 Main facility in 2019 | |
| Formerly |
|
|---|---|
| Company type | Subsidiary |
| Founded | 1897 |
| Founder | Louis Meyers |
| Headquarters | , United States |
| Parent | Service Corporation International (1971-present) |
The Riverside Memorial Chapel is an American Jewish funeral home chain with their main facility at 180 West 76th Street on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City. [1] The company has been owned by Service Corporation International since 1971.
Riverside Memorial Chapel was founded as Meyers Livery Stable [2] in 1897 by Louis Meyers on Norfolk Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. In 1905, the business was relocated to 54 East 109th Street and the name was changed to Meyers Undertakers. In 1916, the business was relocated to 228 Lenox Avenue (at 122nd Street) in Harlem and the name changed to Meyers & Company. In 1926, they moved to 180 West 76th Street and Amsterdam Avenue on the Upper West Side and built a large four story chapel. In 1933, they divided into two separate companies, Riverside Memorial Chapel and Parkwest Chapels. The funeral company was headed by Charles Rosenthal. [3] [4] They expanded thereafter to Miami, Florida (1935); Brooklyn (1938); the Bronx (1940); and Westchester County, New York (1950). [1] The company, then owned by the founder's grandson, Edward Rosenthal, expanded via acquisitions acquiring the Frank E. Campbell Funeral Chapel (1948), the Universal Funeral Chapel (1955); and the Walter B. Cooke Chapel (1957) to become the largest funeral company in the United States. [5] In 1958, Rosenthal retired and ceded control to his son-in-law Steve Ross. [6] In 1961, the company was merged with the Kinney Parking Company (then, renamed as Kinney Service Corporation) and taken public. In June 1971, Riverside Memorial Chapel was purchased by Service Corporation International. [1]
Riverside Park is a scenic waterfront public park in the Upper West Side, Morningside Heights, and Hamilton Heights neighborhoods of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. The park measures 4 miles (6.4 km) long and 100 to 500 feet wide, running between the Hudson River and Henry Hudson Parkway to the west and the serpentine Riverside Drive to the east.
Kinney National Service, Inc. was an American conglomerate company from 1966 to 1972. Its successors were National Kinney Corporation, Warner Communications, and WarnerMedia and its current successor is Warner Bros. Discovery. Kinney National's predecessors were Kinney Service Corporation and National Cleaning Contractors, Inc., whose merger began in January 1966 and was completed in August of the same year. National Cleaning Contractors was founded in 1886 by Louis Frankel and Max Sweig as National Window Cleaning & House Renovating Co., and was later known as National House Cleaning Contractors, Inc.
Kinney Parking Company was a New Jersey parking lot company owned by Manny Kimmel, Sigmund Dornbusch, and mob figure Abner Zwillman.
Steven Jay Ross was an American businessman and CEO of Time Warner, Warner Communications, and Kinney National Services, Inc. He is also known for helping to popularize soccer in the United States.
Patricia Deutsch Ross, known as Patti Deutsch, was an American actress who was well known as a recurring panelist on the 1970s game shows Match Game and Tattletales.
Lewis Merenstein was an American record producer, most famous as the producer of the Van Morrison album Astral Weeks, and as executive producer for Moondance, Morrison's 1970 album. Astral Weeks was listed as #19 on the Rolling Stone Magazine's The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003. In November 2006, when CNN published their list of The All-Time 100 Albums, Astral Weeks was on the list, along with Moondance.
Morton Arthur Sweig was an American businessman and industry leader in janitorial and maintenance services.
Eric Siday was a British-American composer and musician. While most commonly known for his pioneering work in electroacoustic music, his early career was that of a hot-jazz violinist in the London dance bands in the Roaring ’20s, including Ray Starita's Piccadilly Revels. As a young violinist, his improvised soloing style was advanced for the time. He played with a modern chromatic style, verging on atonal, often incorporating multi-stops, playing up to four notes in harmony on the violin simultaneously using multiple fingers.
Ted Ashley was the chairman of the Warner Bros. film studio from 1969 to 1980 and founder of the Ashley-Famous talent agency.
Jerome Toobin was an American television producer.
Jacob Rosenzweig was an American gambler and underworld figure in New York City. He was one of several star witnesses in the Becker-Rosenthal trial, among these being fellow gamblers Bridgie Webber, Harry Vallon, and Sam Schepps. Rose's testimony was the most damaging because he directly implicated Becker in arranging the murder of Herman Rosenthal. As Becker's debt collector, Rose confessed to hiring the Lenox Avenue Gang, providing the getaway car. He testified he did it all on the orders of Charles Becker.
David Deutsch was an American advertising executive and artist. He founded David Deutsch Associates, now known as Deutsch Inc., in 1969. He served as the agency's CEO from 1969 until 1989, when he handed control of the company to his son, Donny Deutsch.
Julie Braun-Vogelstein (1883–1971) was a German-born American art historian, author, editor, and journalist.
Edward Rosenthal (1903–1991) was a former vice chairman of Warner Communications and president/owner of the Jewish funeral home chain, Riverside Memorial Chapel.
Henry G. Plitt was an American businessman and war hero who founded Plitt Theatres.
Benedict I. Lubell was an American oil executive and philanthropist.
Grace Borgenicht Brandt was an American art dealer.
Nat Lefkowitz was an American talent agency executive who served as co-chairman of the William Morris Agency.
John Vogelstein is an American businessman who, with Lionel Pincus, established the "venture capital megafund" in the 1960s, while running the private equity firm Warburg Pincus. He joined Pincus and the firm from Lazard Freres in 1967. Pincus was the founder and chairman while Vogelstein was vice chairman and then president. During his time at Warburg Pincus, the company became the financial industry’s first $100 million fund in 1981, and the first $1 billion fund in 1986. He and Pincus went on to raise billions of dollars to invest in companies across diversified industries. He ran the company with Pincus until 2002, when they both stepped down.
