David G. Zuckerman

David G. Zuckerman, who lived in Slate Hill for 33 years and practiced law in Goshen, died on Monday, April 17 at Horton Hospital. He was 67.

Born in Brooklyn in 1938, he was the son of the late George and Charlotte Zuckerman. He was a devoted and much-loved husband, father, sibling, lawyer and neighbor.

He was also a talented writer, who wrote poetry, as well as beautiful letters to his family and friends. He loved to play guitar, which he learned as a young man and took up again a few years ago. He was taking lessons at the time of his death. Growing up in Brooklyn, he was a loyal Brooklyn Dodgers fan. Later, under the influence of his wife of nearly 40 years, Rita, he became a reluctant follower of the New York Yankees, and they spent hours watching games together. In addition to music, especially classical and jazz, he loved the arts in general-something he instilled in his three children: a composer, an actor, and an arts journalist. He also adored his chocolate lab, who often accompanied him to the office.

After graduating from the University of Vermont and Brooklyn Law School, he was an attorney with Maritime Overseas Corporation/Overseas Shipholding Company in Manhattan. In 1972, after returning from an extended trip to Europe with his wife, he left the city, hung a shingle and opened his own practice on Route 211 in Middletown. His clients, some of whom he worked with over the course of three decades, say he offered them an unusual level of concern and generosity.

He served as the Wawayanda Town Attorney for 10 years. He had been a member of the Minisink Valley school district board of education, and a member of the Orange County Department of Social Services child abuse diagnostic team. He served as the chairman of the Orange County Bar Association's Family Law Committee and was a member of the Middletown Bar Association.

He was the senior class president of Long Beach High School (Long Island) and was joyously helping to organize his 50th reunion, planned for this June.

He will be missed terribly.

Survivors include his wife, Rita; daughter Alicia Zuckerman and companion, Mark Opatow, of Manhattan; daughter Cady Zuckerman, of Brooklyn; son and daughter-in-law Jeremy Zuckerman and Susan Miller, of Los Angeles, California; sister and brother-in-law, Linda and Eli Sloves, of Poughkeepsie; brother and sister-in-law Lawrence and Catherine Zuckerman, of New Gloucester, Maine; aunt and uncle Evelyn and Hyman Rosenblum, of Marlboro; father-in-law Sam Adelman, of Tampa, Florida; and many cousins, nieces, nephews and friends.

Funeral service will be held Friday, April 21 at noon, at Doulin's Funeral Home, 318 North Montgomery St., Newburgh.

Interment will follow at Agudas Israel Cemetery in New Windsor.

The family will be sitting shiva at their home in Slate Hill, following interment on Friday, Saturday evening and Sunday.

In lieu of flowers, donations in David Zuckerman's name may be made to the American Heart Association, P.O. Box 3049, Syracuse, NY 13220-3049 or www.americanheart.org.