MEMORIAL | Silvia Tennenbaum (1928-2016)

Silvia Tennenbaum, 1928-2016.

June 9, 2017—A memorial service for our former neighbor Silvia [Pfeiffer] Tennenbaum was held today, Friday, at noon.

Her tombstone was unveiled at the Green River Cemetery on Accabonac Road in Springs.

Present were her brother and her three sons and many other relatives and friends.

Silvia died last year on June 27 at 88 at the Bryn Mawr Hospital in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. She had moved in 2014 from her home in Springs to the Quadrangle, a Jewish-affiliated nonprofit independent-living facility in Haverford, Pennsylvania, where she reportedly continued to follow her team, the Mets. 

At a reception following the unveiling at Ashawagh Hall, her eldest son, Jeremy, told us that the Quadrangle was founded by a couple of Haverford professors and that the Philadelphia area is heavily populated by nonprofit religion-based assisted-living facilities. It is close to where Jeremy lived, and he took charge of managing his mother's last years.

Jeremy reported that his mother was suffering from bleeding ulcers and pneumonia and asked that there be no intervention. "She was ready to go," he said. She had previously lost much of her mobility out of a reluctance to move around.

Two of Silvia's fellow Mets fans, who show in their
 hair their solidarity with Silvia and The Team.

Silvia had a defiance about her during her last decade of life in Springs, symbolized by the blue streak she put in her hair. 

Two of the women who came to the unveiling were retired Postal Service staff members at the Wainscott Post Office. They were grateful for the Mets tickets that Silvia subscribed to and would bring them in weeks that she couldn't use them. 

Silvia was born in 1928 in Frankfurt, Germany, daughter of a mixed-religion marriage between Lotti Clara Stern and Erich Pfeiffer-Belli. Perhaps because of the rise of Nazi-inspired anti-Semitism in Frankfurt, her parents divorced in 1930. (It turned out that the Nazis tended to leave alone couples with one Jewish partner and a Christian partner, but no one could be sure.) 

Silvia's brother.

Four years after divorcing her first husband, Silvia's mother married William Steinberg, a talented conductor. Together with Silvia, now eight years old, in 1936 the couple fled Hitler's German tyranny. Steinberg went to Tel Aviv, where he helped create the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. In 1938 he was recruited by Arturo Toscanini to assist him in running the NBC Symphony Orchestra. 

Silvia was a fervent Mets fan.

Silvia loved America. She graduated from New Rochelle High School in 1946 and attended Barnard, earning a BA with honors in Art History in 1950. As a new immigrant, she took to baseball as a way of embracing her new  homeland and followed the Brooklyn Dodgers until, through Walter O'Malley's teachery, they decamped for Los Angeles in 1957. (Ask a Brooklyn Dodger fan: "If you had a gun with only two bullets in it and were in a room with Hitler, Stalin and O'Malley, which one would you shoot?" The answer will be: "Shoot O'Malley, twice!") 

She switched her allegiance to the New York Mets and never for a minute ever left them.

Studying for an MA in art at Columbia University graduate school, she met and, in 1951, married Lloyd Tennenbaum, who was a student in mathematics and philosophy and became a rabbi. 

Meanwhile, Silvia's father, by then conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, became also a guest conductor of the New York Philharmonic and in the 1960s the family stayed in East Hampton during the summers.

The Tennenbaums moved for seven years to Lynchburg, Virginia, where Silvia gave birth to three sons. Her husband was eventually appointed rabbi to two congregations on Long Island's North Shore and the family settled in Huntington, New York. 

Million-dollar sale
of paperback rights.

There Silvia wrote her first book, Rachel the Rabbi's Wife (1978), a caustic roman à clef about the life of a self-important rabbi and a demanding congregation that believed in its entitlement to unlimited support services from the rabbi’s wife. The book was a huge success. Silvia told me she sold the paperback rights for a million dollars, and used the money in part to build on the property a studio where she liked to write. 

However, by 1981, when we became her neighbors, the couple had separated. Silvia retained the house. She was extremely welcoming and told us all about the merits of registering as Democrats in East Hampton.

During the next 33 years, Silvia continued to be outspoken and flamboyant. She had her front fence painted a bluish-tinged purple, not quite the same color as the streak in her hair.

In the 1980s, one of her letters to the East Hampton Star prompted a local resident to place in front of her house a sign, “Communist Headquarters”. A critic of Israeli policy toward Palestinians, she preferred not to be formally associated with the large Jewish Center of the Hamptons and instead affiliated with Sag Harbor’s Temple Adas Israel, the oldest synagogue on Long Island, led until 2014 by widely published Rabbi Leon A. Morris. 

Silvia's three sons, L to R, Rafe, David and (holding the "veil"),
Jeremy, with Rabbi David Geffen.

