Seven Sisters Over 70 Years

by Krissy Dietrich Gallagher ’91

Many of us found our lifelong best friends on the playgrounds at Noble or Canterbury, in the cafeterias of Roxboro or Monticello, or in the hallways, classrooms, fields and stage of Heights High. But few of us can claim the longevity or commitment that define the friendship of the Pleiades, or “Seven Divine Sisters,” from the class of 1951.

Frances (Benovitz) Gellin, Phyllis (Birnholtz) Melnick, Eileen (Gisser) Gold, Sally (Katzel) Rich, Lois (Klein) Goodman, Joanne (Waxman) Lewis, and the late Sally (Schagrin) Rich have been meeting at least monthly for the past seventy years. All born in 1933, some met in CH-UH elementary schools, some on their neighborhood streets in Cleveland, all becoming friends when they began Heights High together in the fall of 1948.

Named by Joanne’s late husband Robert Lewis, a Greek classicist, the Pleiades are a constellation of seven stars, the world’s most visible star cluster. Except only six stars are actually visible in the night sky with the seventh considered “the lost sister,” fitting for this group who lost one of their own in a tragic accident decades ago. Sally Schagrin Rich, known to many as “Sally 1,” was visiting her daughter Nancy in Michigan when she was struck and killed by a driver at the age of 54.

But her connection to her divine sisters didn’t end. As Joanne said in her eulogy at Sally’s 1988 funeral, “we must come to understand that, like the constellation, we are inevitably fixed in a pattern together.” And they were indeed fixed together as Sally Katzel, herself a widow, eventually married Sally 1’s husband cementing her nickname “Sally 2.”

The Pleiades, whether six or seven of them, have taken sixteen trips together over the years, from Vermont and Charleston to Italy and England. These trips were always taken without their husbands or children, as part of their deep commitment to one another. They still plan monthly get-togethers, usually over lunch, which carried on virtually during the pandemic.

Several married Heights grads, many had children go through the schools, and two (Joanne Lewis and Lois Goodman) are members of the Distinguished Alumni Hall of Fame, along with Joanne’s daughter Clea. Sally Katzel Rich was the school psychologist at Heights High for many years, where her stepdaughter Nancy has long been head of the Art Department. Nancy considers all of the women “mother figures” who’ve been fixtures in her life for as long as she can remember.

According to Lewis, “We’re such different people but it’s like we’re sisters. We’ve just been there for each other through whatever happens. We have grown up together; made a commitment to share life’s story together.”

And share it they have. Making their own story along the way, eternally linked, a constellation of stars sparked to light in the halls of Heights High.

Frances (Benovitz) Gellin

Phyllis (Birnholtz) Melnick

Eileen (Gisser) Gold

Sally (Katzel) Rich

Lois (Klein) Goodman and Sally (Schagrin) Rich

Joanne (Waxman) Lewis