed to The Lasker Home for Homeless Children in appreciation of the help given by Morris Lasker, a Galveston merchant, banker, and philanthropist. Many citizens of the city have contributed time, effort, and money to the support of the home since its inception. Because of its age, scale, and function, it has been a Galveston landmark for over a hundred years.

The first owner of the property was Judge John L. Darragh (Darrough), who bought it with other property from the Galveston City Company in 1860. Tax records show the value of the lots as $800 from 1861 to 1868, with no mention of improvements. Judge Darragh was a prominent pioneer merchant who came to Galveston from Philadelphia in 1843. He was president of the Galveston City Company, the National Bank of Texas, and the Wharf Company. In 1868, he sold the property to Marcus C. McLemore. In 1889 he was declared insane by the court and left Galveston to live in the east, where he died in 1892.

Marcus C. McLemore was a Galveston lawyer practicing in partnership with F. Charles Hume in 1870. In 1882 he is listed in the Galveston City Directory as having an office with A.R. Campbell, attorney, at 77 Strand. He was Court Recorder for Galveston County for many years before his death in 1898. McLemore came to Texas from South Carolina. Tax returns for 1868 show that he paid taxes on property in Galveston valued at $15,700, not including lots 8 and 9 in Block 136, which represent the present structure. In 1870 he did pay taxes on this property valued at $8,000 with improvements. McLemore died without a will and research could find no obituary or other death notice. Laura is listed as a widow in the Galveston City Directory of 1899, and not at all after 1901. Their son, Marcus McLemore, became United States District Attorney, Eastern District of Texas, in 1899.

J.C. League bought the property at a sheriff's sale in 1900, before the hurricane of September 8th. He was the son of Thomas Jefferson League, who had built the T. Jeff League Building on the Strand, now restored. League's wife Mary was the daughter of Samuel May Williams, one of the founders of the city of Galveston. J.C. League was an attorney and managed his family's large estate. In 1901 he sold the present property to the Society for the Help of Homeless Children.

In 1894, six Galveston women, all with a common concern for helpless children, met and organized and incorporated the Society for Friendless Children, with the intention of providing a home for children regardless of race, color, or religion. The original incorporators were locally prominent citizens: Mrs. F.B. Nichols, Mrs. Rebecca Hayes, Mrs. Hunter Griffin, Mrs. W.H. Stewart, Mrs. Mary Burns, and Mrs. Mary B. Nichols. Prior to the 1900 hurricane, the members of the Society managed to maintain their homes without endowments or regular sources of income. The 1900 storm was devastating. The building being used at 29th and Winnie was destroyed, and many of the children were killed. With the help of the city and county government, the McLemore residence was bought in 1901 so that the Home could continue to provide shelter.

The classification of children in the Home was class 1, children whose board was fully paid; class 2, children of widows (these women generally paid the home for their child's care but on occasion could not); class 3, children who had no father or mother and who were destitute. The Home for Homeless Children was the only city institution that would accept children whose mothers did not have a marriage certificate.

In 1908, a unique means of raising money was begun. A special board meeting, chaired by Miss Rebecca Ashton Brown, established an annual tag day for the children of the city. Miss Brown is better known as "Bettie" Brown, a daughter of James M. Brown, the builder of Ashton Villa (National Register), which is now a house museum operated by the Galveston Historical Foundation. Tag Day was successful and was repeated for several years. By 1910, however, it was evident that major repairs had to be made to the building, and on November 17, 1911, Morris Lasker, a prominent Galveston businessman, donated $10,000 to the Home for renovation.

Morris Lasker was born on February 19, 1840, in Lansk, Germany. His parents were Daniel and Rebecca Lasker. His mother died when he was 18 months old, and his father when he was 12. An orphan himself, he attended school until he was 15 and at the age of 16 emigrated to America on a sailing ship that was expected to make port in New York. Instead, 13 weeks after leaving Hamburg the ship arrived at Fortress Monroe, Virginia, detoured by storms. After working in Virginia, New York, Florida, and Georgia, Lasker came to Texas in 1860 and settled in Weatherford. To get to Texas he bought a horse and became a peddler, arriving in Texas with nothing more than a knowledge of three things: Latin, Greek and peddling. During the Civil War, he joined the Confederate army and fought in the battles of Galveston and Sabine Pass. After the war, he became a partner in the firm of Marx & Kempner, a wholesale grocery firm at Galveston. A year later he left Marx & Kempner to go into business with Louis Le Gierse. Le Gierse & Co. became one of the most successful grocery businesses in the city. In 1876, Lasker married Nettie Davis of Albany, New York, a niece of the prominent Heidenheimer brothers of Galveston. There were seven children.

In 1895, Morris Lasker was elected to fill an unexpired term in the Texas Senate. There he introduced bills regulating fish and oyster culture in the state, and the Drainage Bill. He was president of the Island City Savings Bank, vice president of the First National Bank, president of the Lasker Real Estate Association, president of the Citizens' Loan Company, and director of the Texas Star Flour Mills. His son Albert Lasker, the best-known of Morris and Nettie's children, is often called the father of modern advertising. John Gunther, in his book on the life of Albert, Taken at the Flood (1960), states that Morris was an extremely good citizen, far in advance of his time. His mill was the second in the United States to install an eight-hour day for labor. Morris Lasker died in 1916 at the age of 76 at his home in Galveston.

The Lasker's own home at 18th and Broadway was designed by Galveston architect Nicholas J. Clayton. It was demolished in 1967, leaving the Lasker Home for Children as the only surviving link with Morris Lasker and his philanthropies in Galveston. It has served the Galveston community in the same structure continuously for over eighty years, and still functions as a children's home. No major additions have occurred in the last sixty years, and the structure retains its historic character to an unusual degree.