Remembering Edward ‘Eddie’ Fox

Edward A. Fox and Sherry, his wife of 57 years, had always ingrained in their daughters the importance of giving to JUF.

“You reap what you sow,” Fox once said. “[My daughters] grew up in a house where from the time they were toddlers, JUF and the Federation were at the forefront of the dinner table conversation.”

Fox, who worked tirelessly on behalf of the Chicago Jewish community for decades–including leading the JUF Board–died at his home in Delray Beach, Fla. on Sept. 26. He was 81.

Professionally, Fox founded and co-owned Parkway Drugs–the last chain of independent drugstores in the Chicago area–and he also managed outpatient pharmacies for Mt. Sinai Hospital. A graduate of the St. Louis College of Pharmacy, he was a registered pharmacist from 1964 until retiring in 2020.

Even with his demanding career, Fox, originally from Rogers Park, dedicated himself to the Jewish community. He served as JUF’s Chair and President of the Board from 1993 to 1995. He also chaired its Jewish Community Relations Council and many key committees and fundraising divisions.

His JUF accolades started with the Young Leadership Award in 1980, and culminated with the Julius Rosenwald Memorial Award, JUF’s highest honor, in 2006. Two years later, he was inducted into the JCC Hall of Fame.

Fox was famous in Jewish circles for his “card calling” ability–announcing one’s gift at fundraising events. As he told Sherry, “I’m asking for those who don’t have a voice to ask for themselves.”

Dr. Steven B. Nasatir, now JUF’s Executive Vice Chairman, was JUF President when Fox helmed the Board. “Over five decades, my dear friend Eddie dedicated his waking hours to the betterment of his Chicago Jewish community,” Nasatir said. “When I think, ‘proud American Jew and great lover of Israel,’ I will always think of Edward A. Fox.”

Fox also served on the board of the Jewish Federations of North America and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. He visited refuseniks in the Soviet Union and, in 1996, he and Sherry led the second JUF mission to Cuba.

“He felt a tremendous Jewish responsibility,” Sherry said. “If he thought to do something for the community, or was asked to do it, he did it. It was not a burden to be asked, but an honor.”

Fox, passionate about educating people on lessons of the Holocaust, received the Holocaust Foundation Humanitarian Award in 1998. With now-Governor J.B. Pritzker, he guided the Holocaust Memorial Foundation of Illinois from a storefront to the current Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center. Fox was the only member of its board who was not a survivor; “I have to speak for them,” he said. “No one spoke for them before.”

Fox was also deeply committed to Israel. He visited the Jewish State more than two dozen times with JUF and co-led JUF Missions with Sherry. His family spent a summer in Haifa in 1982, during the Lebanon War. He witnessed the 1994 signing of the Israel-Jordan peace accords in Washington, D.C.

Then, in 1995, when Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, Fox–JUF Board Chair at the time–spearheaded the community’s memorial service two days later. “I really loved Rabin,” said Fox, who had met Rabin on two occasions. “[Rabin’s death] was one of the saddest days, yet it led to one of the proudest moments that I ever had at this Federation.”

It was Israel that initially inspired Fox to get involved in JUF. “1973 is when I first made my first gift to JUF, during the Yom Kippur War,” he recalled. Sherry said this gift was “the most important step of his life.”

Fox said how meaningful it was for him to be honored with the Rosenwald Award. “Those others that had won were my heroes, and to have been included was very special [for me and] my family,” he said. “Hopefully, that will remain… something my daughters will pass along to my grandsons when I’m no longer here. When they come into the Federation building, and they show them my name [engraved] on the wall–that was Papa.”

Fox was husband to Sherry, his wife of 57 years, and father to daughters Donna (Matt) Goodhart and Julie (Stewart Booden). He is also survived by his grandsons, Hayden Meir Goodhart and Trevor Dylan Goodhart, his treasured brother and sister-in-law Mickey and Ingrid Kuper, and his sister Leslie Sadovi, as well as his nieces Kira (Larry) Zahn and Adina (Jason) Chirogianis, his great-nephews and great-niece, cousins, and friends.

Services were held in September in Delray Beach, Fla., with interment at Eternal Light Memorial Gardens. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the JUF Edward A. Fox Memorial Fund c/o JUF. Eddie and Sherry are Golden Givers to the JUF Annual Campaign.