December 10, 2020

Marsha Lefkof

Marsha's family roots reach across continents. Her paternal grandfather was born in Vilnius, Lithuania, and came to the United States around 1918 to avoid being drafted into the Lithuanian army. Taken off his ship in Boston with smallpox, he was separated from his brother, who could not disembark until reaching Mexico. The two lost contact for 50 years before being reunited, and their Mexican branch of the family, originally named Karakowski before her grandfather changed it to Gordon, thrived and later spread to Monterrey and Houston. Other relatives perished in the Holocaust. Her paternal grandmother was born in Boston, and her mother's family came from the Minsk area of Belarus and settled in Providence.

Marsha grew up in Providence until age 11, roller-skating through her Jewish neighborhood, then moved to Lawrence, Massachusetts, where her father worked in men's clothing. Her mother, who died when Marsha was 16, was an active volunteer with Jewish organizations, sang in the synagogue choir, and instilled a lifelong love of service. Marsha was active in her temple youth group and volunteered at a cerebral palsy clinic, which sparked her interest in physical therapy. She attended the University of Connecticut, worked in Connecticut and Michigan, and earned an advanced degree at Boston University before taking a teaching position that brought her to Dallas.

In Dallas, Marsha married Gary, a physician she met soon after arriving, and the couple raised two daughters, Heather and Melissa. She threw herself into community life through Federation's Younger Set, NCJW, Hadassah, and city politics, serving on the Cultural Affairs Commission for about six years and as president of the Dallas Chamber Orchestra. She helped launch cultural arts at the JCC and co-chaired a year-long JCRC project commemorating the expulsion of Jews from Spain, which helped identify some 1,000 Sephardic Jews in Dallas. A longtime member of Temple Emanu-El and later Congregation Shalom, she has directed the Shalom gift shop for about three and a half years.

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