Gordon Streib

GORDON FRANKLIN STREIB,

Noted Gerontologist Dies at 92.

Gordon Streib, 92, died February 17, 2011 at Oak Hammock Continuing Care Retirement Community (CCRC) in Gainesville, FL. He was grateful to have lived at Oak Hammock for 7 years with his beloved wife of 67 years, Ruth. Dr. Streib retired from the University of Florida as a Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus of Sociology in 1988.

An internationally known scholar of retirement housing, Dr. Streib and Dr. Ray Coward made a presentation to then UF President John Lombardi and began a process resulting in the development of Oak Hammock, a CCRC affiliated with the University of Florida. Dr. Streib and his wife, Ruth, were residents of Oak Hammock and were active participants in the residential community.

Dr. Streib was born in Rochester, New York in 1918. Although his parents were unable to send him to college, the pastor of his church noted that he was a bright young man with college potential. As a result, the minister made it possible for Gordon to attend North Central College in Naperville, Illinois. He received a BA in history in 1941. As World War II was looming, Gordon registered as a Conscientious Objector and served in widely diverse capacities that included building roads in upstate New York, serving as a cook's helper at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, and volunteering for human hunger experiments. He met his wife, Ruth Boyer, in the kitchen at the hospital where she served as a student dietician. They married in 1944. While working at the hospital he attended the New School of Social Research and received his master's degree in sociology in 1946. After the war he helped transport horses to Poland for the American Friends Service committee in order to help rebuild Poland's agricultural stock.

Dr. Streib received his Ph.D. in sociology from Columbia University in 1954. As a graduate assistant for Paul F. Lazarsfeld, Gordon completed his dissertation research on the Navajo reservation at Four Corners in New Mexico where he took his young family to live on the reservation in the early 1950s.

Gordon began his teaching career at Cornell University in 1949. While at Cornell, he was the recipient of two Fulbright scholarships and completed research on aging in Denmark in 1959 and in Ireland in 1966. Both resulted in widely distributed publications. After teaching there for twenty-six years, Gordon retired from Cornell as Professor Emeritus in 1975. Shortly thereafter, he joined the faculty of the University of Florida as a Graduate Research Professor of Sociology. While at Florida, he undertook a wide variety of local, state, national, and international programs and activities and research activities.

Dr. Streib was the author or editor of eight books, 150 journal articles, and numerous book chapters. Among his well-known books are Retirement in American Society: Impact and Process, with Clement J. Schneider (Cornell University Press, 1971) and Old Homes-New Families, with W. Edward Folts and Mary Ann Hilker (Columbia University Press, 1984).

Dr. Streib was a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America, Social Science Editor for the Journal of Gerontology, a frequent member of NIH Study Sections for research on aging, a member of the Board of Directors of the Andrus Foundation of the American Association of Retired Persons, and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters degree by Waterloo University, Ontario Canada. He was honored by the Gerontological Society of America with the Robert W. Kleemeir Award for Outstanding Research, and received the "Distinquished Contributor to Sociology of Aging" from the American Sociological Association. He was a founding member of the Southern Gerontological Society which named their Gordon F. Streib Distinguished Academic Gerontologist Award after him. As an example of Dr. Streib's indomitable spirit, when he was 90 years of age, he and his wife, Ruth, drove from Gainesville to St. Petersburg, FL to attend the annual meeting of the Southern Gerontological Society in 2009. They never missed one of these meetings and they always attended as a couple - which is quite rare for married attendees of annual professional meetings.

It is easy to note a person's professional accomplishments in a short obituary. It is much more difficult, however, to communicate the humanity embodied in a person who meant so much to so many others. As Gordon's daughter said: "Dad could talk to anyone - he was fundamentally interested in human beings - a true social scientist - a quality that made him a great field researcher."

Ruth Streib, Gordon's wife and companion, died just one day after he died and a family member said: "It was absolutely a blessing that they died so close together in time...because neither one would have wanted to go on without the other."

Dr. Streib's survivors include his children, Nelson A. Streib of Watsonville, CA, Larry Streib of Watsonville, CA, Marshall G. Streib of Gainesville Florida and Carol S. Nielsen of Evanston, IL, his grandchildren, Peter R. Nielsen and Christopher G. Nielsen, and his sister Doris Smith of Rochester, New York. Among Gordon's "survivors" should also be counted the many students, colleagues, and friends whose lives he enriched.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to American Friends Service Committee, Haven Hospice of Gainesville, Florida, or the UF Department of Sociology for the Gordon and Ruth Streib Graduate Scholarship Award. Following a private service, there will be a Celebration of Life program and reception held in The Oak Room at Oak Hammock on Saturday April 2, 2011 at 3:30 PM. Milam Funeral and Cremation Services 311 S. Main Street Gainesville, FL 32601 (352) 376-5361