Shirley Friedman

1934 - 2019

Shirley Friedman

July 20, 1934 – April 3, 2019

Surrounded by her husband, children, and grandchildren, Shirley Friedman died peacefully on Wednesday, April 3, at Marin General Hospital. She had been battling stomach cancer for almost three years.
Shirley Jane Stephenson was born on July 20, 1934 in Hanford, California to Byron Stephenson, an electrician, and his wife Bernice, a homemaker. Shirley attended elementary and middle schools in Hanford and Hayward, where the family moved after Byron started working at the shipyards during World War II. She graduated from Hayward High School in 1952 and then attended UC Berkeley. A serious but fun-loving student at Cal, Shirley earned her BA in Decorative Arts in 1956. She was a member of the Tri-Delta sorority, where she formed a lifelong friendship with writer Joan Didion, with whom she shared an apartment during their junior and senior years. She also took the course Introduction to Architectural Design, taught by renowned designer Charles Eames; there she met her future husband, noted architect Rodney Friedman, who was the class Teaching Assistant.
Rodney and Shirley were married on May 6 of 1956, just as Rodney was about to enter the Air Force. They soon found themselves in Frankfurt, Germany, where Rodney was stationed at Rhein-Main Air Base for two and a half years. Their daughter, Alison, was born on Valentine's Day, 1958. Once back in the Bay Area, Shirley worked on a diverse range of projects as an interior designer. The young family eventually purchased a house in Tiburon and had a son, John, who was born on August 24, 1961.
Settling into married life, Shirley was an active homemaker, using all the skills she had learned at Cal and while living on her maternal grandparents' farm in Hanford during the two times her mother was being treated for tuberculosis. She cooked wonderful meals, made her children's clothes, gardened, and designed and produced the family's Christmas cards, among many other things. She was a warm, devoted mother and a loving wife who lived exactly the life she had hoped for as a young girl.
With Bob Fisher, Rodney formed a successful architectural design partnership in 1964, Fisher Friedman Associates (FFA), and the Friedman family soon moved to a house that Rodney designed in Belvedere, where he continues to live. Shirley took up photography, eventually taking over the job of photographing the projects designed by FFA. Throughout, she enjoyed an active social life at the Tiburon Peninsula Club, where she swam and played tennis regularly. She also became an accomplished scuba diver and golfer, exploring the Great Barrier Reef in Australia and playing the courses in Scotland where the game was invented.
Though Shirley and Rodney's depression-era upbringings led them to live relatively modest lives at home, they never skimped on their global travel which, aside from sports and sightseeing, revolved around Shirley's interest in exploring her genealogical roots. This led to the discovery of her connections to the Marmaduke family, who settled in North America in 1638, and even further back, to important Scottish figures such as Robert the Bruce. Almost every year of the past decade, Rodney and Shirley made two annual trips, the first to the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel in Hawaii, often joined by their children and grandchildren, and the second to Great Britain's Henley Royal Regatta, where they enjoyed watching the Cal Rowing Teams compete. A highlight was witnessing the Freshman 8 win the Temple Challenge Cup just a few weeks after they won the U.S. National title in their shell named "Shirley Friedman," which Shirley and Rodney, a coxswain for Cal's Varsity 8 in the 1950's, had donated to the team. Supporting Cal's oarsmen brought great satisfaction to their lives, as did watching their children grow, marry, and have their own families, Alison residing in Oakland, and John in Los Angeles.
Shirley is survived by her husband, Rodney, her daughter and son, Alison Steppan and John Friedman, their spouses Mark Steppan and Alice Kimm, and four grandchildren: Matthew Steppan, Rae Friedman, Zoey Friedman, and Milo Friedman. A private cremation will take place on Sunday, April 14, with a memorial to follow in the next few months.