Mira Lee Goldstein
Mira Lee Goldstein, 95, a first-grade Sunday school teacher at Temple Emanuel for more than 30 years, passed away Feb. 7, 2017. Rabbi Bernard Gerson and Cantor Saul Rosenthal officiated at the Feb. 10 service at Rodef Shalom. Interment followed at Emanuel Cemetery. Feldman Mortuary made the arrangements.
Mrs. Goldstein grew up in a pioneering farm family on South Dakota’s Western Slope. Her Ukrainian immigrant parents, Sam and Rose Bober, lived in Newell, SD, population 700.
Her father, an internationally known farmer, rancher and seed developer, met with President Calvin Coolidge in 1927 to discuss farm policy. Six-year-old Mira Lee was photographed next to “Silent Cal” at a farm picnic during his visit.
President Eisenhower nominated Mr. Bober, who ran for Congress as the Democratic standard bearer in 1950, to the Federal Farm Credit Bureau board. Mrs. Bober stayed in Newell, where she was an admired hostess and cook.
Mrs. Goldstein was educated at Stephens College in Missouri and the University of Illinois, where she studied social work and education.
After working as a social worker at Chicago’s famed Hull House, she moved to Denver.
She met Henry Goldstein through the Temple Emanuel couples supper club.
They were married on July 24, 1949, at Emanuel.
Already a teacher, Mrs. Goldstein taught first-grade Sunday school students at the temple more than three decades. She also was a substitute teacher for DPS.
In the 1970s, Mrs. Goldstein joined the Colorado Committee of Concern for Soviet Jewry and became one of its most dedicataed advocates.
She wrote letters to public officials, attended rallies and took up the cause of “refusnik” Abe Stolar, who shared her mother’s maiden name. When Stolar was finally permitted to leave the Soviet Union, he came to Denver to personally thank Mrs. Goldstein for her efforts on his behalf.
Mr. Goldstein passed away on July 5, 2016.
A resident of Denver’s Congress Park neighborhood since 1951, Mrs. Goldstein took energetic walks and was highly regarded for her home-cooked pastries, cinnamon roles, pies and meals.
Since 1982, she belonged to belonged to Rodef Shalom.
Mrs. Goldstein is survived by her brother Jack Bober of Rancho San Bernardo, Calif.; daughters Bonnie (Morris) Haimowitz of Aurora and Helene Michael) Lohman of Omaha, Neb., and son Edward (Melanie Flamenbaum) Goldstein of Potomac, Md.; grandchildren Rebecca Haimowitz-King of Simi Valley, Calif., Benjamin and Justin Lee Lohman of Omaha and Brooks Goldstein of Potomac; and great-grandson Asher Haimowitz-King of Simi Valley.
She was predeceased by her grandson Russell Goldstein.
Contributions may be made to the Russell Elliott Goldstein Memorial Fund, c/o Jewish Communal Fund, 575 Madison Ave., Suite 703, New York, NY 10022; or JFS.
Copyright © 2017 by the Intermountain Jewish News
