Albert Reichmann was born in Vienna on January 18, 1929. His father, Samuel, born in Hungary, was an egg exporter who moved to Austria in 1928. His mother was Renée (Gestetner) Reichmann.
After the Anschluss, the annexation of Austria by Germany, Samuel moved his bank accounts to London and converted his holdings into gold, which he used to finance the family’s escape.
The Reichmanns settled in Paris and then in Tangier, where Samuel became a currency trader. His wife led the family in packing and delivering food and other necessities to concentration camp inmates via the Spanish Red Cross. The family home in Tangier has become a sanctuary for refugees.
Albert was mostly home-schooled, his grandson Robert said.
He married Egosah Feldman, an immigrant from Romania who taught school in Israel in the mid-1950s. The couple moved to Toronto in 1959. She died that year.
Besides his grandson Robert, Mr. Reichmann is survived by four children, Philip and David Reichmann and Bernice Koenig and Libby Gross; several other grandchildren and great-grandchildren; and her younger brother, Ralph, her only surviving sibling.
By the time Albert arrived in Toronto, two of his brothers, Edward and Louis, had established Olympia Floor & Wall Tile in Montreal, and his brother Ralph was in charge of the Toronto branch of the tile company. His brother Paul ran a real estate development subsidiary in Toronto.
With around $40,000 from his father, Albert formed York Factory Developments, to build warehouses. In 1964, at the request of their father, the brothers merged the companies into Olympia & York Industrial Development. A global real estate giant was born that would make the Reichmanns one of the wealthiest and most philanthropic families in the world.