Jack Rudinow 1919-2004
Jack Rudinow, long time Santa Rosa resident, died Wednesday morning April 28 after a long struggle with cancer.
Born in Odessa, then Russia now the Ukraine, on August 14, 1919, he arrived in the U.S. with his parents and younger sister Naomi in 1930.
Jack was the loving husband of Mattie Rudinow, devoted father of Joel Rudinow of Sonoma, Ann Rudinow Saetnan of Trondheim, Norway, and Dita Rudinow of Hayward. He cherished his grandchildren Lindsey Urbina of Berkeley, and Eli Saetnan and Bjorn Saetnan of Trondheim, Norway. He loved his sister and brother-in-law Naomi and Stanley Cohen of Oakland and their children and grandchildren, who also survive him. All of us will miss his warm smile, his loving concern for our well-being, his ready wit and his outrageous puns.
The son of singers who graduated from the Conservatory of Music in Odessa, Jack, though not himself a musician, loved music all his life. Following graduation from UC Berkeley with a B.S. in Soil Chemistry in December 1941, Jack expected to become a farm advisor. But WW II began and Jack went to work instead at the Kaiser Richmond Shipyards where he became an administrative assistant and ultimately head of the Progress Department responsible for tracking completion of vessels being built there.
When the war ended, Jack chose to follow his heart to a farm rather than accept a management position at Kaisers Willow Run auto factory then starting up. Neither did he opt to join his friend and colleague Hans Goldschmidt in a venture producing a home workshop tool for which Jack had assisted Hans in securing a patent. This was the Shopsmith which made Hans wealthy and would have done for Jack too. Jack never felt regret about the path he took. That choice brought Jack to Santa Rosa where the family lived, farming when that provided a livelihood and Jack seeking employment elsewhere when it didn't.
When he retired in 1977, Jack was chief Right of Way Agent for the Sonoma County Water Agency, responsible for negotiating easements or acquisitions for the aqueducts supplying water to the communities served by the agency and for flood control channels.
His enduring commitment to making the world a better place led Jack to join in establishing the Sonoma County chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union and to serve for some years on its board. In 1951 Jack and Mattie helped found the Santa Rosa Cooperative Playschool, a parent participation nursery school which met initially in the First Presbyterian Church. He participated in campaigns for nuclear disarmament, joined the struggle to save the lives of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. He lent a hand to an effort to open a Consumers' Cooperative Market in Santa Rosa. Jack was a long time supporter of the Sonoma County Peace and Justice Center and active in its affiliated group, Pledge for Peace in Central America. He strove with others to keep the Community Hospital a public entity and when that effort failed he joined HealthWatch which sought to monitor how Sutter Health which now operates the hospital fulfilled its obligations to Sonoma County.
The family is grateful for the comfort and care provided by Hospice of Petaluma. We thank the many thoughtful friends who sought to help us in the last difficult weeks and his physicians and the staff of the Infusion Center at Kaiser Santa Rosa who treated him earlier in his illness.
Memorial Service
A celebration of his life was held on Saturday June 19 at 7 pm at Congregation Ner Shalom in Cotati. Donations in Jack's memory may be made to the Jack and Mattie P. Rudinow Peace Scholarship Fund at the Santa Rosa Junior College Foundation, 1501 Mendocino Avenue, Santa Rosa, CA 95401-4395, or to the Sonoma County Peace and Justice Center, 467 Sebastopol Avenue, Santa Rosa, CA 95401.
"I am leaving this legacy to all of you... to bring peace, justice, equality, love and a fulfilment of what our lives should be. Without vision, the people will perish, and without courage and inspiration, dreams will die: the dream of freedom and peace." Rosa Parks At a celebration in her honour in 1988
