Merle Eleanor Gold

1921 - 2017

Gold, Merle Eleanor

Merle Eleanor Gold died peacefully at Kendal in Ithaca on September 29, 2017, at the age of 96.

Merle was born to Nathaniel and Eleanor Tuberg in Rochester, Minnesota on March 7, 1921, the youngest of three children. She grew up in Rochester, Minnesota and graduated as valedictorian of her high school class in 1939.

When many of her classmates, the children of Doctors from the Mayo Clinic, went East to attend colleges, Merle, lacking the funds, trained as a medical secretary at the clinic. Two years later, unbeknownst to her rigid father, she applied to and was accepted at the University of Chicago.

Merle received her undergraduate degree from the University of Chicago in two years, and went on to obtain a Ph.D. in astro-physics in 1946 under noble laureate Subrahmanyan Chandrashekhar. She spent more than a year at the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, preparing her dissertation which was entitled: The Variations of Absorption Line Contours Across the Solar Disc. In 1946 she was awarded a post-doctoral fellowship at Cambridge University in England, where she met her husband, astronomer Thomas Gold. She was married in June 1947, and remained in England until 1956, when Tommy was offered a teaching position at Harvard University followed three years later by an offer to direct Cornell's Center for Radiophysics and Space Research in Ithaca, New York.

With few opportunities for both career and family, Merle chose family. Merle had two daughters in England and a third born in Ithaca after the family settled there. She was a kind and loving mother and always supportive of her daughters' endeavors.

In 1971, following her divorce, Merle had to put her secretarial skills back to work as an editor in the Cornell School of Agriculture, where she was employed until her retirement.

Merle was an excellent tennis player and even after she could no longer play the game herself she remained an avid fan of professional tennis. She followed the careers of Chris Evert, Martina Navratilova and the William sisters, never missing a tournament on TV. She also enjoyed ice skating and skiing. She loved yellow, roses and forsythia in the spring. She loved Vermouth, Grand Marnier, coffee and chocolate and she loved the smell of freesia. She was impish with a twinkle and a smile, and a beautiful laugh.

Merle lived alone in her little stone house in Ellis Hollow well into her 80s, enjoying daily walks in the Cornell Plantations but in 2003, when walking became more difficult, she moved to Kendal in Ithaca.

Merle faced the hardships of advanced age with steadfast determination. After both her legs were amputated she was able to walk with two prosthetics and when her sight failed she took it in stride. It was only when her memory started to falter that she showed frustration.

She was inspired by the writings of Virginia Woolf and Emily Dickenson and she followed the advancement of women, happy that her daughters and grandchildren have more choices than she. She voted for her first woman for president.

Always concerned for others, just two days before she died she was still checking to be sure that her daughters had a good lunch when they visited her, and she was concerned that her caregivers at Kendal were working too hard.

Thanks to everyone at Kendal for her remarkable care.

Merle is survived by her three daughters, Linda Gold (Bruce Bryant), Lucy Gold (Norman Brown) and Tanya Vanasse (Stephen Romaine), and five grandchildren, Leah, Atalia, (Umberto) Adrian, Alex and Claire. She was predeceased by granddaughter Jessica.

Merle donated her body to science, and requested no memorial service.