Richard David Rosenthal

With That Devilish Grin
Richard D. Rosenthal was not a daredevil, but he did have a childlike adventurous streak. "My older daughter called him a man-kid," said his sister, Audrey Model. His 40th birthday party had a "Three Stooges" theme. For his 50th birthday party last May, Ms. Model toasted her brother, saying she hoped he would remain a man-kid.

And Mr. Rosenthal, of Fair Lawn, N.J., did so, on family vacations with his wife, Loren, and sons Ethan, 18, and Seth, 14. He coaxed his wife into trying white-water rafting on a cruise last summer. "He always had a devilish grin on his face because he knew I was scared," she said.

But the Rosenthals made a great team, said Ms. Model, dealing with their elder son's familial dysautonomia, a serious genetic disease. Mr. Rosenthal served as the treasurer of the Dysautonomia Foundation for 15 years; he had been a vice president at Cantor Fitzgerald for just six months.

Ms. Model had a hand in building that team: when her brother was younger, she taught him how to dance, and by consensus he had all the right moves. "He was a person that everybody would notice at the dance, because he danced that well," said his wife, who met him at a school dance when she was 14 and he was 17. This month, they would have been married for 24 years. "We spent more time together than we did not," said Mrs. Rosenthal.


Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on November 18, 2001.


Richard Rosenthal, 50, a zany friend Richard Rosenthal of Fair Lawn was a lot of things -- hard-working, devoted, fun-loving and sarcastic.

The one thing he wasn't, according to his friend, Louise Hutton of Demarest, was a "kvetch."

"He didn't complain," Hutton said. "He wasn't a whiner."

Mr. Rosenthal seemed to have a knack for turning potentially trying situations into sources of humor. Hutton was in a car accident just two days before she and her son, Nathaniel, were to join Richard and Loren Rosenthal at Disney World nine years ago. The Rosenthals brought their two sons, Evan, who is handicapped, and Seth. Mr. Rosenthal told Hutton, on crutches, not to worry; he would look after her.

"We had wheelchair races, drove down the ramps, and did 'no hands,' much to the peril of other Magic Kingdom visitors," Hutton recalled, laughing.

Mr. Rosenthal, 50, was in his 101st floor office at Cantor Fitzgerald when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the World Trade Center's North Tower on Sept. 11. Vice president of finance at Cantor Fitzgerald, Mr. Rosenthal had joined the firm in March.

"We grew up together," Loren Rosenthal said. "We graduated from Clifton High School. He was very kind and generous (then) and he was that way as an adult."

On their first date, they went to a dance in Clifton. She was only 14 -- her future husband was three years older -- but the two sensed even then they were meant for one another.

"We always figured the two of us would be together," she said. "We thought it would be forever. Forever turned out to be a short time."

Another friend, Bonnie Taplits, recalled the cruise to Alaska she, her husband and the Rosenthals went on two years ago. Mr. Rosenthal loved taking pictures of everyone and everything.

"We called him the fashion police," Taplits said. "He said he had to take pictures of me every night because he didn't want me to duplicate my outfits."

"He always had a smile," Loren Rosenthal said. "He had a very sarcastic sense of humor. And he was smart. You have to be smart to be sarcastic, and he pulled it off."

Mr. Rosenthal, who received his bachelor's degree from Boston University and his MBA from Rutgers University, was treasurer of the Dysautonomia Foundation. Dysautonomia, the illness from which his son suffers, is a genetic disease involving a group of disorders of the autonomic nervous system. Mr. Rosenthal also was treasurer of the Jewish Center in Fair Lawn, where a service in his memory was held last Sunday.

"There must have been a thousand people at the center," Loren Rosenthal said. "It was outrageous."

Mr. Rosenthal was a big football fan, and loved working in the garden and around the house. This summer, at the Jersey Shore, he went parasailing for the first time. His last words to his wife the morning of Sept. 11: "Have a great day, honey. I'll see you later."

Besides his wife and two sons, Mr. Rosenthal is survived by his parents, Leonard and Florence Rosenthal of Passaic, and his sister, Audrey Model of Roseland.

A fund has been established for the Rosenthal children. Contributions can be sent to the Richard Rosenthal Children's Fund, PMB 206, 637 Wyckoff Ave., Wyckoff, N.J. 07481.