Richard Swirnow, an engineer who bought the old Key Highway ship repair yard and made it into one of the Inner Harbor’s largest residential areas, died of heart failure Oct. 1 at Autumn Lake Healthcare. He was 91.
His HarborView development was ultimately home to actor Kevin Spacey and Orioles player Manny Machado, but the project was originally beset by delays, legal and financial wrangles and community-based criticism.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, he was the son of Irving Swirnow and his wife, B. Roberta Levy. He attended New York City public schools and graduated from Johns Hopkins University’s Whiting School of Engineering.
He met his future wife, Rae Masry, through friends in Brooklyn. His son, David Swirnow, said he was out driving when he spotted her in a passing car. They later reconnected and eloped. The couple married on New Year’s Eve and settled in student housing at Johns Hopkins.
“My father was a self-made man, truly a creative visionary. All of his life, he was an industrious, intelligent hard-working man,” said his son, David. “As a boy growing up in Brooklyn, the owner of the corner drugstore recognized his industrious nature and my father was soon delivering pharmacy orders around the neighborhood.”
As a Hopkins student, Mr. Swirnow sold pots and pans door to door to supplement his full academic scholarship. He joined the Army Corps of Engineers and later moved into real estate development, working in Carroll and Harford counties. He developed Kensington and Surfside in Anne Arundel County, though a plan to build a condominium on East Joppa Road failed.
A 1983 Sun article called Mr. Swirnow “the unobtrusive ruler of a diversified business empire” and noted he worked out of a plain converted rowhouse on East 25th Street in Charles Village. Among his ventures was the Hambro flooring franchise.
After the old Key Highway Shipyard at the east base of Federal Hill closed on New Year’s Eve 1982, he spotted an ad for its sale at auction. He acquired the property and initially tried to keep it functioning as a ship repair yard. That failed, sparking a decades-long controversy over building heights and blocked views from Federal Hill Park.
He later sought to redevelop it as Harbor Keys, later rebranding it as HarborView. Financial backers came and went, and the Bangkok Bank of Thailand and Parkway Holdings of Singapore eventually became his financiers.
A 1990 Sun story said Mr. Swirnow “held on to the HarborView site like a pit bull.”
He achieved his vision; today the site includes the Ritz-Carlton Residences and Ammoora restaurant, among other buildings.
“My father’s greatest achievement was to envision a revitalized community built on the south side of Baltimore’s Inner Harbor with HarborView Towers, Pier Homes and the Marina & Yacht Club,” his son, David, said.
He was a donor to Easter Seals Cruise for Kids, the former Baltimore County General Hospital, where he was president, the Associated Jewish Charities and Johns Hopkins University and Hospital. He received the Johns Hopkins Presidential Medal.
Services are private.
Survivors include his wife of 72 years, Rae Masry Swirnow; two daughters, Judith Swirnow Dack, of Boulder, Colorado and Amy Schapiro, of Park City, Utah; a son, David E. Swirnow, of Palm Beach Gardens, Florida; and six grandchildren.
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