Harold Edward Krivan passed away peacefully in St. Augustine, Florida, on July 12, 2023. While the last five years were marked by struggle, Harold’s fight against Parkinson’s and dementia highlighted his competitive spirit, embrace of hard work and, most of all, love for family and friends.
Harold was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the first child of Sydney and Dorothy Krivan; two sisters followed on his heels. In 1957, soon after Harold’s bar mitzvah, the family relocated to Jacksonville, Florida. Harold thrived at Alfred I. DuPont High School, where he excelled as a student, starred as a three-sport varsity athlete and, most importantly, met the love of his life, Sunny. During their college years, the quarterback and the cheerleader continued their romance long-distance until the summer of 1964, when they were married at the Jacksonville Jewish Center. That fall as he completed his senior year, they lived on campus at Harvard and went on to settle in the Boston area.
Harold and Sunny re-located to Hanover, New Hampshire, in autumn of 1967 so he could pursue an MBA at Dartmouth. A year later, they had their first child, and in 1971, after the family returned to the Boston area, the twins arrived.
During this time, Harold established himself as a management consultant, first with Arthur D. Little and then as a partner with the fledgling Berwick Group. All along, while advising various companies on how to be more productive, he knew he wanted to make a difference inside a company he admired. That opportunity arrived in 1979, when he took a marketing job at Rockwell Automotive, where he spent 16 years in various leadership roles, including an ex-pat assignment in London that allowed him to develop new partnerships while exploring Europe with Sunny. His deep expertise in the auto industry led him to his last job, as an executive with J.D. Power & Associates, where he grew the Detroit business, pioneered new approaches to using customer data to improve quality, and helped develop the next generation of leaders for the company. He retired in 2007 and soon after, Harold and Sunny relocated to their dream house in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida – not far from where they met as teenagers.
Retirement allowed Harold to finally pursue his passions full-time – golf, leisure travel, barbecuing, yard maintenance, bridge, grandchildren and Boston sports teams. Occasionally he dusted off his business skills and went back to work – to support a small consulting engagement or serve on the country club or cultural center board – but mostly he relaxed and enjoyed life in Florida. His fight against Parkinson’s and dementia, which began in earnest in 2018 and continued through the pandemic, took away many of the activities he loved, but he found new ways to compete and a new community for support, including the amazing caregivers who along with Sunny were by his side on his most difficult days.
He is survived by Sunny, his wife of nearly 60 years; his sisters, Susan Krohn (Richard) and Laura Waldman (Alan); his sisters-in-law, Margie Stormes (the late Dan) and Jacki Anderson; his children, Michael Krivan (Jessica), Leah Henderson (Tagg) and David Krivan (Kristie); and his nine grandchildren, Alex, Joshua, Avery, Andrew, Matthew, Shea, Lake, Jacob and Katie. He loved them all dearly.
