Norwood Couple Gertrude and Louis Feldman Prove Retirement is for Achieving-August 4, 1981

⠀

Retirement is often thought of as a time to putter around the garden, play bridge, and take it easy, but 68-year-old Gertrude “Gert” Feldman and her husband, Louis Feldman of Norwood, strongly disagree. “I wanted to take the time to achieve something I couldn’t when I was younger,” explained Gert. “I’m filling the need for giving, for serving, which I didn’t have time for when I had to work for a living.” As the only husband-and-wife team among the 2,850 volunteers in the School Volunteer for Boston program, the Feldmans spend one day a week tutoring children in reading and math at the Henry L. Higginson School in Roxbury—situated right across the street from the Jewish Memorial Hospital, where Gert previously worked for 26 years, working her way from clerk to director of admissions and patient accounts before retiring in 1978 and enrolling at Curry College.

Beyond mentoring third-graders—where Lou even plays second base on the third-grade baseball team and proudly unrolls handmade banners gifted by students—the couple dedicates their time to leading a weekly discussion group at the Ellis Nursing Center in Norwood. Armed with travel slides, newspaper clippings, and topics ranging from Social Security and busing to condominium conversions and women’s liberation, the Feldmans encourage residents to engage with today’s world rather than just “vegetate.” “The main thing is to get them out of their shells,” noted Lou, who also works two days a week at the Allen Pen Company in Newton. Nancy Gregory, volunteer coordinator at the Ellis Nursing Center, praised the couple’s impact, stating, “The group is certainly stimulating for the residents, and that’s what volunteers can do—make patients feel that they are part of the mainstream of life.”

Lifelong activists whose roots date back to the union marches of the 1930s in Dorchester and Mattapan, the Feldmans continue to pack their schedules with learning and community service. While Gert studies at Curry College and plans to teach Yiddish at the Brockton Community Center, Lou is an active member of the Norwood Camera Club. Looking ahead, the energetic couple hopes to learn Spanish to tutor bilingual students, organize senior field trips, and bridge generations through an oral history project. They are proud parents to two children—Dr. Norman Levinsky, chairman of the Boston University School of Medicine, and Ellen Sussman of New Jersey—along with five grandchildren.

Archival Note: This article has been dynamically reconstructed from the original public record print archives of the Patriot Ledger