Maria Michal

Maria Emma Michal 1916-2011 LENOX Maria Emma Michal, 94, of 235 Walker Street, Kimball Farms Retirement Community, died Thursday morning, August 4th at Kimball Farms Nursing Care Facility. Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., August 16, 1916, the daughter of Jaroslav A. and Marie Anna Wagner Michal, Maria "Ria" Michal's connections with Lenox were of very long-standing. Her father first came to the United States in 1905 at the invitation of the engineer George Westinghouse, and Ria fondly remembered visiting the Westinghouse's Lenox estate, Erskine Park, as a child. Maria grew up on Manhattan's Upper West Side and she attended schools there, particularly enjoying classes in ballet and ice skating. In 1929, while vacationing in Prague, Miss Michal's father died suddenly. After learning of the simultaneous crash of the New York Stock Exchange, her mother made the decision to remain in Europe, where Maria began her medical studies at Charles University in Prague. When the Nazis took over Czechoslovakia in 1938, the Michals, as American citizens, sought to return to New York. Denied permission to travel, they ended up being classified as POWs once the U.S. entered the war. The Germans closed the University to Czech students, so Maria was forced to give up her plans for a medical degree. After four years in Nazi-occupied Prague, the Michals were allowed to leave as part of a 1942 German-American exchange of stranded diplomats and citizens. A dramatic train trip to Portugal ended with the Michals returning to New York. As an eyewitness to the harsh realities of the Nazi occupation, Ria spoke to American students at several U.S. Information Agency events - memorably one in Boston where the headliner canceled, and she ended up going on for Frank Sinatra. Ria applied for and won an Ada Comstock Scholarship to Smith College in Northampton, where she earned her BA degree in Education in 1945. Picking up the thread of her interrupted medical studies, Maria worked for many years at New York Hospital, where she became administrator of Rockefeller University's blood research program - The New York Blood Center. An avid skier and lover of the outdoors, she and her lifelong companion, Aglaia Hodza, were frequent visitors to the Berkshires and retired to Lenox 1982. Miss Hodza - "Glasha" - was the daughter of independent Czechoslovakia's last Prime Minister - Milan Hodza - a brilliant internationalist who began his career as an aide-de-camp to Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand of Austria. Miss Michal served for many years on the vestry of Trinity Church, and was a longstanding member of the Lenox Club. With Miss Hodza, she continued to ski into her eighties. Following the loss of her friend Glasha in 1995, she moved to Kimball Farms, where she was fortunate to enjoy another fifteen years and make many valuable new connections . While Ria leaves no immediate family, she will be sadly missed by Miss Hodza's nephews and nieces and by the family of her lifelong friends, Maria and Milos Krofta. FUNERAL NOTICE: The funeral will be 11 a.m. Saturday, August 27th at Trinity Church with reception to follow at the Lenox Club. A private burial service will take place at a later date in Fern Cliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, NY. In lieu of flowers, donations in Maria's memory may be made to Trinity Church, in care of the ROCHE FUNERAL HOME, 120 Main Street, Lenox, MA, 01240.