Remembering Countess de Hoernle whose legacy lives on at PBSC
As family and friends prepare to memorialize Countess Henrietta de Hoernle Aug. 6, Palm Beach State College also is remembering the noted philanthropist for her generosity.
De Hoernle, who has four buildings and an endowed scholarship at PBSC named in her honor, died in hospice care in Boca Raton July 22. She was 103.
According to her obituary, de Hoernle was born in the German Black Forest town of Karlsruhe to musician parents and came to America in 1931 to live with her grandparents in the Jackson Heights neighborhood of Queens in New York. Twice widowed, she met businessman and engineer, Adolf, the Count de Hoernle in 1950. Together, they spent the next decades transforming the communities in which they lived by their generosity and humanitarian spirit. Those communities included Palm Beach County, where they contributed their time and resources to hospitals, colleges and universities, soup kitchens and historical points of interest. After Adolf died in 1993, Henrietta de Hoernle continued her philanthropic work.
Palm Beach State was a major beneficiary of that generosity, and four buildings bear the de Hoernle name:
- Count and Countess de Hoernle Historic Building in West Palm Beach
- Countess de Hoernle Humanities and Technology Building on the Boca Raton campus
- Count and Countess de Hoernle Technology Center on the Lake Worth campus
- Count de Hoernle Student Service Center on the Boca Raton campus
Click here to read the complete obituary and funeral details.
