Gerry Cristol

Gerry Cristol was born in 1935 in Haverhill, Massachusetts. She attended grammar school in Massachusetts and was the only Jewish child in school there at the time. After high school, she attended Goucher College and met her husband, Charlie, who was originally from San Antonio, at age 21. After marrying, they moved together to Dallas. When her children were young, Gerry went to SMU and obtained a Master’s in History. She became the archivist at Temple Emanu-El, authored the book entitled A Light in the Prairie, and also became the President of the Dallas Jewish Historical Society.

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Miriam Creemer

Miriam Creemer was born in Calgary in 1936 to Polish immigrant parents. Miriam grew up in a very close-knit family and later attended the University of Alberta, where she graduated with a degree in teaching. She became a teacher in one of the largest elementary schools in Calgary and later was head of the English Department at the Jewish day school that she had attended when she was a young child. Miriam met her husband, Al, in Vancouver, British Columbia, and they moved to the United States in the late 1970s. When she first arrived, she worked at an old age home and really grew to love working with seniors. After moving to Dallas, she eventually became the Director of the JCC Senior Adult Program, where she worked for 20 years. Miriam instituted a senior drama group, choir, reading club, and many other programs that she led. As a speaker of Yiddish, she shares her passion for the language and translates and teaches it as well.

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Annette Corman

Annette Corman was born in 1937 in Chicago, Illinois, but moved with her family shortly thereafter to Texas. Annette grew up in Corpus Christi and attended high school there as well. After high school, she attended the University of Michigan and the University of Cincinnati. In 1991, she married Jack Corman, and combined their families. They have five children and multiple grandchildren. Annette has been involved in Temple Emanu-El’s Sisterhood in addition to Brandeis Women’s book group while working as a stock broker for over 25 years.

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Judy Cohn

Judy Cohn was born in 1935 in Brooklyn, New York. As a child, she studied piano and dance for many years at Carnegie Hall, at Ballet Arts, and also at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. She attended Abraham Lincoln High School in Brooklyn and then went to NYU for a year before she transferred to Brooklyn College, where she studied Secretarial Studies. Judy married her husband, Norman, in 1956, and they settled in North Dallas. At the Jewish Community Center, Judy worked in the kindergarten, became the music specialist for the preschool, and also served as Cultural Programs Director. Judy has also served as the Executive Director of the Richardson Symphony and went back to school to receive a degree in Arts Administration. Judy has been a giving member and leader of Dallas’s Jewish community.

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Dr. Mona Hersh Cochran

 

Dr. Mona Hersh CochranMona Hersh Cochran was born in 1934 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and grew up in Atlantic City, New Jersey. After high school, Mona went to Rutgers University, where she got her degree in economics and attended Temple University  to work on her Master’s. Then, she moved to Dallas in 1960, and eventually became the first female recipient of a Ph.D. from SMU, successfully defending her doctoral dissertation in the economics department. She began a long career as a professor of economics at Texas Woman’s University, where she had begun teaching during her last year of Ph.D. studies. Mona was a 1991 recipient of TWU’s most prestigious award for faculty, the Cornaro Outstanding Professor Award, and received SMU’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 1995.

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Esther Bramnik

Esther BramnikEsther Bramnik, the oldest of four children, was born in 1934 in Havana, Cuba. Esther’s father came from Syria to Cuba at age 13 and became a jeweler. Esther is a very musical woman who loved playing piano and singing as a young girl. She met her husband, Maurice, at her home during a party that her parents had put together, and they married in 1957. She moved to the United States in 1961 with her husband and two children and eventually her whole family moved out of Cuba. They settled initially in Miami but ended up in Dallas. Appreciative of her new life in America and the welcome she received from the Dallas Jewish community, Esther has always been interested in giving back to the community.

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