Lasting Memories

Anne Blachman
Sept. 11, 1919-July 31, 2017
Palo Alto & Oakland, CA
Submitted by Susan Blachman

Anne Blachman, born September 11, 1919, died peacefully on July 31, 2017 at the age of 97 in Oakland. As per her wishes, her body was donated to Stanford Medical School through their Willed Body Program.

She was adventuresome, loved to learn, had an eager intellect and was an independent thinker; she was a voracious reader, adored connecting people (ie ‘networking’), was physically active, matter-of-fact and an excellent cook. She had considered emigrating to Palestine/Israel after receiving her BA in economics from Brooklyn College in 1941, but the outbreak of WWII put an end to that plan.

Instead, she went to work in Washington D. C., in the Office of Price Administration with the Processed Food Division, where she helped set the value of rationed products. In 1943 she took a job in the administrative offices of the Tule Lake war relocation camp. In 1945 she returned to the East Coast to work at Columbia University, and then, after the war, she traveled to Hokkaido, Japan to work for the American Red Cross running a recreation center for US serviceman where she handed out doughnuts and coffee, something that she said she hoped would allow her to meet nice young men. She next secured a job as a Research Assistant at the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, in 1948, not long after it was founded.

Thanks to a mutual friend, at the age of 34 she was introduced to Nelson Blachman. Their courtship was short and sweet. They married at a small ceremony over the Thanksgiving weekend in 1953 and continued to celebrate their anniversary on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. She joined Nelson in Washington DC and the following year moved to Palo Alto, where she lived for the next 40 years, except for sabbaticals in London, Madrid and Washington DC as well as sojourns to many other countries.

Anne was delighted to be a housewife and mother, as she had worked from a young age at the family shoe store. In her ‘free time,’ she became a personal investor for her family, exercised regularly, took classes, read, socialized and over the years derived great satisfaction from finding good deals and collecting entertaining stories at garage sales.

In 1996, she and Nelson moved to Piedmont Gardens in Oakland, where she made new friends and spent time with her children and grandchildren. Around 2008, at the age of 89, her ability to care for herself began to falter and her health took a turn for the worse. While she was not the social outgoing person she had been, she was kind and appreciative, thanking the staff and greeting everyone who passed her. Her family dubbed her condition “zen dementia” as she seemed to be happy in whatever moment she was in. Her husband, 4 years her junior, died in 2014, and although she wasn’t always aware of what was happening, when informed of his death she said “I’m sorry to hear that. He was a good man. The world needs more men like Nelson.”

She is survived by her two daughters (Susan and Nancy Blachman), their husbands (Joel Biatch and David desJardins) and four grandchildren (Isadora and Sophia Blachman-Biatch and Louis and Sarah Blachman).