Winter 2009 Newsletter
The Inserra Family Foundation and
Hackensack University Medical Center:
Close To Home
Hackensack University Medical Center knows him formally as Lawrence R. Inserra, Jr., second vice chairman of the HUMC Board of Governors and chairman of the Human Resources Committee. But Larry Inserra knows HUMC in a host of meaningful and intimate ways that go well beyond his official capacity.
That’s because his son, Lawrence, was diagnosed at the age of five with Hodgkin's lymphoma. The Inserra family turned to HUMC for treatment of the disease, and with good effect; today young Larry is flourishing as a college student in his early 20s.
“Our family had some history with HUMC and had donated to the medical center in the past,” Larry said. “But when my son was being treated, I saw firsthand what a great institution this is. I thought to myself, ‘Wow…this is an unbelievable place.’”
The Inserra family had been notable in the community for years, starting when Larry’s grandparents founded the family’s supermarket business after the Great Depression. By the late 1950s, Larry’s father and two uncles joined the business actively, and Larry himself became president of Inserra Shop-Rite Supermarkets in 1982—ascending the company ladder after obligatory stints stocking shelves and working in the meat department in his youth to learn the nuances of the business.
It’s long been the family’s commitment and philosophy to give back to the community. As such, the Inserra Family Foundation donates to a wide variety of charitable causes and organizations—but according to Larry, HUMC is clearly in the forefront of those activities. Along with a significant pledge to the Women’s and Children’s Pavilion that kicked off in the early 1990s, the Inserra Foundation has donated across the board to all of HUMC’s endeavors.
Larry joined the Board of Governors in 1995, and today also serves as a co-chair of the Beyond Extraordinary Campaign to raise $75 million for the new John Theurer Cancer Center at HUMC. But the Inserra family’s efforts encompass more than money, as witnessed by the beautiful aquarium in the cafeteria of the Women’s and Children’s Pavilion, donated and maintained by the family.
The ties that bind HUMC and the Inserra family together grow even stronger. “My father finally succumbed to lung cancer three years ago after treatment here, and my mother is currently being treated for the same disease at HUMC,” Larry said. “I’ve spent a lot of time in different hospitals—my daughter is diabetic, and my brother Carl died of leukemia in his late 20s—so I know of what I speak. I’ve never been anywhere that can match the quality of care and people that we have here at HUMC. It’s a special place.”