Personal Life
In 1955, Lerner married his wife Norma. They were married for 47 years and had two children, business executive Randy Lerner, and Nancy.
He was extremely private and shunned the limelight.
He was proud of being a U.S. Marine and flew a Marine Corps flag atop the stadium during the entire time he owned the Browns. Additionally, he flew the Cleveland Browns football team flag at all MBNA America corporate sites along with the American flag and State flags.
Cleveland native and fellow marine Drew Carey paid tribute to Lerner at the end of a season 8 episode of The Drew Carey Show called "The Dawn Patrol."
Lerner was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2001 and that May underwent surgery, spending most of his last year in and out of hospitals. He died on October 2, 2002.
Read more about this topic: Al Lerner
Famous quotes containing the words personal and/or life:
“The child realizes to every man his own earliest remembrance, and so supplies a defect in our education, or enables us to live over the unconscious history with a sympathy so tender as to be almost personal experience.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The work of adult life is not easy. As in childhood, each step presents not only new tasks of development but requires a letting go of the techniques that worked before. With each passage some magic must be given up, some cherished illusion of safety and comfortably familiar sense of self must be cast off, to allow for the greater expansion of our distinctiveness.”
—Gail Sheehy (20th century)