Many people in the community are mourning the death of Jona Goldrich, a Holocaust survivor who escaped Nazi persecution, moved to the United States and became a successful real estate developer, residential property owner and philanthropist.

Developer and philanthropist Jona Goldrich is pictured at the 2014 Yom HaShoah ceremony in Pan Pacific Park after receiving an award. Goldrich started the annual Yom HaShoah ceremony. He was surrounded by his grandchildren and family members. (photo courtesy of LAMOTH)

Goldrich passed away on June 26 at age 88. The Beverly Hills resident died in a “residential setting” of “natural causes,” according to David Rochkind, chief operating officer for Goldrich & Kest Industries, LLC.

Goldrich was well known in the Jewish community. He was a driving force behind the creation of the Los Angeles Holocaust Memorial in 1992 and the Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust (LAMOTH) in Pan Pacific Park in 2010. Goldrich also started the annual Yom HaShoah ceremony 24 years ago commemorating victims of the Holocaust in Pan Pacific Park.

“He was one of the great members of the great generation,” said Samara Hutman, executive director of LAMOTH. “He was an extraordinary man.”

Goldrich was born on Sept. 11, 1927 in Turka (Lvov), Poland. According to a biography provided by Rochkind, Goldrich’s parents instilled strong Jewish values and “a thirst for knowledge and a philanthropic obligation.”

Goldrich was forced to flee his home in 1942 after the Nazi invasion, and was smuggled through Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Syria and Lebanon. He ended up in a school for children in Haifa, Israel. Goldrich’s parents, older brother and extended family members perished in the Nazi genocide.

Goldrich later worked as a taxi driver and auto mechanic and studied at the Technion University in Haifa. He was also apprentice union head for the General Federation of Labor, Israel’s principal labor union. Additionally, Goldrich served in an elite commando unit during Israel’s War of Independence and later the Israeli Navy.

In 1951, while working as a merchant marine for a shipping company, Goldrich visited New York City. When the company he worked for went on strike, the Israeli consulate general arranged for Goldrich and 170 others to be transferred to Ellis Island where he obtained a visa allowing him to remain in the United States.

Goldrich originally sought to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology but was not accepted due to his lack of knowledge of the English language, according to his biography. He boarded a Greyhound bus and headed to Southern California with only $50 in his pocket.

In a 2006 interview with the Park Labrea News and Beverly Press, Goldrich said he saw billboards on the way to Southern California that proclaimed 1,000 people were moving to the state every day. He said the signs gave him the idea of going into real estate because the people moving to Southern California would need housing.

(Jona Goldrich)

Goldrich said the key to his success was a realization that not everyone coming to California could afford a single-family home, and that young families, singles and seniors needed affordable housing. He focused on apartment buildings, and set about building projects throughout Los Angeles and other parts of California. Many of the apartment buildings he constructed are in the Miracle Mile, Koreatown and Hollywood areas. They include Museum Terrace, on South Curson Avenue; Casa Serrano, located near Third Street and Western Avenue; and Lanewood Pines in Hollywood. Other properties still owned by Goldrich & Kest are located in Culver City, Redondo Beach and downtown Los Angeles.

Rochkind said under Goldrich’s and his late partner Sol Kest’s leadership, the company built a portfolio that included 122 apartment buildings with 13,500 units, five marinas with 2,107 slips, 24 senior living facilities, seven commercial buildings, 16 retail properties, 26 industrial properties and nine mixed use rental and commercial properties.  Seventy-two properties accommodate low-income families.

Rochkind said Goldrich stayed active in the company and took a hands-on approach. He frequently acted as a “secret shopper,” arriving unannounced at his properties and speaking with sales managers who did not recognize him to make sure business was being conducted properly.

Rochkind added that in recent years, Goldrich passed the torch to his business partner’s son, Dr. Ezra Kest, and Goldrich’s son-in-law, Barry Cayton, who now operate Goldrich & Kest. Rochkind said Goldrich wanted people to remember his philanthropy as his legacy. The Goldrich Family Foundation has more than $100 million and supports everything from research hospitals and local schools to organizations in Israel.

“They support a lot of social causes,” Rochkind said. “It is things that make the world a better place.”

Hutman said Goldrich’s most lasting legacies are the Los Angeles Holocaust Memorial and LAMOTH in Pan Pacific Park, as well as the Yom HaShoah Ceremony. Goldrich remained on the LAMOTH board, and Hutman said she often saw him at meetings. She said he was “very proud” of the memorial and museum and he always asked about attendance.

“He was a very present, caring and invested board member,” Hutman said. “He was always in the front row at Yom HaShoah, year after year. He always said, ‘You’ve got to keep teaching the young people.’ He would say, ‘Are the [attendance] numbers going up?’ and I would tell him, ‘this place you created is growing every day.’”

Hutman said Goldrich was a visionary leader whose philanthropy will forever be associated with the monument and museum.

“He wanted people to experience history in the present,” she added. “[He wanted] people to remember the people who are no longer with us, and if we don’t tell their stories, no one will.”

Goldrich is survived by his wife of 56 years, Doretta, brother Avraham in Tel Aviv, daughters Melinda Goldrich and Andrea Goldrich Cayton, son-in-law Barry Cayton and grandchildren, Garrett, Lindsay and Derek. Funeral services were held on Wednesday at Mt. Sinai Hollywood Hills. The family requests that contributions be made to LAMOTH at 100 S. The Grove Drive, Los Angeles, CA, 90036.