Sad News

Anne, my friend of some forty years, farewell. Remember when we toiled over requests cards in the bibliographic department at the UC library to verify and justify the purchase of books. We have come a long way from there professionally speaking, and you were a major part in many of those developments. Your contribution to our lives personally and professionally is vast. You were one of my very fist American friends. - I came to this country in 1956 and to the Berkeley Library school in 1959. Anne and have been friends ever since. Even through the years of 1971 and 1986 when I was back in Hungary. - Anne, I will never forget how you helped to update my 15 years of missed American librarianship. You never let me down, you always inquired to see how I was faring. When deeply involved in CLA ACTSS activities a few years back and out speaker let us down in the last minute almost you jumped in and saved the day. You were even too modest and humble not wanting to do it saaying that you were not really savvy talking about metadata. Hah! Needless to say, you did pull it through better than anyone could have done it. You did not let down, and I knew it was for our friendhip mostly that you obliged. We will never forget when shortly after our arrival in 1986 how my Hungarian husband of poor English language facilities "fell in love" with you because you were patient with him, was able to converse with him, or better yet, he was able to converse with you because you chose your words so well that he could understand even complicated concepts the way you presented them. A very special talent that I always appreciated very much. He even understood what the Internet was in those early days of the early nineties. We'll all think of the fabulous parties you and Steve gave, how you made all your guests feel that they were the only people there. Dear Steve, Jenny, Stephanie and Nicolas, your loss is immeasurable, however your lives were (created) and made richer by Anne who will always be with us!

Dear friends: It seems impossible that Anne is gone, and even more impossible that in the space of a few months we have lost, in Anne and Reggie Zelnik, two of the most humane, compassionate & multi-dimensional people for whom the Berkeley campus has been home in the last few decades. When you hear "life isn't fair," this is what is meant. I want to beat my fists against the hard walls of Fate. It cannot be. To Anne I owe my first real library job, and a quarter century of productive work later at the UC Berkeley Library, I am in debt to her for having conferred upon me my true vocation. The warm camaraderie of the early days in the Cooperative Services Department remains a bright light in the memories of all, (students, staff, librarians and the faculty on the receiving end) who participated. I can see Anne, leaning back in her chair, gazing out the windows of room 386 into the gray Berkeley morning sky toward Haviland and the tall trees along the north edge of campus, wrapped up in thought and miles away from us all, as clearly as if it were yesterday. The dreamer and the immensely practical, both rolled up in Anne. We miss a GREAT person, but more than anything we miss the person herself. It seems now that, in death as well as life, she has shown us all how to move forward with dignity and courage. May we keep the faith that was hers: freedom of speech, faith in human possibility, caring deeply about others and taking action to achieve those goals. In peace, David Kessler Bancroft Library staff

I first met Anne on a visit to Australia with Steve in about 1991. We got talking about reference service and I realised it would be really valuable to have Anne return and run her reference interview workshops for us. It was the beginning of years of organising Lipow workshops in Australia. I was always amazed by Anne's energy, enthusiasm positive outloook and the caring interest she took in the people around her.Even after I moved out of librarianship we continued to meet for dinner whenever she was passing through Sydney. The last time was at a restaurant near the Opera House but of course neither of us knew it would be the last. I always looked up to Anne as a role model, both as a librarian and a fine human being. Anne, you will be missed.

Dear Stephen, It hurts us to hear that Anne no longer is between us. We remember our visit in San Francisco and your wonderful home in Belvedere, July 2002, with warmth and great joy, and we remember Anne's generous offer to us: "Just come and stay in our home, as long as you want". We remember you and Anne standing at the harbour waiting for the ferry, bringing us to you for a wonderful evening with a delicious dinner, a visit at the violin- and guitarmaker and the walking through the beautiful paths and roads in Belvedere. Dear Stephen: Our thoughts are with you. Anne will stay in our minds. Yours Jette and Per, Silkeborg, Denmark

