Irving Joseph Spitzberg, Jr.

Irving and I were classmates at Pulaski Heights Junior High School and Hall High School. There we had many classes and activities together, including marching bands at both places. During high school, we also did research with Dan Mathews at the University of Arkansas Graduate Institute of Technology. During the year the Little Rock schools were closed, we participated in a book club of sorts (often meeting at Martha Sue Brown´s house which was across the street from Irving´s parents' house)...

I have known Irving since we were in elementary school together in Little Rock. We shared a lot of experiences in Junior High and High School. We even overlapped one year at Columbia. My fondest memories of him, however, are the times we connected later in adulthood. I think that's because he was years ahead of most of us in knowing who he was, and what his mission in life was. It took me a long time to catch up with him. I don't think I ever really did. Irving Spitzberg, Jr. was special....

Irving and I entered Pulaski Heights Junior High School in Little Rock shortly after Labor Day, September 1954. We met either that year or the next. Since so many here have known and written about Irving in his post-Little Rock years, I thought I would make a few comments about Irving in Little Rock before Columbia, Oxford, and Yale whisked him away. I might note here that early on-that is in junior high--I learned that Irving had focus and purpose to spare and, furthermore, when he...

It was always a treat, when the family convened during holidays, to be astounded by whatever fangled tie, suspenders, or whacky t-shirt Irving would be sporting that season. His humor was forever present, and situationally undaunted. Excellent at questions, and thorough with his answers, I was always fascinated by the depth & breadth of his knowledge. His deep honor and pride in his roots and family made him an uncle to look up to. Thank you for gracing my World Irving, your humor and great...

I met Irving when he and Ginny were here in Lacey WA visiting Ginny's mother, Dorothy. I was overseeing her care, managing her bookkeeping and being her friend. Irving was very interested in the business I had created in 1984 which included overseeing the care and living of Seniors in their own homes. Ginny and I became good friends and I have enjoyed visiting them in their home after Dorothy had passed away. They were a wonderful couple and I admired and have appreciated their...

I met Irving after befriending Ginny, and I had the great pleasure of visiting them many times in their delightful Monkton home as part of a small singing ensemble they just loved to feed and hear laughing and singing in their living room. He was the only Jewish Santa I've ever known, and his flair for dressing the part prompted my husband to dub him "the jolly elf." He was, indeed, that and ever so much more ... RIP you marvelous man.