Ernest, Richard

Description

Richard Charles Ernst was born on April 2, 1915, in New York City, New York, to Roberta Christine Claus, age 32, and Bernard Morris Leon Ernst, age 36. Richard was a graduate of Harvard University and the Columbia University Law School.

He married Susan Jane Bloomingdale on August 11, 1938, in Purchase, New York. They had three children during their marriage. Susan Bloomingdale, a granddaughter of the founder of Bloomingdale’s department store. Richard was associated with the publishing companies of Howell Soskin and Alfred A. Knopf before joining Bloomingdale Properties.

He enlisted and served in the U.S. Army. During World War II, Richard was promoted to captain while serving in Europe with the Ninth Infantry Regiment of the Second Infantry Division. He took part in the invasion of Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge and earned five battle stars. He also received the Bronze Star, the French Croix de Guerre and the Belgian Fourragere.

After the war, Richard was president and later chairman of the board of Bloomingdale Properties, an investment organization for members of the Bloomingdale family, from the mid-1950’s to 1983 and was chairman of the company’s executive committee.
In 1959, Richard was a founding director of and stockholder in Atheneum Publishers. Atheneum merged with Charles Scribner’s Sons in 1978 to become the Scribner Book Companies, of which Mr. Ernst was also a director. Scribner Book Companies was then taken over by Macmillan Inc.

Richard C. Ernst, former chairman of Bloomingdale Properties and a founder of Atheneum Publishers, died of cancer June 19, 1984 at his home in Manhattan. He was 69 years old and also had homes in New Canaan, Conn., and Elk Lake in the Adirondacks.

His wife, Susan Bloomingdale, a granddaughter of the founder of Bloomingdale’s department store, died in 1981.

His father, Bernard M. L. Ernst, was attorney for the escape artist and magician, Harry Houdini. The younger Mr. Ernst kept his father’s memorabilia, which he made available to Houdini’s biographers.

At the time of his death, he was survived by a son, John L., of New York; two daughters, Carolyn E. Stewart of New York and Dorothy P. Ernst of Geneva, N.Y.; two sisters, Eleanor Timberg of Washington and Cornelia Zagat of Stamford, Conn., and four grandchildren.