Lutheran marrying a Jewish girl from Palestine, and another Norwegian
marrying a girl from Turkey." But perhaps most surprising of all, "there were
hardly any divorces in that group of highly-unlikely marriages."
The same strong bonds characterized the I-House friendships, with striking
examples of a friend offering to come up with the mortgage for a widow left with
four kids; friends gathering together for cheap sherry and dinner every week
over the course of half a century; a Golden Ager commemorating, year after year,
the birthday of a departed friend by throwing flowers into the Bay; and, finally,
0f friends helping their fellow I-Houser move into a retirement center fifty
years into the friendship. For the majority of the post-war cohort, their I-House
sojourn became a life-transforming event.
With its generosity and enthusiasm, the Golden Age cohort cannot but help
remind us of the great potential of places such as I-House to heal in times of
historical challenge. We cannot help but marvel at this remarkable group of
people who, in their eighties or early nineties, still possessed a distinctive spirit of
passionate engagement with the world. "Onwards!"—as one of the Golden Agers
saluted us in her email.
Tonya Staros and Jeanine Castello-Lin
Co-Presidents, Berkeley Historical Society
April 2016
106
Latin American Sunday Tea Dance, Spring 1947.
Decorations by Rafael Rodriguez.
