LAWRENCE JENKINS BRAMAN

1944 - 2021

BRAMAN, Lawrence Jenkins Of Cambridge, MA, died peacefully on the morning of December 18, 2021, due to complications of cancer. The son of Chester Alwyn Braman, Jr. and Gladys Pomeroy Jenkins, Larry was born into a life of privilege, but he chose to spend his life improving the world for others. Larry was educated at The International School in Geneva, Switzerland, Yale and Columbia Universities, and he was a Loeb Fellow at Harvard's Graduate School of Design. Larry's long and successful career focused largely on affordable housing and community development. He served on the MA. Architectural Access Board, held positions at Greater Boston Community Development (now The Community Builders), Urban Edge (a community development organization based in Boston's Jamaica Plain neighborhood), the Boston Department of Neighborhood Development (DND), and finally at the Cambridge Building Department where he reviewed building plans for their compliance with architectural access requirements. He retired earlier this year. Larry was a kind and gentle man whose intelligence was often revealed in his sharp wit. Never one to complain, it is remarkable that he happily greeted the world from a wheelchair for the last 52 years of his life following a diving accident in 1969 that left him a quadriplegic. Larry is survived by his half-sisters, Mary Stevens Fillman and Gladys Stevens Thacher, many nieces and nephews, many great-nieces and nephews, and many close friends. A gathering to Celebrate Larry's extraordinary life will be held later in the spring. Donations in Larry's memory may be made to the Boston Center for Independent Living, 60 Temple Place, Boston, MA 02111.