By Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO, Calif.—Hundreds of mourners trudged up a hillside of El Camino Memorial Park to attend graveside services today (Feb. 15)  for Barbara H. Goldberg, a popular volunteer for the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center and Tifereth Israel Synagogue, who died Feb. 12 of cancer at age 65.

Goldberg and her husband, Martin, both were members of the steering committee of the highly successful San Diego Jewish Film Festival, which is currently in progress. The Goldbergs were particularly friendly with the festival's chair and fellow Tifereth Israel Synagogue member Judith Friedel, and her husband Dr. William Friedel, who were among the hundreds who listened under blustery skies to a eulogy delivered by Rabbi Leonard Rosenthal.

The film festival is a program of the San Diego Center for Jewish Culture, an affiliate of the Lawrence Family JCC.  Barbara Goldberg also had been a mainstay of the JCC's "Meet Your Match" program, which, while in existence, attempted to introduce marriageable Jewish men and women to each other. That group disbanded with the growing popularity of internet Jewish dating services.

The Goldbergs' own marriage had lasted 46 years, their wedding having occurred when she was 19 and he was 23. Rabbi Rosenthal told  the mourners that the young Barbara Linderman, a Bronx resident, had first seen Martin Goldberg on a New York City train.  Actually, her mother noticed the "nice Jewish boy" reading a newspaper.  Barbara told her mother that he really was studying a racing form.  But they met again outside a synagogue during the High Holidays, where Martin was "davening" with some friends "over a pair of dice," according to Rosenthal.

It was clear that when it came to marriage, Marty did not want to gamble.  Knowing he was going into military service, he asked Barbara to marry him before he left "to make sure that he would be with him for the rest of their lives," the rabbi related. "Barbara and Marty shared a wonderful life and marriage. Throughout all the years they would laugh, they would hug each other, they would hold hands." The couple's two children, Lee Goldberg and Michele Nowicki, now are married  respectively to Kathleen and Richard, and have produced four granddaughters: Kimberly, Alyssa, Daniela, and Marisa.

The Goldbergs relocated to San Diego in 1972, where they joined Congregation Beth Tefilah, which since had merged into Ohr Shalom Synagogue.  Rosenthal had served as Lee's Hebrew School teacher t Beth Tefilah. Years later, as a rabbi at Tifereth Israel Synagogue, he was reunited with the Goldberg family as congregants. Barbara was an active member of the Sisterhood.

After her family was raised, Barbara became a traveling sales and marketing  representative for a line of high-fashion women's clothes, the rabbi said. "Her family told me that when she was on a sales call in San Antonio, Texas, the store owners told her they had a customer who would love the merchandise but would not come to the store to see it.  Well, Barbara did not hesitate; she called Mrs. Pickens to arrange to go to the house for a private showing.  Mrs. Pickens was so impressed that she told Barbara to call her the next time she came into town, and Barbara wouldn't have to come to her house, she would come to the store.  Only later did Barbara learn that Mrs. Pickens was the wife of T. Boone Pickens, the petroleum industry magnate."

Besides sales ability, Barbara Goldberg possessed a delightful brand of chutzpah.  "Her family told me that when Cafe Pacifica (in San Diego) opened, it was impossible to get a reservation, so Barbara called up and asked the name of the owner, then she called back and asked to speak with Kip. 'Kip,' she told him, 'I'm Barbara Goldberg, I'm having trouble getting a table for my friends and myself.  Well, Kip quickly made the reservation and when they arrived at the restaurant Kip went over to them.  'Who's Barbara Goldberg?' he asked. 'I am.' 'Do I know you?' 'Well, you do now,' she answered."

The rabbi quoted family friend Lily Strassberg as recalling that one of Barbara's "quirks was hiding jewelry and money away, perhaps for a rainy day to make sure it would not be found by thieves. Trouble was, she could never remember where she put it, and would constantly be calling her family to help with the search. Once she lent Lily a heavy coat to take on a trip to Europe. When Lily returned it she handed Barbara $400.00 in cash. 'What’s that for?' she asked. 'I don’t know, said Lily, I found it in one of the pockets!'"