Class Correspondent

65th Reunion
June 9-11

Increasingly, news of our class will be found on the In Memoriam pages. That’s a reality we accept now that we are all in our 80s. We have always been the first at Brandeis to go through each experience. Our memories and our lives are special, so let’s share them at our 65th Reunion. This year, I am serving as president of the resident council at Brewster Place, the 400-resident Topeka, Kansas, retirement community where I have lived happily for 12 years. My daughter, Naomi, a massage and occupational therapist, has organized the annual Women’s Art Festival in Minneapolis for the past 23 years. My son, John, a partner at BakerHostetler, was appointed by New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to the city’s Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Penny (Peirez) Abrams writes, “I will not be able to join you at Reunion, much to my disappointment. Arthritis has won the day, and traveling has become too difficult. I still do a lot of reading and original needlepoint (with a lit magnifier); play mah-jongg; and go to dinner, and the symphony, and even the theater. I also ‘supervise’ Julie Koss’ ambitious gardening — more or less. How did we get so old? I wish you all as much time as you want and the energy to use it. Au revoir, mes amis.” Herbert Bloom and his wife, Arlene, split their time between Westport, Connecticut, and Florida. Herbert was a senior editor at the American Library Association for 24 years. Son Kenneth, a senior partner at Korn Ferry, specializes in executive placement in the transportation field. Daughter Sarah, formerly a board of governors member at the Federal Reserve System, served in the Obama administration as U.S. deputy secretary of the treasury. Son-in-law Jamie Raskin, a three-term Democratic state senator in Maryland, was elected U.S. representative for the state’s 8th Congressional District. Last year, Stephen Meltzer, G’10, visited the Brandeis campus for the first time in 16 years when he came to Massachusetts to spend time with his grandson, Ethan ’10, who’s currently doing his residency in neurology at Harvard. David, P’10, Stephen’s son and Ethan’s father, flew up from Dallas to join them during this memorable weekend. “They said they wanted to see the campus through my reminiscences of the way things were way back then,” Stephen writes. “It was not too difficult to contrast the few facilities that were our everyday haunts with the magnificent structures that are now present.”

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