Helen Lebedinsky

LEBEDINSKY, Helen Helen Lebedinsky of East Hartford, died Tuesday (June 13, 2006) at the age of 95. Born in Poland in 1911, she emigrated to the United States as an infant and grew up in Chicago. She met her husband Aron, a Russian immigrant, in an art school and after their marriage in 1932, went to the Soviet Union for a few years to escape the Great Depression and to teach children of American engineers employed by the Ford Corporation in the city of Gorky. They ended up trapped by the political system of the Soviet Union and were unable to leave for 48 years. In 1936, they moved to Moscow, where she taught at an Anglo-American school. A few years later, she became a member of the faculty of the Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages. She wrote and edited a number of textbooks on the teaching of English as a foreign language. At the outbreak of World War II, she was evacuated to the Ural Mountains with her four-year-old son and two-week-old daughter while her husband served in the army. She managed to survive and thrive under grueling circumstances, and kept the family alive and sane through the experience. She and her family finally returned to America in 1979, where she devoted her life to the rediscovery of her artistic side. She and her husband, who died in 1983, were active members of the West Hartford Art League, and after Aron's death, she continued to paint, draw, sculpt, and teach until the end of her life. In her spare time, she was an avid Scrabble player and enjoyed lively political and philosophical discussion on any level and with any age group. She was predeceased by her husband, Aron, and her son, Nahum. She is survived by daughter, Marisa Brondshpits, of East Hartford; a daughter-in-law, Betty Lebedinsky of West Hartford; two grandsons and their wives: Alex and Melissa Lebedinsky of Gaithersburg, MD, and Henry and Emily Lebedinsky of Cornelius, NC, and two great-grandchildren: Joshua and Rachel Lebedinsky. She will be greatly missed by all her friends, family, and former students. Funeral services will be held on Friday, June 16 at 12:30 p.m. in the Chapel of the Weinstein Mortuary, 640 Farmington Ave., Hartford with Rabbi Michael Pincus officiating. Interment will follow in Fairview Cemetery, West Hartford. A memorial period will be observed at the home of her daughter, Marisa, 375 Oak St., East Hartford, on Friday, following the funeral. Memorial contributions may be made to the West Hartford Art League, P.O. Box 270727, West Hartford 06127-0727 (or www.whal.org). For further information, directions, or to share memories of Helen with her family, please visit online at www.weinsteinmortuary.com.