Background
Sarah Bavly was born to Nathan and Lina-Leah Bavly on October 18, 1900, in Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands. She was the youngest of five children in a religious Jewish family.
Sarah Bavly
Amsterdam, Netherlands
University of Amsterdam
New York, United States
Library of Columbia University
Ministry of Education Emblem
Kalman Ya'akov Man St, Jerusalem, Israel
Hadassah Medical Center
Amsterdam, Netherlands
University of Amsterdam
New York, United States
Library of Columbia University
Kalman Ya'akov Man St, Jerusalem, Israel
Hadassah Medical Center
Ministry of Education Emblem
Sarah Bavly was born to Nathan and Lina-Leah Bavly on October 18, 1900, in Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, Netherlands. She was the youngest of five children in a religious Jewish family.
Sarah Bavly received her Master of Science in chemistry at the University of Amsterdam in 1925. On the recommendation of a friend who had already made aliyah, she spent the following year acquiring specialized training in nutrition and economics in order to bring useful work skills to Palestine.
Her first position in Palestine was as a teacher of nutrition and chemistry at a WIZO school in Nahalal, where she taught young women in their twenties. In April 1927 Sarah Bavly left the moshav for a position as a dietitian at the Hadassah hospital in Tel Aviv. Shortly afterward, she was engaged as a teacher of nutrition and dietetics at the Hadassah Nursing School in Jerusalem, becoming the first educator in the country to teach these subjects.
In 1928 Sarah Bavly was offered the position of a chief dietitian for all five Hadassah hospitals in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa, Safed, and Tiberias, including the set-up and managing of dietary departments at each location. Before assuming this post, she was sent abroad by the Hadassah directorship for a study year abroad.
Sarah Bavly returned to Palestine in August 1929. In addition to her new role as a chief dietitian for Hadassah hospitals, she was asked to open a nutrition department at the recently constructed Nathan Straus Health Center in Jerusalem. However, the 1929 Palestine riots broke out at this time and she and other residents were forced to take shelter in the Straus Center for a week. In this and other emergency situations over the coming two decades, Bavly's department supervised and provided food for immigrants and for paramilitary and military forces.
In 1930 Sarah Bavly was named director of the Hadassah school lunch program, which furnished 1,000 children in eight schools and 12 kindergartens with a daily meal. She also supervised nutrition education programs for the public.
Foreseeing the need to develop formal training programs and courses for dietitians and nutritionists in the Hadassah system after the establishment of the State of Israel, Sarah Bavly asked for and received a scholarship to return to Columbia University in 1946. She earned her Doctor of Philosophy in nutrition in August 1947. Her doctoral thesis, "Family Food Consumption in Palestine", was reprinted in 1972 by AMS Press.
In 1950 Sarah Bavly founded and served as director of the Institute of Nutrition Education, a research institute underwritten by Hadassah. Hadassah transferred the Institute to the State of Israel in 1952. In 1953, under the Ministry's auspices, Sarah Bavly helped found the College of Nutrition and Home Economics in Jerusalem, a teacher training college for nutritionists who would work in hospitals, clinics, schools, and retirement homes. She became the college's full-time dean in 1960. n 1959 the college was noted for conducting a national survey on nutrition among immigrant families in conjunction with UNICEF and the World Health Organization. Under Bavly's direction, senior students interviewed 800 immigrant families on the subject of dietary habits, illness, and infant mortality. The College operated independently until 1981.
Sarah Bavly retired from the College of Nutrition and Home Economics in 1965. She continued to engage in research and conducted periodic nutrition surveys for the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics.
She died in 1993. Her papers are stored in File A520 at the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem.
Sarah Bavly made pottery as a hobby and was recognized for her artistic talent by the Jerusalem House of Design.
Sarah Bavly married Dr. Yehuda Meir Bromberg (1902-1943), accountant-general of Hadassah, in April 1930. Bromberg later became assistant director-general of the Hadassah Medical Organization in Palestine. The couple had one son and one daughter.
