Lewis, Samuel Alexander
LEWIS, SAMUEL ALEXANDER
LEWIS, SAMUEL ALEXANDER (1831–1913), U.S. politician and philanthropist. Lewis was born in London, but at the age of six months was brought to the United States. He first devoted himself to business and was so successful that he was able to retire in 1862 and thereafter devoted himself to public life, his first appointment being as school commissioner of New York, of what were then the Ninth and Sixteenth wards, in 1868. In 1874 he was elected alderman-at-large and later, in the same year, president of the aldermanic board, and was reelected in 1876. During this period he served as acting mayor of New York City for six months. In 1877 he declined an invitation to accept nomination as mayor on the Democratic ticket.
Lewis was one of the founders of the Jews' Hospital of New York (now Mt. Sinai Hospital).