By: Benyamin Davidsons

Bernard Marcus, cofounder of The Home Depot, has died at the age of 95. On Tuesday morning, the Home Depot announced his passing. “The entire Home Depot family is deeply saddened by the death of our co-founder Bernie Marcus,” a spokesperson for The Home Depot wrote in a statement. “We owe an immeasurable debt of gratitude to Bernie. He was a master merchant and a retail visionary. But even more importantly, he valued our associates, customers and communities above all. He’s left us with an invaluable legacy and the backbone of our company: our values.” The statement added, “More than anything, he deeply believed in the company’s core values, particularly that of giving back. He never lost sight of his humble roots, using his success not for fame or fortune but to generously help others.”

As per Fox5, Marcus was born to Russian Jewish immigrant parents as the youngest of four children, and lived in a tenement. Marcus wanted to become a doctor, and was accepted to Harvard Medical School but could not afford the tuition, per Wikipedia. He graduated from Rutgers University with a pharmacy degree.

He started off working as a pharmacist but moved on to work a cosmetics company and other retail positions, becoming CEO of Handy Dan Improvement Centersin Los Angeles. In 1978, he went on to co-found retailer The Home Depot, together with Arthur Blank. They both became billionaires, growing the company into over 2,300 stores, with over 500,000 employees. Marcus had served as the Atlanta-based retail giant’s first CEO for 19 years and also served as chairman of the board until he retired in 2002.

After he became a billionaire, he turned his attention to helping others and back to his passion for medicine and healthcare. “I was able to do things my parents could only dream about… and have focused on helping those I will never meet,” he wrote in his book “Kick Up Some Dust: Lessons on Thinking Big, Giving Back and Doing It Yourself.”

Marcus was a dedicated and truly generous philanthropist. He was one of the first signees of the Jewish Future Pledge, a charitable campaign launched in 2020 modeled after The Giving Pledge to encourage American Jews to designate at least 50% of their charitable giving to Jewish- or Israel-related causes. He and his wife Billi are also signors of the Giving pledge as of 2010. In 2019, he vowed to give away 90% of his $5.9 billion fortune to charity. He had already donated over $2 billion at that time.

He was founder and chairman of the Marcus Foundation, whose priority charities include children, medical research, free enterprise, military veterans, Jewish causes, and the community.

He and his wife launched the Marcus Autism Center, a not-for-profit subsidiary of Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, which treats more than 5,500 children annually. Marcus was on the Board of Directors and an active volunteer for the Shepherd Center, a non-profit hospital. He also supported Zionistic causes. Marcus co-founded the Israel Democracy Institute in 1991, contributing $5 million for the construction of the institute’s building in Jerusalem, per Wikipedia. In 2016, Marcus and Billi also donated $25 million to help build the $133 million MDA Marcus National Blood Services Centre in Israel.

Marcus is survived by his wife, Billi, his two children, Frederick Marcus and Susanne Marcus Collins, and his stepson, Michael Morris.