Celia Hirschman
Daughter
Celia
Many have talked about the professional Ruth—the woman who envisioned better radio and built it piece by piece.
I’ll speak for Ruth Hirschman, my mother. Ruth met my father Jack Hirschman at City College, New York. Her own father (Jack Epstein), had died weeks before though she didn’t learn about the nature of his death for 6 more years. It’s impossible to understate the loss of her father. He passed on his love of books, compassion and ideas to his daughter. When she met Jack Hirschman, it must have felt so familiar to her. Both Jacks were devoted to ideas, books and the arts. By friends’ accounts, Ruth and Jack Hirschman’s attraction was immediate and electric.
Cut to when my brother David & I were young. He was two years older than me. We were now a tribe of four. Jack taught English at UCLA and we looked from the outside like a typical family. Except whenever Jack and Ruth walked into a room, everyone wanted to know them. They were so interesting to look at. Then Jack won a sabbatical scholarship to write a book. He took the money and bought four tickets on the QE2 so we could all go to Europe to meet his publisher in London. Life changed dramatically. Suddenly we were regularly touring Europe, city to city.
Days were spent in museums and cafes, on trains and in airplanes, while our nights were spent at art house cinema, dinner parties and poetry readings.
Ruth & David
My brother and I would fall asleep in the corners of rooms, quietly waiting for Ruth and Jack to take us home, wherever that was. And home and schools changed regularly. Cheviot Hills, Paris, Hampstead (London), Highgate (London), Hydra,(Greece), Topanga Canyon, Venice, and Laurel Canyon, all in the span of 8 years. As long as we were together and moving, we were fine. And there was always that electric undercurrent in the air. I think it was the electricity of creativity meeting chaos.
We did everything on the cheap - and our friends were open-hearted and generous. They made it possible for us to see the world together as a family.
From the age of 8 on, I called them Ruth and Jack. No one objected.
We settled in Venice, California. Ours was not a typical domestic situation and my parents gravitated to like-minded artists and thinkers of their day for social interaction. David put earphones on and listened to music, and I roamed Venice. Ruth went to work everyday at KPFK, while Jack focused on writing and painting. These were very lean years and it weighed on her.
I often went to work with Ruth in the summertime. From the age of twelve, I was splicing commercials out of Studs Terkel’s radio show, and manning the 84-line switchboard. I loved it. I met Will there, who would become a lifelong business partner with Ruth.
Ruth & Jack
In the early 70s, things got tough between Ruth and Jack and there was just no way to make that marriage work. They were in two very different places. While I think it broke her heart, in 1973, she divorced Jack. David and I moved with her to Fraser Street in Ocean Park. Jack traveled and moved up to North Beach.
Ruth started working at KCRW a few years later and I think it really was the door she’d been waiting for. She loved it and she began to smile again. Then, out of nowhere, my brother David was diagnosed with an aggressive form of childhood Lymphoma while studying at UC Santa Cruz. He died in her arms in 1982 at the age of 25, in the house on Fraser Street.
What happened next was very private grief. I think it was the final straw for her. She closed the door on her own personal life and threw herself into her work, focusing on elevating the cultural discussion and pushing the creative landscape forward. David would have loved that. She transmogrified her pain and sadness into something beautiful. I vowed to stay close and for the next 38 years we both traveled regularly to visit despite both our busy careers.
In 2020, her health changed and she needed more help but craved independence. Tom Mobley came by several times a week to walk with her and all her friends and I pitched in to help in any way we could. Then in 2021, Jack died suddenly and it threw her for a loop. She had expected he would outlive her. In 2022, I came down to assess her failing health and just moved in. One thing Ruth loved more than anything in the world, was Ocean Park. She moved there in 1973 and never left. Now at the end of her life, all she wanted was live out her days at home. I promised her she would have that. So for the last 18 months, I became her caretaker, her cook and her friend.
I found great joy and satisfaction in caring for Ruth. It was exactly what she and I both needed.
I can’t imagine doing anything more meaningful to express my love and close our journey. And I know she was incredibly grateful to go through this together.
My mother was a very complicated and dynamic person. The reason I wanted to organize this website is because she created a powerful light with her work. The record should reflect that. And her joie de vivre lasted until the very end of living. Goodnight sweet Ruth.
