Helen Schneider

1933 - 2021

Helen Schneider
June 8, 1933 - February 20, 2021
Our loving mother, grandmother, and aunt Helen Schneider passed away on February 20, 2021 at her home in Berkeley. She was 87.

She told family members gathered around her in her final days, "I want you to know I had a good life."

Helen was the third of four children born to Max Slavin and Sophie Goldman Slavin, Russian Jewish refugees who met and married in San Francisco. Their families emigrated to the city at the turn of the last century to escape anti-Jewish pograms in their native country.

Helen grew up in a large and loving family of aunts, uncles, and cousins in San Francisco's Western Addition. They were part of a vibrant community of immigrant families from the shtetls of Eastern Europe. Her father was a grocer in the days before supermarkets. He operated a fruit and vegetable stall in the old Bay City Market at 945 Market St.

Helen graduated from Washington High School in 1951. Along with her cousin and life-long friend Faye Rimon, she was a self-described bobby-soxer who adored Frank Sinatra.

She married Sanford Schneider in 1953. The newlyweds lived in Germany where Sandy was stationed in the service. When they returned, they opened the Record City music store on Telegraph Ave. in Berkeley. From 1956-1973, Record City was a welcoming home to music lovers, including student activists involved in the historic events of the era.

They later established Contractor's License Courses of Oakland, a test preparation center for the state exam that operated into the early 2000s.

Helen served on the staff of the Berkeley Art Center in the 1970s, the California School of Professional Psychology in the 1980s, and the Oakland Men's Project in the 1990s. She was a long-time volunteer at the Women's Cancer Resource Center and at Long Life Medical Center.

She was a founding member of Berkeley's Congregation Netivot Shalom, which originated in the Schneider home on Marin Ave, over many decades a place of family and community gatherings filled with music, laughter, wonderful meals, and Jewish ritual.

Helen was a familiar figure in Berkeley, easily spotted by her distinctive white hair. Friends and family were forever amazed that wherever she went, someone would inevitably recognize her and come over to share old stories and new adventures.

Helen was very much the loving matriarch of her extended family. She and her late siblings, Thelma Proweller, Jerry Slavin, and Bernie Slavin were uniquely kind and caring people who sustained their love for one another throughout their lives.

Helen's husband Sandy and her son Matthew predeceased her. She is survived by her daughter and son-in-law Lauren and Matt Bryant of Walnut Creek, their children Karli, Meagan, and Max; her son Matthew's children Eric, Sophia, and Andrew, Andrew's wife Nicole, and their son Dominic.

Burial was at Rolling Hills Cemetery on February 25, 2021.