As he approached his 100th birthday on Feb. 2, 2023, businessman, civic leader and former N.C. Sen. Marshall Rauch shared gems of wisdom, such as the value he held on making personal connections and how all those interactions resulted in his feeling he had lived a good life.
“In Judaism, there are eight degrees of charity,” Rauch shared that day from his home at Covenant Village in Gastonia, “and the highest and best charity you can do is to help someone in a manner that they don’t need help anymore, such as helping someone get into a business or obtaining an education.
“And I have enjoyed that privilege many times.”
Rauch died Tuesday morning at the Robert Johnson House with his family by his side. He was 102. Gaston County Commission Chairman Chad Brown had U.S. flags fly at half-staff in his honor.
Rauch, who made a fortune making Christmas ornaments despite his Jewish faith, spent 38 years in elected office, the first 14 years on the Gastonia City Council, and the final 24 in the North Carolina Senate, ending in 1990. The lifelong Democrat’s contributions to community life went deeper than politics in the Gaston County community he came to love. Before Gaston County Schools began teaching black and white students in the same classrooms, Rauch and a Black pharmacist, Norman “N.A.” Smith, worked together to ease tensions. Both men are credited with helping that transition go smoothly.
Despite living most of his adult life in Gaston County, Rauch never lost his Long Island, New York, accent. He came to the Tar Heel state in 1940 to play basketball at Duke University under legendary coach Eddie Cameron. In Rauch’s day, college freshmen were not allowed to play varsity basketball, and his freshman team was the first to use Duke Indoor Stadium, which was renamed Cameron Indoor Stadium in 1972.
World War II ended his basketball career and also his college education. He joined the Air Reserves in college and was drafted in his junior year. Rauch was in Italy, France and Germany during the war, and was preparing to go to Japan before the atomic bomb ended that conflict.
Rauch did inquire about returning to Duke once to finish his degree while also serving in the state Senate in Raleigh. Duke University administrators were less than encouraging.
“They said, ‘All the math courses you took here they now teach in high school,'” Rauch said in 2023. Rauch was awarded two honorary doctorate degrees, including one from Belmont Abbey College.
He may have never earned a degree from Duke, but he did find love there. He claimed he noticed the former Jeanne Girard sitting in the stands while playing basketball at Duke. He and his late wife, who died in August 2010, were married 64 years and had five children.
Rauch joined the Girard family textile business in Bessemer City after the war. He then started Pyramid Mills on the side, eventually going out on his own.
A big break came in 1963 when a man Rauch did not know at the time, Bill Spiegel of Spiegel Catalog fame, called him with a proposition.
“He told me if I could wrap rayon thread around Christmas ornaments, we’d both make a lot of money,” Rauch said.
With an $800 investment in a newly designed metal device, Rauch produced 300,000 boxes packed with a dozen ornaments each. Rauch Industries grew to 1,400 employees at six different plants in five different countries. At one time Rauch Industries was one of the largest Christmas ornament manufacturers in the world.
“That was when the aluminum Christmas trees first came out,” Rauch would say of the start of his company. “Those satin Christmas ornaments looked great on those aluminum trees.”
Rauch took the company public in 1983 and it was acquired by East Boston, Massachusetts-based Syratech for about $50 million in 1996. Business declined following the acquisition, and ownership later changed hands. No ornament manufacturing remains in Gastonia.
His best investment may have been in an employment company called One Two Three Hire, which was about to collapse when a new owner, Ric Elias, stepped up. He offered Rauch $1,000 for his stake, which Rauch declined, then followed up two years later with a $3,500 offer. Rauch held on and decided to visit the company, which transformed into Red Ventures, an Indian Land, South Carolina-based digital marketing firm with more than 3,000 workers in 12 offices. CEO Elias and Rauch would become good friends.
Rauch’s last business venture ended a few years before his 100th birthday when he helped his grandson, Julian, start Edgeway Pharmacy in Cramerton. “I never worked a day in my life,” Rauch recalled of his professional life. “I enjoyed every bit of it.”
College football fans will remember Julian Rauch for his 2007 field goal that helped Appalachian State University beat Michigan, a win Sports Illustrated named the greatest upset ever in college football history. Julian Rauch remains the CEO of the pharmacy.
Before his 100th birthday, Rauch’s mind remained alert, but he couldn’t pinpoint the secret of his long life. Even as he grew older, he still ate pasta and ice cream almost every day, he said then. His father had lived to 10 days before his 99th birthday and his grandfather had lived to the age of 104, he added.
“My life,” Rauch would say then, “has been a series of good luck.”
Rabbi Yossi Groner and Dr. Charles Brown will lead a memorial service at 4 p.m. Wednesday, March 19, at McLean Funeral Directors, 700 S. New Hope Road, Gastonia. The service will be live-streamed; visit the McLean website for the link and recording.
Instead of flowers, the family requests donations to the Temple Emanuel Endowment Fund, c/o the Gaston Community Foundation, P.O. Box 123 Gastonia, NC 28053 and Chabad of Charlotte, 6619 Sardis Road, Charlotte, NC 28270.