Isidor Straus

Representative from New York; born in Otterberg, Rhenish Bavaria, Germany, February 6, 1845; immigrated to the United States in 1854 and settled in Talbotton, Ga.; attended Collinsworth Institute; moved to New York City in 1865 and engaged in mercantile pursuits and later became owner of R.H. Macy and Company; elected as a Democrat to the Fifty-third Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Ashbel P. Fitch and served from January 30, 1894, to March 3, 1895; was not a candidate for reelection in 1894 to the Fifty-fourth Congress; resumed the mercantile business in New York City; member of the New York and New Jersey Bridge Commission; perished in the wreck of the steamship Titanic on April 15, 1912; the body was subsequently recovered and interred in the family vault in Beth-El Cemetery, Fresh Pond Road, Brooklyn, N.Y.