Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2009/01/11
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Peter- Sorry to read of your loss. I think it is harder than losing your father (at least it was in my case). Good luck going forward. Stasys On Jan 10, 2009, at 1:41 PM, Peter Klein wrote: > LUGgers: My mother, Emilie Klein, is gone. She passed away at dawn > on Thursday morning. Her younger sister and I were with her > throughout the final night. > > Emilie's years (1921-2009) spanned the Jazz Age, the Great Depression, > WWII, the 50s, the Age of Aquarius, the Space Age and the digital > revolution. She was a courageous woman whose mobility was impaired by > polio when she was just a year old. Through most of her life, she > could walk, but one leg was shorter than the other and she wore lifts > on one shoe. The last couple of years, she was mostly in a motorized > wheelchair. > > Though she never got a college degree, she took courses at the New > School in New York, was an avid reader, and became a self-taught > librarian. She created the library at Temple Isaiah in Lexington, > Mass. and ran it for about 30 years. She was a "people person" who > became friend, confidant and surrogate mother to many. > > My mother's influence formed the humanities half of my makeup, as my > father's formed the scientific/technical. It was her example that > sparked my interest in photography. On all our trips and family > outings, she would carry her Bolsey B2 rangefinder and Gossen Pilot > light meter. She shot only Kodachrome. I have a heritage of hundreds > of slides, dating from about 1950. And she was a Leica user--after I > got my M2 about 1970, she bought a IIIf and brightline viewfinder, > which she used until she couldn't see well enough to focus. She > didn't know much about photographic technique, but she did fine. > > Here are the three pictures that will stand with her memorial candle > at our house this week: > > From 1951-52, with my Dad (Kodachrome, slightly overexposed): > http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/pklein/family/Misc1950s/ > 19EmMilt52.jpg.html > > October 2007, my favorite recent picture of her (B&W, of course): > http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/pklein/family/SuzyOct07/L1002138EmBW- > w.jpg.html > > May 2008, at the Tulip Festival near Mt. Vernon, WA: > http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/pklein/family/tulips08/L1003317- > prf.jpg.html > > --Peter > > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >