Obituaries

HARRIET BRESENOFF

RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA—Harriet R. Bresenoff, born on September 2, 1931, passed away October 25, 2021 surrounded by her loving children.

Sensing her deep loss, she left this earthly realm a mere 16 weeks after her beloved Morty. Harriet and Mort had 69 years of delight together. Harriet was born and spent her younger years in the hills of Scranton, Pa., the daughter of Frank Isaac and Rose Jacobs, a hard working family.

During Harriet’s teenage years the family moved to the Washington Heights neighborhood of New York City where her parents opened The Rose dress shop. Harriet loved fabric and fashion and received an associate degree in retail marketing. As a young teen she was called upon to do the buying in the garment district for The Rose shop upon her father’s untimely heart attack. Under her mother’s tutelage, Harriet learned how to sew, and learned the cut, color, and quality of fashion. She showed by example throughout her life how to always look immaculate, stylish, and coiffed. Most vividly and impactful to her children was how to set a beautiful holiday table and the importance of Yiddishkeit in the home.

Harriet met her bashert, Mort, while he was in a CCNY college study group with her brother-in-law, Jerome R. Jacobs, of blessed memory. Harriet’s sister, Marilyn, of blessed memory, made an expedient introduction and a marriage quickly ensued. During the Korean War, when Mort was stationed as a Lieutenant in the U.S. Navy serving on a destroyer based out of Norfolk, Virginia, the young newlyweds made a huge decision to move away from the family in NYC to begin their own family in Norfolk. They spent 42 years there before retiring to Florida and then to Raleigh, N.C. to be close to their children and grandchildren.

Harriet and Mort had a rich social circle, and were inaugural members of a local investment club and the Amity social club. Harriet was involved either as member or leader in all the various Jewish organizations, including life member of Hadassah, ORT, Temple Israel Sisterhood, Jewish Federation, and Bonds for Israel. Harriet even stepped up to be the “House Mother” of her daughter Lisa’s Jewish teen sorority.

Harriet was a devoted daughter to her mother, Rose Jacobs, of blessed memory, who lived in Norfolk, and whom her grandchildren remember being part of weekday lunches, every family gathering and holidays.

Harriet’s grandchildren remember her for her love of speaking Yiddish and teaching them the “less Kosher” Yiddish words, showing them how to be mensches. Her love of family and her Jewish faith and how that faith looks, smells, and feels is Harriet’s most memorable legacy.

Harriet is survived by her children, Lisa (Steven) Feierstein and Marc Bresenoff; grandchildren Alison Bresenoff (Carla), Aaron (Sarah) Feierstein and Joshua (Mollie) Feierstein; and great grandsons Ethan and Theodore who all strive to follow in the Jewish heritage that was so close to their Bubbe’s heart.

CHARLES STUART HEYMAN

NEEDHAM, MASSACHUSETTS—It is with great sadness that we inform you of the passing of Charlie Heyman, on Friday, October 22, 2021 in Needham, Massachusetts.

Charlie was the loving husband of Renee Heyman (of blessed memory). Charlie is survived by his daughter Joanne Heyman (Joe Green), son Richard Heyman (Anne), and daughter Beverlie Marks (Morris), and his cherished grandchildren Scott and Julia Heyman, Andrew, Ilana and Alex Marks, Sydney and Morgan Greene, and Rashid Perkins.

Charlie served as president of Temple Emanuel from 2007 through 2009. He remained an active board member until he moved back to his home state of Massachusetts.

A graveside service was held at Plainville Cemetery in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

We ask that you join us in offering comfort to the Heyman family at this difficult time:

May God comfort and embrace you alongside all those who grieve.

MORTON J “KAPPY” KAPLAN

VIRGINIA BEACH—Morton J. “Kappy” Kaplan, 91, passed away on Tuesday, October 19, 2021.

A native of New York, he was the son of Harry Kaplan and Mary Levine Kaplan.

