My father, Jack Aaronson, who has died aged 97, spent three decades as a principled and successful “company doctor”, helping to rescue failing manufacturing companies, as well as organisations such as Bonhams, the fine art auctioneers, and the Greyhound Racing Association. He salvaged many jobs and livelihoods in the process, including, in the late 1960s, those of 700 redundant miners and steelworkers in County Durham who were retrained as engineers to build vehicle bodies for a failing company he had relocated from London.
Jack was born into an Orthodox Jewish household in the East End of London, to Samuel, an importer and exporter, and Sara (nee Chaikhin), a housewife. All his grandparents had come to England to escape persecution in imperial Russia; on Samuel’s side from Latvia, and on Sara’s side from Ukraine, via Palestine. Jack’s childhood was marred by his parents’ separation and his father’s return to Palestine. Sara struggled to bring up her seven children, who were often farmed out to other families, but this failed to dent Jack’s incorrigibly extrovert character and positive outlook on life.
After attending Central Foundation boys’ school in Islington, north London, Jack was unable to afford university, and left in 1936 for Palestine to gain work experience with an audit and accountancy firm. When the second world war broke out he was offered a commission in the British army, but chose to enlist in the ranks, in the Royal Artillery. War service took him to north Africa – including El Alamein – and to India, where he served in a Sikh regiment, finishing the war as a captain and meeting Marian Davies, an army nursing sister. They married in London in 1946 on demobilisation.
Qualifying as a chartered accountant, Jack became the founding general secretary of the Anglo Israel Chamber of Commerce before joining the General Electric Company as an economic and financial adviser, rising to become its overseas general manager. In 1963, after management changes at GEC, he resigned, and rebuilt his career rescuing failing companies on behalf of institutional investors, continuing that task well into his 70s through his own company, Equity Recoveries.
Although his achievements were considerable, he never quite joined the establishment and somehow remained an outsider. But he never lost heart, and even as a care home resident in his last two years retained his indefatigable energy and determination to do things for himself.
Marian died in 2008. He is survived by his two sons, Robin and me, and by seven grandchildren.
