Howie Mandel hosts St. Mary’s Kids gala

In honor of its 150th anniversary, St. Mary’s Hospital for Children threw a star-studded virtual celebration Nov. 18, which raised over $415,000 in a few short hours.

The Big Night in for St. Mary’s Kids was hosted live by TV personality Howie Mandel via loopedlive.com. It took the place of the hospital’s annual gala, which was canceled due to the pandemic, but maintained the same goal: to raise funds to support life-changing services.

“We can’t wait to celebrate St. Mary’s 150th anniversary with their kids, staff, families and you, our dedicated supporters,” Mandel said as he opened the celebration. “They’re dedicated, these supporters. I know that I had the same jockstrap for four years in high school and that supporter was so dedicated. That’s what these people are like.”

The evening was peppered with performances by celebrities, like Jesse Collins Young and Paul Anka. Broadway’s Rock of Ages Band made an appearance to perform a medley of songs from their show, which has been paused since March.

Actor Jonathan Sadowski played St. Mary’s trivia with Mandel and the two remarked on the deep history of the hospital — founded in 1870 by the Sisters of the Community of St. Mary, it was the first New York medical facility dedicated solely to the care of critically ill children. It was originally located in Manhattan and supplied with only 15 beds, but was moved to the nine-acre Bayside campus in 1951, where it has operated a 124-bed inpatient program since. In 1983, the hospital added a family-centered home care program to accommodate patients with the highest levels of medical complexity.

The virtual gala was just one of many commemorative events to recognize the anniversary, the exact date of which was Sept. 23. That month, St. Mary’s hosted the #smk30daychallenge, a month-long fundraiser that encouraged participants to form teams and engage in different virtually conducted physical activities each week, including paint night and trivia night. Additionally, the hospital hosted a virtual walk where participants were encouraged to share videos and photographs of themselves and their team on social media along with the fundraiser’s hashtag. St. Mary’s raised nearly $10,000 in the month of September.

Though the virtual gala fundraiser has ended, the hospital is still accepting donations via its website, stmaryskids.org/give.

For more information, call (718) 281-8800 or email info@stmaryskids.org.