The Jewish community of Montreal founded it in part as a response to the anti-Semitic "Days of Shame" doctor's strike at the Hôpital Notre-Dame in Montreal, Quebec, Canada where all interns at the hospital walked off the job for four days to protest the hiring of a Jewish senior intern, Dr. Samuel Rabinovitch and then only returned to work after Dr. Rabinovitch had resigned.

While part of the Quebec medicare system, and functionally bilingual in French and English, the hospital continues to be run chiefly by members of the Jewish community.

At his death in 1928, Sir Mortimer Davis left most of his estate to be used to construct a Jewish public hospital that would bear his name.

In 1953, enlarged at Pavilion C & D. Among many other medical innovations, in 1974, the JGH was one of the first hospitals in Canada to open a division of colorectal surgery.

LDI researchers have made major breakthroughs in the areas of HIV/AIDS, aging, cancer, vascular disease, epidemiology, and psychosocial science.