Obituary: Dr. Yosef Walder, 73, Humble Philanthropist

chabad.org

Attempting to write an obituary for Dr. Yosef (Joseph) Walder is like trying to take several separate biographies and synthesize them into a single one.

He was a brilliant scientist who revolutionized his field. He was a visionary businessman who built a multibillion-dollar company—synthesizing DNA sequences—out of a few dozen rickety machines. He was a committed and modest Jew who embraced a Torah lifestyle with simplicity and grace. He was an inspired philanthropist who had a passion for education and empowering others. And most of all, he was a genuinely kind person, whose largess extended to individuals with special needs, children from challenging backgrounds and anyone else who found a place in the Walder home.

And yet, these strands come together remarkably well to form a tapestry of the lifework of a man, whose brilliance, kindness and care were as legendary as they were hidden.

Born to Martin and Gertrude Walder in 1951 in Philadelphia, Joseph Walder grew up in Morton Grove, north of Chicago. As a child, he was enamored with chemistry and his father fueled this passion by building him a chemistry lab in the basement—an entire room with a Bunsen burner, sink and vials of chemicals. He graduated from medical school in 1975 and then received his Ph.D. in 1978, all at Northwestern University.

Taking a professorship at the University of Iowa in 1978, he worked to develop anti-sickling compounds and hemoglobin derivative blood substitutes, cloning of restriction-modification systems and developing modified nucleic acids as anti-sense reagents.

In the course of his work, he would often find the need for oligos—short synthetic strands of DNA or RNA—which many universities would produce on large, slow, cranky machinery.

Sensing an opportunity, he cut deals with many universities, who gladly gave their machines to his newly-formed company, Integrated DNA Technologies (IDT), in exchange for credit towards on-demand oligos.

Before long, IDT emerged as the leading supplier of oligos in a rapidly expanding field.

Not an Ordinary Scientist

Living in Iowa City, he immersed himself in science and other pursuits.

Then, following the passing of his father in 1993, he felt the need for a Jewish connection. Through his sister, he was introduced to rabbis of Lubavitch Chabad of Skokie and the Skokie Community Kollel, who introduced him to the rich and fulfilling world of Judaism.

“Within months, he was moving very rapidly,” said Rabbi Yosef Posner, director of Lubavitch Chabad of Skokie and president of the Chicago Rabbinical Council (cRc). “I told him that it would make sense to slow down. He told me he knew what he was doing—and he did!”

Soon Walder had adopted a full Jewish lifestyle and relocated to Skokie to immerse himself further in Jewish life. In Skokie, he soon opened a satellite office in some unused space in Skokie Chabad.

Not long after, he married Elizabeth (Shira Malka) Mallor, an immigration attorney, who would become a partner in his every endeavor.

With a keen sense of opportunity, he was quick to find jobs for people in need, as well as finding the right people to fill his company’s needs. For example, an immigrant taxi driver who once gave him a ride in New York was the perfect candidate to maintain and fix his burgeoning collection of oligo-generating machines, and dozens of members of the Chicago Jewish community found work as executives in the rapidly expanding enterprise.

As the company outgrew the Chabad House, it moved into its own space. But Walder made sure to take the Chabad House along. The new office was outfitted with a synagogue, where daily prayers, Torah classes and regular events could take place.

A Firm Believer in Divine Intervention

As his assets grew, so did his philanthropy. In fact, often the philanthropic pledges preceded the business growth, each given with the optimistic expectation that G‑d would provide the means for them to be filled.

Given his knack for strategic investing, he often supported projects that he saw having broad, far-reaching effects, such as the early-childhood programs of the Shluchim Office, which he knew would empower thousands of emissaries around the globe, or Torah Umesorah’s Walder Education Pavilion, whose materials are in virtually every Jewish classroom in North America and beyond.

And in Chicago itself, he changed the model of day-school funding with the Kehillah Fund, which distributes funds to all Jewish day schools, and introduced STEM to classrooms and homes through the Walder Science Center.

Yet there was plenty of spontaneous giving as well. When a Chabad emissary couple in the American West was $10,000 short of attaining their all-or-nothing matching goal for a new mikvah—the only one in their entire state—he gladly cut a check and helped them over the finish line with just minutes to spare.

A firm believer in Divine intervention, he saw every change in circumstance as an opportunity to do good. G‑d gifted him with a company so he could distribute charity. Since IDT was based in Iowa, he made sure to found Lubavitch of Iowa City in 2002.

At one point, there was talk of doing business in Tbilisi, Georgia. The opportunity never materialized, but he took it as a sign that there was something for him to do in that city, so he sent a handsome donation to the Chabad emissaries in the city to support their work there.

For decades, no one knew the full extent of his largess since he distributed funds through several people, none of whom was aware of what the other was doing.

Posner recalls once meeting Walder and asking him to write about two dozen checks for pledges that were due. As he and his vice president of finance—both very busy people—sat and wrote out check after check, Posner wondered to himself if a single check could be written to a designated fund, which would allow others to then take care of the paperwork. Suddenly, Walder looked up with a grin and said, “This is so much fun!”

Rabbi Meir S. Moscowitz, regional director of Lubavitch Chabad of Illinois, recalls meeting him to ask for help during a difficult time. “He asked me to describe all the expenses we expected and then told me, ‘You probably forgot something, so take an extra 30%.’ ”

At times, his charitable giving reflected his personal giving and vice versa. For example, the kitchen in the new under-construction Bais Menachem Chabad House blocks from the Walder home is dedicated to honor a man with cognitive differences who frequently enjoyed kiddush at the synagogue and many meals at the Walder Home.

And in 2016, they dedicated the Lubavitch Mesivta of Chicago in memory of Eliyahu Neeman, an orphan whom the Walders had taken into their home as a child and who tragically passed away shortly after the birth of his first child.

Humble and Accessible Until the End

As the decades passed, IDT’s output grew exponentially as did the sophistication of their product. Always a researcher, Walder held more than 50 patents for his pioneering breakthrough technologies.

Indeed, IDT’s primer and probe testing kit—a key component of the PCR test for COVID-19—was the first to be approved by the CDC.

Yet Walder remained as humble and accessible as ever.

When he was home—and he was often away—he could be found serving food to an assortment of people in need of a meal, the same people for whom he would defer business meetings so he could give them rides to doctor’s appointments in his trusty Buick.

And despite it all, he applied the same focus that had propelled him to the heights of scientific discovery and business success to Torah study, carefully paying attention to the words of prayer and the Torah he learned.

In 2018, IDT was acquired by Danaher Corporation and the Walders finally had enough liquid cash to finance even larger and more ambitious projects than ever before, but ill health prevented him from fully indulging the pleasure of writing checks and strategizing how he could do even more good and improve even more lives.

Dr. Yosef Walder passed away after a lengthy illness on Mar 26, 2024 (16 Adar II). In addition to his wife, he is survived by his children: Moshe Chaim Walder, Kathryn Walder Christensen, and Mordechai Avraham Walder.