Ludwig Bauman General Manager & and GNYHFA Executive Director Irving Sherman Passes at 97

Furniture World Magazine

- Eulogy for Irving Sherman, April 1, 2001, Rabbi Kenneth S. Weiss I don’t think that any of us will remember Irving Sherman for his ability to engage in small talk. It’s not that he couldn’t carry on a conversation about the weather. Rather, Irving’s genuine interest and curiosity relegated small talk to no more than a few seconds so that he could move on and say, "Tell me something new, something I don’t know." Irving wanted to know about you, about each of us, about our lives. He was energized by information. It’s no wonder, then, that the man who never had time for small talk found time for so many other things. Irving was a cross country runner and a champion tennis player in high school. He became a champion ballroom dancer who loved the mambo and tango, and eventually taught at the Arthur Murry dance studios. He enjoyed riding horses and fishing off Montauk, Long Island. And Irving turned his talent in downhill skiing into a stint with the Lake Placid Ski Patrol in the 1920’s, an experience that left him with so many good memories that he attended the ski club’s sixtieth reunion. Irving took the time to dress sharply, and to enjoy a good cigar. Irving was born in 1904 as Isadore Asherman, and grew up in the Bronx. His mother had tuberculosis so Irving and his sister Belle spent much of their childhood shuttled from one aunt to another, and they were often separated from each other. Irving met his wife, Fannie, at a dance in the 1920’s and they spent almost fifty years together before Fannie died in 1972. After Fannie’s death Irving married June Morrison and was fortunate to spend more than ten wonderful years with her before she died in 1988. Both Fannie and June are buried right here, next to Irving. It’s likely that Irving succeeded in the home furnishing business because his own childhood taught him the value of a stable and secure home. After graduating from City College in New York Irving worked at Ludwig Bowman from 1929 until 1957, much of that time as General Manager. He became a leading figure in the home furnishings business and served as the Executive Director for the Greater New York Home Furnishings Association. Irving also spent some time as a senior executive for the New York restaurant chain, Brass Rail, and even bought and sold wine for a short period. Irving was a macher, an important person who knew how to speak with people and easily earned their heartfelt admiration and respect. When entering a restaurant, maitre’d’s and waitresses would welcome him as if he were their largest tipper during the past year. In turn, Irving did not just know how to ask the right questions, but in addition, he was sincerely concerned about a person’s well being. Irving loved to use any connection or knowledge he had to help someone else. Perhaps he liked helping people because it made him feel needed, or vital, or he simply had a big heart. Who knows? But even during his last days, Irving asked you how your life was going. Irving’s professional experience and personality matched each other perfectly. Irving’s realistic side and his sentimentality endeared him not only to his family, but also, to those people he would meet in daily life. As a realist, Irving would disdain many of the awards he received during his life. He didn’t see the use in dwelling on history, including his own. Instead he focused on the here and now. If you were at dinner with Irving, he was completely there, focused. Of all the awards that Irving threw into shoeboxes, only one stayed with him - the Meadoff Memorial Award for Sportsmanship presented to him by the Greater New York Home Furnishings Association in 1951. The award acknowledged Irving’s sense of fair play and fairmindedness, along with his support for humane and philanthropic causes. As a sentimental person, Irving took great pride in his children, Roger and Marian, both of whom predeceased Irving; his grandchildren, Michael and Sally, Susie and Andrew, Steve and Susie, Suzanne and Robbie, and Jennifer; and his great-grandchildren, Thomas, Tucker and Daniel, Austin, and Isaac. It was to be closer to Roger and a manageable distance to the family in the Bay Area that in 1997 Irving moved from New York, his home for more than ninety years, to Los Angeles. Recently his eyes would well up at the mention of Isaac or Suzanne and Robbie’s wedding. And he took great pride in first seeing Roger off to Yale, and then helping Steve move into the same school almost thirty years later. Irving would also go out of his way to care for you, as he did in the 1930’s when his life-long friend Howard Quh’s ex-wife died. Irving knew that it would be inappropriate for Howard, who had since remarried, to take care of his ex-wife’s possessions, so Irving took the responsibility himself. Irving had a sense of humor that ran from slightly raunchy to politically correct. Once a pretty, young woman sat down next to Irving, by this time well into his ninety’s. Irving evidently gave the woman a look, and she said, "Don’t worry, I don’t bite." To this, Irving replied, "That’s a pity." Upon leaving a doctor’s office recently Irving said to Patrick Quh, "I have a clean bill of health - now I can die in peace!" But if the you began a joke that Irving sensed would have an insulting punch line, he would say, "If that disparages anyone, I don’t want to hear it." He also loved a well placed Yiddish phrase. I cannot deny the pain we feel now that Irving, someone so close to us, has died. But we have the good fortune to celebrate Irving’s life and we are privileged that he touched our lives. All I need to do is visualize the picture of Irving, Roger, Steve and Isaac together - the picture I hope everyone here has an opportunity to see - and I know, as we all know, that we will always be with Irving, and Irving will always be with us. Steven Sherman's Remarks May our memories of Irving Sherman be a blessing to each of us. Irving was no spring chicken when he died, having lived nearly the entire 20th Century. But I will always associate Irving with spring, for Irving was born in the spring—May 5—and died in the spring. And he lived a life that was spring-like, emergent and in full bloom. I always viewed Irving as a might oak tree: solid, sturdy, tall, well-balanced, dignified. While nearly everyone knew him only as "Irving" or occasionally as "Mr. Sherman", I knew him as "Grampa" my whole life. I will deeply miss him. Being a Californian, I didn’t see Grampa Irving much until I was 17, when I came back east for college. During my ten years on the East Coast, I visited with Grampa Irving frequently. I could always talk with him about deeply meaningful things in my life, and he would ask me questions that cut to the core issues I was grappling with, whether it was about career, family, or my love life. I cherished our many visits, too, after he moved to the West Coast, to be closer to family. Irving lived life well, with dignity and purpose. He sought to help others. Even when he was in the hospital a few weeks ago, he was talking about organizing breakfast for twelve, including the intensive care unit staff, patients, and my cousin Suzi, my sister Suzanne, and myself, who were with him there. We thought he was a bit confused—talking about breakfast for twelve while in intensive care—but then he said that he was simply doing something to occupy his mind, and that was to do what he always did well: bring people together, to organize events, and to share good food and conversation, and to make everyone feel comfortable and at home. Although he never managed to teach me to enjoy smoking a cigar, which he did for more than 80 years, and enjoyed smoking a cigar even just three weeks ago, Irving taught me to enjoy life, to live it well Irving’s life very much reflects this statement by Jacob Philip Rudin [Steve found it the Bay Area Center for Jewish Healing book on mourning]: "When we are dead, and people weep for us and grieve, let it be because we touched their lives with beauty and simplicity. Let it not be said that life was good to us, but rather, thatwe were good to life." And were he able to speak right now, I have a strong feeling that Irving would raise a glass and say "L’Chaim!"