Mark F. Bernard
1970 – 2026 Mark Frederick Bernard, born March 28, 1970, in Cleveland, Ohio, died September 8, 2026, in Indian Harbour Beach, Florida.
Mark grew up in Lorain, Ohio, where a lifelong curiosity and love of learning first took shape. He attended Ohio University and majored in accounting, earned his CPA designation, and went on to Suffolk University Law School in Boston. There, he graduated Magna Cum Laude and served on the prestigious Bar Review. He later earned a Master of Laws degree from Boston University.
His professional life reflected both ambition and intellectual rigor. Mark began his career at Ernst and Young in international tax law, then continued at Deloitte & Touche in New York City and Chicago. He had a gift for finding order in difficult questions, but those who knew him best remember something far more lasting: his hearty laugh, radiant smile, easygoing manner, and remarkable ability to expect good things from life.
That optimism had its fullest workout in Ohio sports. Mark remained faithful to the Browns, Indians, and Buckeyes through every improbable season. He believed the Browns might someday win a Super Bowl, the Indians might bring a World Series parade to Cleveland, and the Buckeyes might once again finish on top. He knew the odds. He simply refused to let them have the last word.
For all of his accomplishments, Mark’s truest joy was his family. His children were the center of his life, and he gave them more than his time. He gave them his attention, his enthusiasm, his steadiness, and his sense that the world was an interesting place waiting to be explored together.
Travel became one of the ways Mark built a family story. He backpacked across Europe in his twenties with his future wife Kimberly, then later shared that same sense of discovery with his children Abbey, Cameron, and Spencer. Family adventures carried them across the country in an RV, through national parks, deep into the Narrows of Zion, high on the mountain tops of the Rockies, into the clear water of Belize, and through the rainforests of Colombia. Mark loved the anticipation of those days: waking before sunrise, packing breakfast sandwiches, gathering everyone into the car, and beginning before the trails grew crowded. He wanted his children to see extraordinary places, but more importantly, he wanted them to remember how it felt to be together in them.
Mark treasured the unique bond he shared with each of his children. He cherished getting dressed up for daddy-daughter dances with Abbey. Friends remember him at Holstein Park in Chicago playing relentlessly with Abbey when she was a toddler and counting with her in animated Spanish. He loved baseball in all its forms with Cameron, from the drive to a game or a lesson to the conversations that followed about players, teams, and the season ahead. Mark and Cameron spent a summer building rockets together and then watching in awe as they successfully launched in a nearby field. With Spencer, Mark delighted in watching his son master chess until Spencer became skilled enough to occasionally defeat his proud father. He treasured the time they spent together building their Pokemon collection and sharing in the small joys and discoveries along the way. He enjoyed current events and politics with all three children, and he was always ready for a game of Catan or Euchre when the family gathered around a table.
He loved Thanksgiving, especially the warmth of being surrounded by his mother and stepfather, Diane and Gerald, his immediate family, extended family, and, in more recent years, friends who became part of the tradition. Mark understood that a holiday was not made by the meal alone. It was made by familiar voices, stories retold, laughter from another room, and the pleasure of having everyone close.
Later in his career, Mark left public accounting for an entrepreneurial venture in home health care. He and his family moved from Chicago to Florida creating a home where beach days, family routines, and the wide horizon of the Atlantic could become part of their everyday life.
Mark is survived by his children, Abigail, 18, Cameron, 15, and Spencer, 13, and Kimberly Bernard, his partner of more than thirty years. He is also survived by his mother and stepfather, Diane and Gerald Rosenthal; brother, Greg Bernard; nieces, Haleigh, Aly, and Aubree; brother and sister-in-law, Kevin and Kimberly Bernard; nephew and niece, Jeffrey and Evelyn; brother, Mark Rosenthal; stepmother Susan Bernard; in-laws Sharon and Tom Allen, Bob and Nancy Grueser, brother and sister-in-law Todd and Monique Grueser and nephew, Dalton Grueser.
He was preceded in death by his father, Jeffrey M. Bernard, and his grandparents, Emerson and Helen Barth, and Benedict (Ben) and Rita Bernard.
To Abbey, Cameron, and Spencer: your father loved you with his whole heart. He was proud of the people you are becoming, delighted by your ideas, and grateful for every ordinary and extraordinary day he had the privilege to be your dad. His laughter, curiosity, and faith in what is still possible are yours to carry forward.
A memorial service will be held on Saturday, November 14th, at 11:00 a.m. at Eastminster Presbyterian Church, 106 North Riverside Drive, Indialantic, FL 32903.
