Max Ratner

Mr. Ratner, who was born in Bialystok, Poland, emigrated to the United States in 1920 and received a law degree from Cleveland Marshall Law School. He began his career at the Buckeye Material Company, a Cleveland lumber concern, which later became Forest City Enterprises. As the company grew, Mr. Ratner worked as a salesman, buyer and manager and, ultimately, served as president and chairman. Forest City is now primarily a national real estate development company with annual revenues of about $500 million. It has redeveloped urban areas in the United States and constructed the Tower City Center in Cleveland. In 1986, Forest City and Mr. Ratner's nephew Bruce Ratner formed a joint venture, the Forest City Ratner Companies, that helped transform the Brooklyn skyline. Its projects there included One Pierrepont Plaza in Brooklyn Heights and Metrotech, a large office, commercial and academic complex in downtown Brooklyn. A long-time supporter of Israel, which he first visited in the year of its independence in 1948, Mr. Ratner was founder and chairman of the America-Israel Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Ratner was a trustee of the Cleveland Museum of Art and a board member of the Greater Cleveland Growth Association. He also had been president of the Park Synagogue in Cleveland. Mr. Ratner and his wife, Betty, donated works to the Jewish Museum in New York. Mr. Ratner is survived by his wife; his sons, Charles, Mark, James and Ronald; his sister, Fannye Shafran, and 10 grandchildren.