It was founded in Memphis, Tennessee by 33rd degree Freemason and Shriner Danny Thomas when he was 50 years old. Danny Thomas was a Catholic Lebanese
immigrant who worked as a nightclub comedian and eventually ended up in Hollywood. He was also Phil Donahue's father-in-law.
The "hospital" claims to be sponsored by multiple corporations and fraternities. It boasts having received $100 million in funding from Epsilon
Sigma Alpha International, as well as an anonymous donation of a McDonald's $1 million game piece. Allegedly, McDonald's broke the rules in order to
award the $1 million to St. Jude Hospital. According to
Wikipedia, St. Jude Hospital has received funding
from the following corporations:
- Target
- Domino's Pizza
- the Williams-Sonoma family of brands (including Pottery Barn and West Elm)
- CVS/pharmacy
- Kmart
- Kay Jewelers
- 7-Eleven
- American Airlines
- American Kiosk Management
- AutoZone
- Brooks Brothers
- Busch Gardens
- Casual Male XL
- Catherines
- Diane von Furstenberg
- Dollar General
- Easy Spirit
- General Nutrition Centers (GNC)
- Gymboree
- HSN (Home Shopping Network)
- J. P. Morgan-Chase
- Marshall's
- The Melting Pot
- the Memphis Grizzlies NBA franchise
- Nine West
- Rochester
- Sag Harbor
- Saks Fifth Avenue
- SeaWorld
- the St. Louis Rams NFL franchise
- Westfield Shoppingtowns
- Yahoo!
- Ronald McDonald House
- Target House
- Bank of America
- FedEx/Kinko's
- Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment
- Stanford Financial Group
It has been endorsed by:
- Miley Cyrus
- Chris Brown
- Justin Timberlake
- Gilberto Santarosa
- Jose Feliciano
- Daisy Fuentes
- Phil Mickelson
- Laura Bush
- Tom Hanks
- Tiger Woods
- Britney Spears
- Ray Romano
- John Travolta
- Marlo Thomas
- Benjamin Bratt
- Ron Howard
- Lucy Liu
- Bill Cosby
- Jon Bon Jovi
- Jamie Lee Curtis
- Garth Brooks
- Cindy Crawford
- Barbara Bush
- Scott Hamilton
- Tara Lipinski
- Nolan Ryan
- Joe Montana
- Mike Ditka
- Bill Parcells
- Don Shula
- Lee Trevino
- Chris Byrd
- Andy Roddick
- Tommy Haas
- Pete Sampras
- Venus Williams
- Lindsey Davenport
- Vijay Singh
Parents with an "inability to pay" are sponsored by charities such as ALSAC, which stands for American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities. St.
Jude is affiliated with other Lebanese hospitals and charities as well.
They work with
the Scholastic Corporation
to produce math education materials in a fund-raising program called the Math-A-Thon. They force students to beg for money and submit it in exchange
for the materials. Some students are awarded objects such as MP3 players for raising a certain amount of money. The phrase "Math-A-Thon" is used,
albeit inaccurately, in an episode of the children's TV show Arthur (which is sponsored by McDonald's, CVS and Chuck E. Cheeses). The show has
parodied South Park, The Sopranos, Beavis and Butthead and the Jerry Springer Show in other episodes. The Arthur character has been ranked as one of
the 50 greatest cartoon characters of all time by TV Guide.
They also hold a fund-raiser called St. Jude Heroes. Participants are asked to beg for money, enticing them with possible rewards like a free
vacation. As a "St. Jude Hero" you get to wear a shiny badge when you register for marathons and such.
The word "Jude" could have been used as double-talk in the song "Hey Jude" published in 1968 by Paul McCartney. Some say that Paul had secretly
died in 1966 and was replaced by a body double.
The official website for St. Jude has a Pharmaceutical Sciences section, which must be located by navigating, or through a search engine (the website
uses uniquely identifying URLs which shouldn't be copy-and-pasted).
According to the Support St. Jude MySpace page (
myspace.com...), "We've seen a single cell grow into a parent's worst fear." The
"Teenagers Speak Out" blog is a lie a minute.
A quote from Danny Thomas can be found here:
www.masonicinfo.com...