Leslie Kay, 85, received a British Empire Medal, having spent more than six decades looking after elderly people in the Jewish community.
Mr Kay, who is honourary secretary of The Fed, in Manchester and is from Cheshire, helped create employment opportunities as a buisnessman in oldham.
He is also the former president of Heathlands’ Care Village – the Jewish community’s largest home for the elderly, where he helped to improve the standard of care.
“It was a big surprise when I got the letter informing me, but a very pleasant one,” he said.
“I’ve been with the organisation in a voluntary capacity for 60 years and I see it as a great Mitzvah. Aside from my family it is the most important thing in my life.”
The honours committee said Mr Kay was “a stalwart volunteer".
They added: “Despite being a hard working businessman and running a significantly large organisation, he visited the home almost every day.
“He was not frightened to roll up his sleeves and become involved in establishing the best quality of care.”
Jill Todd also received a British Empire Medal but her first thought when she received the letter was "Oh no what have I done."
She first became suspicious when colleagues kept asking questions about her volunteering but she could not wok out why they were so interested until the letter.
Ms Todd discovered she had been awarded the BEM for services to the community in Tower Hamlets, six weeks ago.
The 71-year-old, who chairs Tower Hamlets Schools Forum, received the award for devoting hours to improving education in the borough.
“I sort of knew something was going on because people kept asking me all sorts of detailed questions about when I did this and that,” she said.
Ms Todd runs a communication agency but in her spare time helps schools in the borough with their governance.
Speaking about her work, she said: “It is fantastic to work in a place that is challenging.
“[Tower Hamlets] went from being bottom of the pile in terms of education to second best and I have never met so many hard working people there.”
She is the chair of Leo Baeck College and a former chair of West London Synagogue, which runs a regular drop-in centre for refugees.
Ms Todd also raised funds for the Caldecott Foundation, a charity which gives therapeutic support to some of the most vulnerable children and young people in the UK.
She has helped raise £750,000 for a new vocational learning centre to help the foundation’s older children acquire workplace skills to improve their chance of employment.
Historian Simon Schama, Holocaust survivor Ben Helfgott and Labour MP Louise Ellman are among the well-known people in the community to also receive honours.
