Brandeis Magazine

Malvin Avchen had a 50-year career as a certified public accountant and has been married to Molly for 63 years. The couple has four sons, seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. “We currently live in Boynton Beach, Florida, and have a vacation home in Hendersonville, North Carolina, where we spend the spring and summer,” he writes. “Life has indeed been good to us.” Bryna Selden Kahalas, G’19, has been married almost 62 years, and has three children, three children-in-law, 10 grandchildren (including Rachael Schindler ’19), two grandchildren-in-law and four great-grandsons. She has lived in Maryland, close to the District of Columbia, for more than 40 years, and spends the winter in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. Avrom Aaron Levy, P’90, P’94, spends his winters in Florida, reading and taking wildlife photos. He reports his three granddaughters — two teenagers and a 2-year-old (“an amazing, bright little one; that is an objective opinion”) — are doing well. Joan Pearl Finkelstein Shapiro, P’89, G’12, is a retired English and writing professor; an award-winning abstract painter; and the author of two volumes of poetry, stories and articles. She has three daughters and seven grandchildren. One grandson, Louis Polisson ’12, is rabbi at Congregation Or Atid, in Wayland, Massachusetts. Judith Grossman Taylor, G’23, and her husband, Mark, were honored in November by the Anti-Defamation League Southeast Region with the Goldstein Human Relations Award. She reports her youngest grandchild, Joshua ’23, has received early admission to Brandeis.

A NEW BEGINNING: Proud graduates walk toward their futures on June 10, 1956, as they head to the university’s fifth Commencement ceremony. They were about to hear an address given by Dean Acheson, who served as U.S. secretary of state from 1949-53 and, at the start of his career, clerked for none other than Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis.