JACK GORELICK

GORELICK--Jack, a fierce advocate for the intellectually disabled passed away peacefully on December 26, 2023 at the age of 104. Born Jacob Samuel Gorelick on February 9, 1919 in Scranton, PA, his parents, Jewish immigrants from Belarus arrived before WWI and soon owned Gorelick's Dress Shop. Jack attended Scranton Technical High School and the University of Scranton. Jack worked as a stringer for Billboard magazine and covered the Ringling Brothers circus strike in 1938. A summer program at Columbia University in 1939 changed the course of his life. There he met his lifelong friend, James McCluskey, and was first exposed to the progressive movement. Disqualified from the Army at the start of WWII, due to a leg injury, Jack worked in the defense industry welding propellers at Curtiss-Wright. Determined to serve his country, in 1943, Jack volunteered for the Navy and was accepted as an aircraft machinist, rising to the rank of Aviation Machinist Mate Second Class. After the war, he became a union organizer for the United Electrical Workers in Lancaster, PA, working to unionize local factories. In 1947, he met Helen Schwanger on the picket line at the RCA factory where she was a shop steward. They married two years later. Together, they were proud to have integrated a swimming pool during a union picnic at a local park against fierce opposition. In 1948 Jack was cited as a Communist by the House Un-American Activities Committee and let go by the union. Shortly, afterwards the young couple were run out of town and moved to New York City where they were part of a progressive community in Greenwich Village. During the McCarthy era, Jack was fired for refusing to sign a loyalty oath at a machine shop, which resulted in his ultimate career with the intellectually disabled, the only industry that would hire him at the time. He began working at the AHRC Occupation Day Center, a sheltered workshop for intellectually disabled adults. He remained in this field for 40 years. Jack was a well-known champion, traveling to Albany to advocate for people with disabilities. Jack began the first program to teach intellectually disabled clients to travel on mass transit. He was also one of the first to publicly recognize that the patients at Willowbrook State School were living in disgraceful conditions. As Jack put it at a party AHRC NYC threw for his 100th birthday, "It was a hellhole, almost indescribable." In 1972 he refused to certify the institution after an official visit. When Willowbrook was closed, Jack was in the forefront of the movement to create group homes throughout New York City. He also launched the first clinic serving the intellectually disabled. In 1982 he helped organize the first support group for siblings, and later established a scholarship for siblings entering the field. Jack received an MA in English from NYU and a PhD in psychology from Yeshiva University. He rose to the level of Associate Director of AHRC and was interim Executive Director in 1975. He retired in 1989. Since 2007, Jack has been instrumental in the Brooklyn to Alaska program. He is survived by a son, Sparrow; a daughter, Anna Gorelick Sterne; five grandchildren and eight great-grand- children. Two of Jack's great-grandchildren carry his name. Jack's motto: "Never give up, never give in!"