Captain, US Marine Corps, Boris Samuel Berkovitch  

Born: February 24, 1921

Died: May 23, 2013 

Boris Samuel Berkovitch was born in Odessa, Russia. He immigrated to New York as a boy with his parents Samuel and Pauline (Kitaer) Berkovitch. He honed his vast knowledge of history at George Washington High School, earned his bachelor’s degree at New York University, and enlisted in the US Marine Corps as a private in 1942. He attained the rank of Captain during two tours of duty, including combat at Roi-Namur in the Marshall Islands in 1944. He fought in the Battle of Saipan in 1944. He later fought in the Korean conflict and later trained infantry at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. 

He earned a bachelor’s degree from New York University and a law degree from Columbia University in 1949. Active in Greenwich Village Republican politics, Berkovitch was secretary of the Greenwich Village Chamber of Commerce and ran for Republican state committeeman. 

He became an assistant U.S. attorney, prosecuting securities fraud, then chief counsel to the U.S. Senate Rules Committee, a legal assistant to a justice on the New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division and deputy superintendent of banks and counsel for the New York State Banking Department. 

In 1966, Berkovitch joined Morgan Guaranty Trust as vice president. He headed the bank’s legal department from 1968 to 1978, served as senior vice president from 1978 to 1983, and then was named vice chairman of the board. As chairman of a bank lobbying group, he pressed for greater access to securities markets by commercial banks and the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act that limited the affiliations between commercial banks and securities firms. 

After Berkovitch retired in 1986, he served on the bank’s directors’ advisory council, became a partner in the New York law firm of Rosenman Colin Freund Lewis & Cohen and served on the board of Pandick Inc. and the board of directors of the Bank of Tokyo. In 2012, he received his 50-year bronze medal from the American Law Institute. 

Berkovitch and his wife, Barbara Ellen Sinclair Berkovitch, whom he had met in the late 1950s, lived in Purchase, N.Y., where they were known for their New Year’s Eve parties. He was an avid reader of Thomas Wolfe novels and had early ambitions to write for The New Yorker. He enjoyed a 51-year marriage to Barbara Ellen Sinclair Berkovitch. His obituary described Berkovitch as a titan wit and intellect. 

Images & Documents

Notes:

1. Berkovitch, Boris Samuel Obituary.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 30 June 2013, https://archive.nytimes.com/query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage-9400E2DB163AF933A05755C0A9659D8B63.html.  
2. Sharpe, Tom. “Boris Samuel Berkovitch, 1921-2013: Attorney, Financial Leader Had Writing Ambitions.” Santa Fe New Mexican, 30 May 2013, https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/local_news/boris-samuel-berkovitch-1921-2013-attorney-financial-leader-had-writing-ambitions/article_aee58640-e0f5-5e88-bf40-958ec7688522.html.  

Prepared by Susan Ruth, Central New Mexico community College, sruth2@cnm.edu

Featured Image:

“Business Beat,” Citizen Register, 28 Aug 1986, Thu · Page 71