We used to call her Hana the Hammer.

Boy, she could be tough.

Hana was a New York born and bred daughter of an Army veteran that liberated concentration camps during World War II. (Her Dad Max Fuchs featured in the movie G.I. Jews.)

Hana had a no-nonsense exterior that a lot of people were afraid of and the perfect personality for her job. As our Chief Financial Officer at both Smile Train and WonderWork, Hana’s job was to protect our organization and our money. And to make sure accounting was 100% accurate and proper.

If one of our vendors wasn’t doing a good job, if a bill came in way over the estimate, if something wasn’t on the up and up, Hana would turn into Hana the Hammer.

And I was always grateful for that.

Hana had incredible integrity and character. She handled more than $700 million worth of donations at Smile Train without a single hiccup. Over the 17 years or so that I worked with her I can’t remember a single incident a mistake.

At WonderWork, Hana worked closely with the chairman of our audit committee who was the former Vice Chairman of Price Waterhouse. And in turn, those two worked with the best nonprofit auditors in America, KPMG. Every year, we had a clean audit and a fantastic working relationship with the entire team.

Because I had so much confidence in Hana, I was able to focus on other parts of the business like building our programs or raising more money so we could help provide more surgeries.
I never had to worry about our books or our accounting.

Don’t tell her I told you but Hannah had a soft side also. She conducted audits of our partner hospitals in both China and India. On these trips she would meet with many of our patients and their parents as well as our selfless surgeons and nurses. She really cared about the work we were doing which may be why she was so protective and indignant when someone would try to take advantage of us.

She could have made a lot more money working for some corporation.

Always be grateful that she worked with us.

P.S. Hana’s dad, Max Fuchs, a World War II “G.I. Jew” and he starred in the movie, “G.I. Jews”  that came out shortly before his death when he was in his 90s. Max Fuchs was one of the American soliders that liberated the first concentration camps. Max was a Jewish soldier and a very talented Cantor.  He sang the first Jewish service held on Nazi soil at the end of World War II.  To learn more click here…