Marcus Katz was born in Germany on Sept. 20, 1820, and, at the age of 25, immigrated to the United States.
Jewish himself, he found work in a Jewish dry goods store in Baltimore. Five years later, in 1850, Katz decided to try his luck in the gold fields of Northern California. He soon made his way south to Los Angeles and then to San Bernardino, arriving there in 1852, only a year or so after it was founded.
Shortly after arriving at what was then more of a fort and outpost than a town, Katz received permission from the Mormon church leaders who had founded San Bernardino to open a store inside the 5-acre fort. With little cash available in San Bernardino at that time, Katz conducted his business on the barter system, accepting items such as butter, produce and eggs as payment for other goods. He then hauled those items to Los Angeles, where they were bought by L.A. storekeepers who paid Katz in hard currency.
After a year in San Bernardino, Katz moved to San Diego, where he ran a book and newspaper business. He married Leah Jacobs there in 1853 in what may have been the first Jewish wedding ceremony in Southern California. They had three daughters and two sons who lived to adulthood.
Katz, along with his wife, moved back to San Bernardino in 1857, where they lived the rest of their lives. By then San Bernardino was an incorporated city and the county seat. Katz had arrived at a unique time in San Bernardino and American history. In 1857, after a call went out from Mormon leadership for the faithful to return to Salt Lake City, about 60% of the Mormons then living in San Bernardino packed up and moved to Utah. This may have given Katz opportunities to be involved in politics and community life than he otherwise would have had.
When he returned in 1857, Katz opened San Bernardino’s first book and stationery store. Katz served as county treasurer from 1858 to 1865 and as a Wells Fargo agent from 1858 to 1874. Katz also served as a governor-appointed notary public from 1857 to 1869 and was in charge of the U.S. Commissary in 1859, when two companies of federal soldiers were stationed in town.
In the 1870s and 1880s, Katz used the money he had made in his various commercial businesses to begin buying a large amount of real estate in and around San Bernardino. Katz was in the process of building his four-story Katz building at the northeast corner of E and Third streets when he passed away in 1899 at the age of 79. That building was torn down in 1969.
One of Katz’s significant contributions to the Jewish residents of San Bernardino was the gift of land in 1861 for a Jewish cemetery. Located on the east side of Sierra Way, just south of Ninth Street, Home of Eternity Cemetery & Mausoleum is the oldest Jewish burial ground in continuous use in Southern California. When Katz passed away, he was buried in the cemetery he had helped found.
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