Dr. Bernard Z. Friedlander

Dr. Bernard Z. Friedlander

April 22, 1927 - Feb. 22, 2023

MADISON - Dr. Bernard Z. Friedlander, Research Professor of Human Development (Emeritus), University of Hartford.

Dr. Bernard Z. Friedlander, Ph.D, "B.Z." to his many friends and family, died in his sleep in Madison, WI, on February 22, 2023. He was 95 years old.

Bernard was born in Brooklyn, NY, on April 22, 1927, to Joseph Friedlander, a successful optician, and Estelle Zuckert, a public school teacher. He had a happy and comfortable childhood in the house that his father built in Scarsdale NY. He attended and graduated from the neighborhood public schools.

Bernard's undergraduate studies at Middlebury College in Vermont were interrupted by basic Army training at Fort Knox. He fully expected to ship out to the Pacific Theater, but the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war. He completed his degree in American Literature and History in 1950.

Bernard worked in local journalism and at the Cambridge University Press during the fifties and was part of the Manhattan literary scene, where he knew e. e. cummings, Marianne Moore, Bayard Rustin, George Gamow and Barbara Perkins.

He was inspired to pursue graduate studies by renowned research psychologist Dr. Evelyn Hooker. He received his Ph.D in Research Psychology from Case Western Reserve University in 1962.

He launched his academic career at the Case Western Mental Development Center, studying how infants come to recognize and understand language. His team developed the PLAYTEST, a system for automated electronic assessment of infant auditory preferences in their cribs. PLAYTEST was also used to evaluate severely disabled children who had previously been considered untestable and unable to learn, demonstrating that these "untestable" children could use PLAYTEST to express preferences and learn to influence their immediate environment.

Dr. Friedlander held faculty positions at Fenn College, Cleveland State University, and the University of Wisconsin, Madison, before spending the bulk of his career as Research Professor of Human Development in the Psychology Department at the University of Hartford in Connecticut.

He was an esteemed colleague who was chosen to represent the faculty in presidential selection committees on multiple occasions at two universities. A popular teacher of human development "from womb to tomb," he was frequently invited to speak to audiences of both educators and parents.

In addition to his research on language development in children, Dr. Friedlander studied the effects of media portrayals of violence on children's learning, children's comprehension of targeted television advertising, and age-appropriate educational television programming.

Bernard was deeply marked by the American experience of World War II. In high school assemblies, the deaths of older classmates were routinely announced. He felt that his good fortune to live a long life was a direct result of the deaths of more than a hundred thousand Japanese civilians when the atom bombs were dropped. He often expressed his sorrow for all the tragedies of that war, and later expressed his opposition to war by marching with the Veterans Against the War in Vietnam. He never saw combat but was haunted and appalled by war all his life.

As a child, his mother Estelle sent him to a Quaker summer camp on the Hudson River, and he attended Friends meetings in some periods of his life. Following the Quaker practice of prison visitation, starting with German prisoners of war during WWII, Bernard maintained a regular correspondence with incarcerated people his whole life, offering the gift of supportive friendship and in a few cases, professional services and testimony on their behalf.

Bernard met his first wife, Hannah Combs, during their graduate studies at Case Western, and they married in 1959. He adopted Hannah's son Matthew, and Hannah and Bernard soon had two more children, John and Julia. Although he and Hannah eventually divorced, re-married, then divorced again, they remained committed co-parents to their children.

After his retirement in 1995, Bernard married Mary Gibson Masich of Bellevue, WA, whom he had met again at his 50th high school reunion. He became step-parent and grandparent to Mary's adult children, Jeffrey Masich, Andrew Masich, Amy Masich Niermeyer and Julie Masich Faulkner, and to their children. Through Mary, he became an active member of the community at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Medina, WA, but declining to hide or disavow his Jewish heritage and agnostic beliefs, he described himself as an "Agnohebrewpalian."

Bernard returned to Madison in 2004, but maintained personal ties in Bellevue for many years. He found professional camaraderie and intellectual engagement as a participant in the multi-disciplinary Chaos and Complex Systems Discussion Group at the UW-Madison, and he treasured the community to which he was welcomed at Madison's St. Andrew's Episcopal Church.

Bernard had remarkable energy, joie de vivre and an appetite for adventure. He was a lively raconteur and provocateur who loved nothing more than a rollicking conversation about a complex problem. He made friends easily, among them many of his former graduate students, and valued them enormously. He enjoyed travel, opera, literature, scientific discovery, intellectual engagement, a nice plate of oysters, and a brisk sail in a good small boat.

While at Middlebury, he learned to fly a small plane, which he and buddy Jim Shapiro piloted on a cross-country trek. In mid-life, he learned to play polo and played regularly without ever having the resources to own a horse. In his later years, up to his last conversations, Bernard maintained that he was "the luckiest old man in America."

Bernard was predeceased by his brother, Henry (d.1995); his wife, Hannah (d. 2012); and his wife, Mary (d. 2014); as well as step-sons-in-law: Keith Faulkner and Bruce Niermeyer. He is survived by three children: Matthew (Kathleen Fish), John, (Debi Miller; and previously, Marcia Minnick), and Julia Friedlander; four grandchildren: Keith Friedlander, Jesse Friedlander, Noah Friedlander and Emily Friedlander; four great-grandchildren, and numerous step-grandchildren.

Bernard's family extends special thanks to UW Health providers Drs. Thomas Shiffler, Robert Przybelski and staff; to the staff of Oakwood Village, of whom he was very fond; and to the St. Andrew's community, especially Father Andy and the Polet-Hawkins family. We are grateful for the kind, compassionate care given by the Agrace Hospice team during his final days, and for SAIL and Moving Forward supporters who eased Bernard's transitions in his later life.

Contributions in Bernard's honor may be directed to St. Andrews, UNICEF, PBS, the American Indian College Fund, and the University of Hartford Emeriti Association Endowed Scholarship Fund.

For online condolences visit www.FuneralHome.com.