Rochester, NY: February 22, 2019. Wife, Mother, Grandmother, Great-Grandmother, lover of family has gone to join her companion, lover, husband of seventy-five years, Maurice. Her long and active life had one focus – the struggle for human dignity and social justice – which she pursued to the very end. She was a proud progressive, an activist in civil rights, anti-war, and women’s rights movements. In dozens of organizations with scores of demonstrations, she pointed out the injustice and inequality in our society and attempted to rectify it. She was a warrior for the rights of those who are disenfranchised and marginalized. She once told a minister friend when he was speaking to her about Jesus “We (herself and husband Max) are just secular Jews but we do his work.” That is the essence of Henrietta Levine. She has now completed her journey and is in a place of absolute justice and total equality.
She is survived by her two sons Alan (Patricia) of Oswego, NY and Robert of Naples, Florida; Two grandchildren, Katie (Joel) of San Francisco CA and Cooper of Albany NY and one Great-grandchild, Zoe.
A memorial celebration will be held in the future.
To all the marvellous family of Henrietta and Max our dear friends from Marlen Garden Florida ….xx
Nos pensees et nos condoleanses ……quel bon temps ensemble …avec Max vous etes nos lovers preferes et notre exemple …
On ne vous oubliera jamais …vous etes dans nos coeurs ….
I remember Henrietta, when we both lived on Harvard Street, as the person who took me and her boys to see the Weavers perform at the Eastman Theater in 1957, and first talked to me, when I was 12, about who Chiang kai-Shek (Time’s “Man of the Year”) really was. The thread broke, but I found it again. I wish I had been able to ask her in later life about her long history of activism, and tell her now about my own.
Before the Scales, Tomorrow
And when the enthusiastic
story of our time
is told,
who are yet to be born
but announce themselves
with more generous face,
we will come out ahead
–those who have suffered most from it.
And that
being ahead of your time
means much suffering from it.
But it’s beautiful to love the world
with eyes
that have not yet
been born.
And splendid
to know yourself victorious
when all around you
it’s all still so cold,
so dark.
Otto René Castillo