Silvia and her husband were divorced in 1986 (he was a few years older than Silvia and predeceased her by a decade). She had returned to Columbia, where she earned an MA in art history in 1983. Besides frequent letters to the East Hampton Star, she wrote for the New American Review and the Massachusetts Review. One story, “A Lingering Death,” was selected by Joyce Carol Oates for “Best American Short Stories of 1979.”  Her second novel, Yesterday’s Streets (1981), was a fictionalized account of her family’s life among upper-middle class Jews in Frankfurt, Germany from 1900 to 1936. In 2012, Frankfurt named this book its "Book of the Year”. 

She is survived by her three sons — Jeremy, David and Raphael (Rafe). She was buried at Green River Cemetery in Springs on June 29, 2016. Rabbi Daniel N. Geffen of Temple Adas Israel presided then and presided again over the unveiling, followed by a sharing of food, beer and memories at Ashawagh Hall.

Additional Comments

Silvia was generous. She gave us a few things she didn't need when we first became her neighbor. She was always responsive to our suggestions about improving our properties and planted pine trees between us after just one suggestion. We and others missed her greatly when she moved to the Philadelphia area.

Alice notes how much fun Silvia was to talk with. She always had an interesting individual point of view, and effectively marshaled facts, often little-known ones, to support her view. We enjoyed her hospitality when we first arrived and were beneficiaries of fertilizer generated from horses in her back yard. She also often shared lilacs from her prolific bushes.

See also: Announcement of her death, one year ago.

R.I.P. | June 27–Silvia Tennenbaum

Silvia Tennenbaum (1928-2016).

Silvia Pfeiffer Tennenbaum died at 88 on June 27, 2016 in Bryn Mawr Hospital, Bryn Mawr, Pa. 

She was born in Frankfurt, Germany, the daughter of Lotti Clara Stern and Erich Pfeiffer-Belli.

Her parents divorced in 1930 and in 1934, her mother married William Steinberg, a conductor. The Steinbergs fled Nazi Germany in 1936 and Silvia was sent for the next two years live in Basel, Switzerland with her aunt Gertrude Ritz-Stern. Her parents went to Tel Aviv, where Silvia's stepfather helped establish the Palestine Symphony Orchestra.

The Steinbergs came to America in 1938 after William Steinberg  was hired to assist Arturo Toscanini of the NBC Symphony. Silvia graduated from New Rochelle High School in 1946 and attended Barnard, graduating with honors in Art History in 1950.


She was a tomboy who loved movies and baseball. A fan first of the Brooklyn Dodgers and Ebbets Field in Flatbush, she later came to love the underdog New York Mets and became a longtime season ticket holder at Shea Stadium. 

She started graduate school at Columbia but left in 1951 after marrying Lloyd Tennenbaum, a Columbia student in mathematics and philosophy who became a rabbi. Her stepfather meanwhile was picked to lead the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (1952-1976).

Silvia and her husband started coming to East Hampton in the 1960s to visit her mother and stepfather who was principal guest conductor of the New York Philharmonic. The Tennenbaums lived the next seven years in Lynchburg, Va. during which time Silvia gave birth to three sons and started her writing career. After briefly serving in Plainfield, N.J., Lloyd Tennenbaum was appointed rabbi to two congregations on Long Island and the family settled in Huntington, N.Y. where Silvia Tennenbaum began writing.

In her first and most famous book, Rachel the Rabbi's Wife (1978), Silvia tells a thinly fictionalized, funny story of her own experience as wife of a rabbi who is vain and a congregation that expects the wife of the rabbi to donate her time to pet activities of the congregation’s leaders.

By 1981, the couple had separated and Silvia lived mostly in her old house on Fireplace Road, becoming active in East Hampton civic and political life. She and her husband were divorced in 1986.  By then, Silvia Tennenbaum had returned to graduate school at Columbia and completed her MA in art history in 1983. An avid traveller and prolific diarist, she is also the author of Yesterday's Streets (1981), a fictionalized account of life among upper-middle class Jews in Frankfurt, Germany from the start of the twentieth century to the Nazi takeover. In 2012, the city that Silvia Tennenbaum had fled named Yesterday's Streets as their "Book of the Year”.

Silvia was generous with her opinions. One of her critical letters to a local paper prompted someone to post a hand-painted sign saying “Communist Headquarters” near her driveway. She kept it for a time.

 As a writer, Silvia continued to find success publishing stories. One of them, “A Lingering Death,” was selected by Joyce Carol Oates for “Best American Short Stories of 1979.”

In 2014, she moved to the Quadrangle, an independent living facility in Haverford, Pa., where she continued to keep up with news. Silvia is survived by her three sons, Jeremy Tennenbaum of Wynnewood, Pa., David Tennenbaum of Chicago, and Raphael Tennenbaum of Brooklyn. She was buried at Green River Cemetery on June 29; Rabbi Daniel N. Geffen of Temple Adas Israel presided.

Comment

Silvia was a neighbor, and a neighborly one she was. She told me she got a million-dollar advance on the paperback rights to Rachel the Rabbi's Wife, which allowed her to build a studio in the back of her house where she did her writing. She gave us a few things she didn't need when we first located near her, and was always responsive to our suggestions about improving the community. We and others missed her greatly when she moved to the Philadelphia area, and continue to now that she has passed on.

See also: One-year anniversary of her death.