The following is the text of my remarks at Anne funeral on Monday For the funeral of Anne Lipow -- Sept 13, 2004 Hello. My name is Steve Silberstein -- I am Anne Lipow's husband. As you know, just four days ago Anne peacefully passed away in her bed our living room, at 10:35 at night. Needless to say, as her breathing stopped, it was difficult to comprehend, being there with her, that she was both there and not there, and in any case that LIFE had left her. I finally was able to get to sleep about 3:00 am, then a few hours latter, at dawn, awoke and grogily went thru the motions of getting up. Anne was an early riser, and looked forward to each day -- I wondered what it would be like without her. As usual I went outside in the early dawn, walking down to the bottom of our steep driveway to get the newspaper, and as I bent down to pick it up, turned around, and headed back up the driveway, not knowing what to think about Anne, I noticed her car, parked in the carport at the top of the driveway, underneath out house. And staring down at me, as big as can be, was the text of its, her, license plate -- LUCHAIM -- Hebrew or Yiddish (I'm not sure which) for "To Life". (The spelling is a little unusual because someone else had taken the more normal spelling, but that didn't stop her from getting the phrase on her car's license plate) There it was, staring me in the face from her car -- Luchaim -- thats Anne -- Life in its fullest, Life the great positive force, that indeed is Anne. Back inside the house, Marianne -- who was helping with Anne care these last couple of months, was up too, and when I told her what I just experienced, she explained to me that indeed Anne's spirit was all through the house -- and as I thought about that, I realized how right she is. As many of you know, Anne was originally very reluctant to leave Berkeley and move into that house which I had ourely by accident come accross eight years ago when I was driving around in Marin just looking for a parking place. After all, we had just completed the remodel and expansion of her longtime Berkeley house which she loved. As I looked around the house in response to Marianne's comment, I realized that she was right -- Anne's spirit is all over the house -- physically through all the remodeling she had both required and inspired -- the entrance way foyer is hers, the incredible kitchen window is hers, the backyard is hers, even the second oven in the breakfast room is hers -- there for her cooking so we could do even more for our annual day after New Years party -- a party which so represents her spirit -- her intense desire to be with people, to share, to introduce each of us to the better parts of each other, the goodness in each other, and to better serve each other. As probably everyone here can attest, Anne just didn't have a negative thought about anything or anyone she came accross -- everyone and everything was wonderful, and all she did focus on that and inspire us all to be even better. For example, one of the reasons she didn't want to move to Belvedere was the commute that it would entail to her office in Berkeley. Yet when she had to make that commute every day, she thought it was wonderful -- it gave her the opportunity to listen to and enjoy numerous books on tape, great radio talk shows like Fresh Air with Terry Gross, All Things Considered, and even so-called right-wing programs like Imus in the Morning and Dr. Laura. Many people know Anne just loved little gadgets. When she discoverd a new one, she just had to share it with everyone she came accross -- which she would do by talking about it, showing it off, and then, if the person wanted, giving them an extra one she always had (or would get). Who remembers the little battery operated personal fan she discovered on a trip to Singapore many years ago? or the apple peeler, or the garlic peeler, or the mezzaluna, or the little hook you could pin on to your sweater to hold your eyeglasses, or most recently the pedometer? Anne's enthusiam for any little thing was just infectious. As many people know, she started the Dreidel Factory because she wanted a better, i.e. non-plastic, dreidel to give her kids. When her friend Dean Metzger came up with a way to make a dreidel out of redwood, she just had to share it with the world. For almost 20 years she loved to sit out on Telegraph Avenue with all the other stret vendors, and show people about the marvelous driedel she had. She wouldn't just sit quitely waiting for someone to approach her -- no, she would proudly announce to every passerby "Look at how well it spins -- here -- try it". I remember once when some African American kids looked at her as somewhat crazy and responded "Whats that? Why would anyone want it?". She immediately went into an enthusistic pitch she thought they could relate to -- it was a gambling device, and they could make a lot of money with it, and gave them its revolutionary history, and lo and behold she had another sale -- thats how infectious and irresitable her enthusiasm was. With her own books at Library Solutions Press, and those of others, she was equally enthusiastic. She couldn't resist telling everyone who wonderful this or that thing that this other person had done was. In my own case, I felt she sometimes went a little overboard talking me up, and afterwards asked her to tone it down somewhat -- but she just couldn't. Cooking -- for most of her life she was enthusistically proud that she didn't and indeed couldn't cook at all -- hard (not soft) boiling an egg was about it, and that only under dire necessity. Then a few years ago, she took up cooking and just feel in love with it -- collecting and sharing recipes, and just loving making delicious and unique meals -- she was just loved it. Similarly, a few years ago she and I took up rowing out in the Bay, me for excercise and a chance to explore all the nooks and crannies of the Bay, she just gracefully get out in the middle of the water where she could sing to the hundreds of birds and half a dozen harbor seals that she said followed her around on the water. Last year Anne got a job putting on a one week training seminar for the Helsinki Public Library. She had always wanted to go visit Russia -- the land of her forebearers, so we planned to both go to Helsinki, and then bicycle on the 200 miles or so to St. Petersburg Russia. She was so ethusistic about this trip that she bought the computer program "Rossetta Stone" and spent hours and hours using it to learn to speak some Russian, which she did learn to do. And when we got there, we had an absolutely fabulous time, staying in a very small apartment of a friend of a friend of a friend, walking all over town, day after day, eating all kinds of delicious blintzs sold by small shops, and conversing and visitng the homes of several families we met. Just another example of Anne's enthusiasm for new things and ability to enjoy the little things in life. No matter what, Anne had fun and wanted others to have fun too. Whenever she attended a small professional library conference she would make up new, humerous lyrics to old-time popular songs so that she and everyone there could end the conference singing joyously about the little problems and ironies and solutions that the conference and its participants came up with. Among those of us who worked with her in the University Library in Berkeley in the 1970s, who can forget the "Unoffical Proceedings" of the UCLA-Berkely Joint Conference on the Future of the Library Catalog? Or her "Little Red Book" of "Quotations from Chairman Joe" -- mockingly refering to Joe Rosenthal the University Librarian and leader of the library's computerization efforts. And speaking of Joe, he, like Anne, was a great dancer -- and she loved to dance with him at every library party. Recently I got a card from someone who remembers that well -- he remarked that they were such a beautiful pair with what he thought was a little too close to the "Dirty Dancing" of the time. Yes -- To Life, LuChaim -- thats Anne. We will miss her imensely -- there is no way life will be nearly good without her -- but her spirit lives on in in both big and little ways in each of us and everything we see around us.