Joseph Aaron Lazarow

LAZAROW, JOSEPH AARON, 84 - died Thursday January 3rd in St. Petersburg, FL after a long illness. Born in Atlantic City on December 17, 1923, son of Eva and Morris Lazarow, he lived in Atlantic City until he retired to Ft. Lauderdale, FL in 1995. Mayor Lazarow graduated from Atlantic City High School in 1942. He won the Avoda Scholarship and briefly attended Rutgers University before enlisting in the United States Army where he served in World War II as a private first class from 1942 to 1945. En route to France, initial seasickness sent him to the kitchen well below waterline where he learned to bake pies, a hobby he would later perfect with his late wife Fredlyn. During his service, Mayor Lazarow was a French interpreter for the Army during the Battle of the Ardennes and The Rhineland Campaign. For his service, Mayor Lazarow received the American Theater Ribbon, the EAMET Campaign Ribbon with two bronze service stars, a good conduct medal and a victory medal. After his honorable discharge and receiving his undergraduate and law degrees, he returned to Atlantic City to practice law. In 1954, Mayor Lazarow married Fredlyn Pogach of Philadelphia, PA. They were married for 39 years until her death in 1993. Mayor Lazarow, who was at the time new to politics, was elected to the Atlantic City city government in 1972. In May 1976, Lazarow was named Mayor by the remaining city commissioners and served as the chief executive of Atlantic City until 1982. After serving as Mayor of Atlantic City, Mayor Lazarow served as the corporate counsel to the City of Atlantic City, until his retirement. Mayor Lazarow saw legalized casino gambling as the only way to revitalize Atlantic City, which had been in decline for several decades. After the 1974 gambling referendum failed, he formed and chaired the Committee to Rebuild Atlantic City (CRAC) in the successful effort to bring casino gambling to Atlantic City. The Committee's grass roots effort urging state-wide voters to save Atlantic City paid off when casino gambling was legalized in November 1976. In 1998, Mayor Lazarow said of casino gambling: "In the old days, people left (Atlantic City) because there wasn't any work in the city. Now, along with the casinos, there are plenty of jobs and a market for other fields such as accounting, law and advertising. It took some time for things to happen and it will take more time, but we will have the best seashore resort in the whole world." (Quote from Newark Star-Ledger, Thursday May 26, 1998). Shortly after casino gambling was legalized but before the first casino, Resorts, opened in 1978, Mayor Lazarow kept Atlantic City in the spotlight by establishing a new world handshaking record in 1977 on a crowded boardwalk, recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records, and broke President Theodore Roosevelt's record, set in the early century. Mayor Lazarow is survived by four children, Harriet Orol of New York City, Robin Lazarow of Boxborough, MA, Brian Lazarow of West Grove, PA and Warren Lazarow of Hillsborough, CA, his brother Benjamin Lazarow, sister Sara Labov and six grandchildren. Relatives and friends are invited to attend funeral services Sunday, January 6th, 1:00 p.m. at Roth-Goldsteins' Memorial Chapel, Pacific and New Hampshire Avenues in Atlantic City. Interment to follow at the Beth Kehillah Cemetery, Egg Harbor Township. In lieu of flowers, contributions in his memory may be made to the Menorah Manor Foundation, 255 59th Street North, St. Petersburg, Florida 33710.

This obituary was originally published in The Press of Atlantic City.