Dr. Roslyn S. Fletcher Obituary (1923 - 2023)

Dr. Roslyn S. Fletcher, age 99¾, of Minneapolis, passed away July 19, 2023. She was preceded in death by husband, Edward; parents,Haim and Anuta Silber; and brother, Hertzl Silber. Survived by daughters, Judith Fletcher (John Rathé), Dr. Deborah Fletcher, and Dr. Carolyn (Kevin) Brochman; grandchildren, Adam Kruma, Zarya Rathé (Chris Wright), Anuta Rathé (Alejandro Ceballos); great-grandchildren, Gwinna and Maia Rathé, and Olivia Kuncar; siblings, Leo Silber and Leon Silber, and Edith (Joseph) Bookstein; and many students. Roslyn was born in Daugavpils, Latvia, October 22, 1923. She spent her childhood in Krustpils where her parents, Haim and Anuta, grandmother,Levenson, and the 5 children lived behind a small dry goods store. Anuta was an educated woman, teacher, skilled clothing designer and seamstress, and Roslyn loved beautiful clothes. When Haim, a cartographer, photographer, artist, builder of buildings, roads, and clay pipe infrastructure requested a permit to build a second story sleeping loft for the children, it was denied- as was the unofficial but usual practice for Jewish property. True to his revolutionist character, Haim refused to tear it down. A crew was sent who shredded it like a tornado, leaving the house flooding with each rainstorm. In 1937, once Roslyn’s too-frail-to-travel grandmother died, Haim obtained 7 visas to the US, and distracted the secret police by applying for a passport to Poland. With the advice of Roslyn’s school principal who predicted she would be a brilliant student, Haim demolished what was left of the house and sold the empty lot to the city. While Haim dismantled the house giving usable materials to people in need, the family stayed with friends in nearby pine woods. They left in secrecy (not even the children had been told) for Rotterdam to board the USS Statendam to the U.S., to join family in Detroit who had earlier fled Latvia. Haim worked as a milkman. Herzl (13) and Leo (8) were expected to help support the family by working for their uncle and learning watch making and the jewelry business. The youngest were 4-year-old twins Edith and Leon. Roslyn (14)--as a kindred spirit of Haim and with nurturing support of Anuta—was unfettered by family or societal gender expectations to be a salesgirl in her uncle’s business, or women’s limited choices of nursing or social work. With scholarship support, she could study whatever she chose. At Detroit Central High School she took some classes at Cass Technical where she encountered Eddie Fletcher. She was not particularly impressed by this “jokester- not a very serious guy.” Eddie went off to WW II as a naval pilot. At Wayne University Roslyn earned her Chemistry B.S in 1945 and MS in 1948. Eddie returned to Wayne and his tenacity in wooing Ros finally lured attention away from her studies long enough to realize she liked his company, and wanted to marry him. When Ros’ Mentor, Herbert C. Brown (1979 Nobel Prize in Chemistry) left for Purdue he brought Roslyn with him, but not before she married Eddie in 1948, and he went with them to Purdue. Roslyn earned her PhD in Chemistry in 1950, defending her PhD thesis while due to deliver Judy. The men on her jury anxiously requested that she forgo the customary standing and sit, to which Roslyn replied “I’m not sick, I’m pregnant.” She insisted on thorough defense of her research, which disproved a previously published conclusion of prominent Harvard chemist, F.C. Whitmore. After 20 years of concentration on raising their children in Cleveland and then Minneapolis, Roslyn began teaching college chemistry and math at Minneapolis Community College. Over the next 20 years, she developed a special niche: mentoring students who were disadvantaged or hampered by doubt of their abilities in math and science, but were willing to work. Particularly for women students, this meant discovery that they could indeed excel in the sciences, and many went on to study nursing, and a cadre of her pre-nursing students instead became physicians. Roslyn was dedicated to social justice, beginning with civil rights sit-ins at segregated lunch counters in Detroit, League of Women Voters, active political involvement, and teaching classes for immigrants. With talented musicians and artists in the family, her dearest interests included visual arts, art history,theater, opera, the Minnesota Orchestra, and St Paul Chamber Orchestra, where she was the last survivor of a group of couples who had first row season tickets from their very first Temple Israel concert. She and her family traveled extensively. She spoke Yiddish, Russian, and Latvian fluently, German adequate for scientific lit, and enough French to learn wonderful cooking skills from neighbors during a sabbatical in France. After her retirement she enjoyed the Yiddish Vinkel, a Yiddish literature group, and exercising at the JCC doing Zumba, aerobics, and Yoga. Eddie died in 2018, and was buried on what would have been their 70th anniversary. She was fortunate to be in good health, vigor, intellect…until her last few months when, as she often said, she was “long past my expiration date” Yiddish Book Center oral Hx: https://tinyurl.com/roslynsilberoralhx Funeral service 2:00 PM, MONDAY, July 24th at ADATH YESHURUN CEMETERY CHAPEL, 5605 France Ave. S., Edina. Also available via Zoom at: http://www.hodroffs.com/RoslynFletcher In lieu of flowers, memorials preferred to Jewish Family and Children’s Service of Minneapolis, 952-546-0616, donation@jfcsmpls.org or Mazon: A Jewish Response to Hunger, www.mazon@mazon.org" title="Click to open in a new window or tab" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">www.mazon@mazon.org or Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, www.michaeljfox.org. SHIVA at 3909 Beard Avenue South, Minneapolis, MONDAY, 7/24, 4 to 8 PM and TUESDAY, 7/25, 5 to 9 pm.