Women’s Collective

Myrna Seidman, 1936–2024

The family album

Photographs

A life in pictures

41 photographs so far, from the Seidman family album and Myrna’s years of work around the world. Tap any photo to see it larger.

Brooklyn and before

The early years

The oldest photographs in the family album, and the Brooklyn years.

Myrna’s grandparents with her mother’s family. The women were still in Eastern Europe and the grandfather in America; the photos were merged long ago into one portrait from two continents.
Myrna’s mother, Pauline, as a young woman.
Myrna as a young girl, Brooklyn, circa 1940–1941.
Myrna and her brother at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, late 1940s.Read: Remembering the War →
Myrna’s older brother Sam and their father outside the family hardware store in Brooklyn. This modest two-aisle store put three children through college on one income, a feat much harder today.Read: The Hardware Store →
The site of the family hardware store, circa 2013, now one block from the front doors of Barclays Center in Brooklyn.Read: The Hardware Store →
Brother Sam as a camp counselor with his campers around the flagpole, mid-to-late 1940s.Read: Remembering the War →
Older brother Sam carrying his books at Brooklyn College, early 1950s.
Myrna’s brother Sam in the U.S. Army.
Sam dressed up for a party in Hawaii, where he was stationed in the U.S. Army. Of blessed memory, Sam, we honor your service. “Freedom is not free.”
Older brother Sam and younger brother Dan in tuxedos at a family wedding, mid-to-late 1950s.
At a family wedding. Myrna’s mother is seated far left, and younger brother Dan sits cross-legged on the floor. In the back row, Sam is second from left and their father third from right, with Myrna to his left.
All of us together

Family and celebrations

Birthdays, dinners and gatherings across the generations.

Myrna and her sons, circa 1972.
The family at Jesse’s bar mitzvah, early 1980s. Myrna’s two nieces are in the first and second rows.
Myrna and her two sons, likely at Passover 1985 or son Jonathan’s high school graduation in 1982.
Myrna’s parents at their 50th anniversary, New York City, circa 1982.
Myrna, brother Sam and sister-in-law Herta Lande Seidman at Jesse’s wedding, 1996.
Myrna’s brothers and their father at his 90th birthday celebration, New York City, February 1995.
Brother Sam and niece Caryn, February 4, 1995.
Myrna’s older brother Sam and their father, 1990s.
Myrna’s son Jesse and her brother Sam during Jesse’s first and only campaign for office, Ann Arbor City Council, 1989.
Brother Sam at his 80th birthday, New York City, 2014.
Myrna’s children, her nieces and nephew, and her brother Sam at a family bat mitzvah, circa 2012.
Myrna’s brother Sam and son Jesse at Sam’s home in Kent, Connecticut, early 1990s.
The family in front of the Brooklyn house on Quentin Road, circa 2013. Sadly, Sam and Myrna are no longer with us.
Myrna’s brother Dan, Myrna and brother Sam in front of their old Quentin Road house in Brooklyn, circa 2013.
Myrna blowing out the candles at her 85th birthday, Washington, D.C., October 2021.Read: Eulogy for Myrna Seidman →
Myrna and a Brooklyn friend on one of her many trips. An inveterate traveler, she visited nearly 90 countries and, but for Covid, would have reached at least 95, with a spring 2020 trip planned to Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
Myrna’s elementary school in Brooklyn.
Degrees, diplomas, big days

Milestones

Two graduate degrees, decades apart, and the celebrations along the way.

Master of Arts in social science, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, June 1, 1959, awarded to Myrna Seidman Levine.Read: The Girlfriends →
Master of Public Health, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, awarded to Myrna Seidman Levine.Read: Mid-Career Re-set →
Son Jonathan’s law school graduation, Yale, 1986, with Myrna, her brother Sam, sister-in-law Herta, her father and son Jesse.
Notice talent. Open doors.

Her work in the world

Field visits, training programs and conferences from Myrna’s years in public health.

Myrna in Mogadishu, early 1980s.
Myrna (center, in blue) with colleagues from the Lagos market-based family planning project, Lagos, Nigeria.
The Lagos market-based family planning project, Mushin Local Government Health and Environmental Services Department, Lagos, Nigeria.
Myrna in the field, likely in the Philippines, where she worked after the Somali civil war ended her work in Somalia.
Myrna taking time off to dance at a celebration in the Philippines.
Caribbean Regional Conference, “Operations Research: Key to Management and Policy,” the Population Council INOPAL Project and UNICEF Caribbean Area Office.
A training program run by the Humanity Association in Balampur.
Women from the Humanity Association training program in Balampur.
District of Columbia Model Cities Program, Washington, D.C. The map shows the Model Area, from 16th Street NW to Bladensburg Road NE. The program grew out of Kennedy-era antipoverty efforts; Bobby Kennedy opened Washington’s War on Poverty offices around the time Myrna began working there in the early-to-mid 1960s.

More photos to come.

Read her words: Stories from my Mother · In Her Words