Kappy was a paratrooper with of the 101st Airborne Division Screaming Eagles in the U.S. Army. He was transferred to Fort Belvoir, Virginia in 1950 where he supervised troop movement to Korea during the Korean War.

Shortly after leaving his discharge from the Army, Kappy went to work for the Hecht Company, and it was there he was trained to a carpet buyer. Eventually he was offered a job as a buyer in Norfolk, Virginia which is was what brought him to the area over 60 years ago. In the early 1960s Kappy opened Thalia Carpet and Drapery Shop directly across the street from Willis Wayside. Kappy ended his career in carpet just weeks before his passing as the flooring department manager for the last 16 years at the very same Willis [Wayside] Furniture. He loved his job, but even more he loved the people he worked with.

In addition to his parents, Kappy was predeceased by his brother and sisterin-law, Richard and Norma Harrison, and by his grandson William Boswell III; Kappy is survived by two daughters Marcy Smith (Ron) and Paula Rodgers (Chuck); two sons Micah Kaplan and Ryan Asher Kaplan; stepson Brock Davenport (Dawn.); nephew Robert Harrison; niece Nancy Harrison; nine grandchildren; and many great-grandchildren.

A funeral service was conducted at Altmeyer Funeral Home, followed by a burial in Forest Lawn Cemetery officiated by Rabbi Rosalin Mandelberg of Ohef Sholom Temple.

Condolences may be shared with the family at www.altmeyerfh.com.

STEVEN SHAWN LAZERNICK

CHESAPEAKE—Steven Shawn Lazernick passed away October 18, 2021, in Chesapeake, Virginia.

Steve was born March 25, 1956, to Albert and Thelma Fay Goldman Lazernick, the third of six children.

Steve was a graduate of Granby High School and attended Tidewater Community College. He retired from the Ford Motor Company and was also a licensed painting contractor, leaving his mark in numerous homes throughout Hampton Roads. Steve never knew any strangers, as he would immediately welcome and talk with anyone within hearing distance.

Steve was predeceased by his father Albert and brothers Eugene and Lee. Left to cherish his memory is his wife of 31 years Joanne, daughters Samara (Shane), Jennifer (Kleyton) and Mandy (Philmore), and son Joshua, and eight grandchildren. He is also survived by his mother Thelma Fay, sister Marlie (Dave) and brothers Brad (Judy) and Ernie (Joe). Steve also leaves behind many nieces, nephews, cousins, and life-long friends.

A graveside service was conducted at Forest Lawn Cemetery. Donations in Steve’s memory may be made to Beth Sholom Village, where Steve raved about the care he received.

PHILLIP ALLAN UNGAR

BRIDGEWATER, VIRGINIA—Phillip Allan Ungar, 82, of Bridgewater, Virginia passed away Saturday, October 23, 2021 at his home.

He was born in Norfolk, Virginia on June 15, 1939, a son of the late Max and Martha (Cooper) Ungar.

Phill was a gentle soul who loved life, his family, and his friends. His greatest gift was teaching and telling stories. His passion was for making pottery. Phill also loved teaching and guiding young people into the field of food service. In Phill’s words he wrote, “He loves the air, the sun, the moon, smiles, laughter, and rain on his face, flowers and their fragrance, the earth, all of mankind, the universal energy, his children, family, and most of all—Pam.”

He was united in marriage to his best friend, Pamela Lynn (Klein) Ungar for 49 years of love.

Surviving in addition to his wife are his children, Eric Andrew Ungar of San Francisco, Calif. and Bryan David Ungar, of Harrisonburg; his sister, Barbara Ungar Krampf, his sister-in-law, Jackye Abbott, and many wonderful loving nieces and nephews and cousins and life-long friends.

A time to celebrate the life of Phillip Ungar will be held at a later announced date at his home in Bridgewater and another celebration in Virginia Beach. Please remember Phill when you take a walk outside, hear laughter, and hold a piece of his pottery. Donations to St. Jude’s Research Hospital for Children, Pleasant

OBITUARIES

View Homes, Blue Ridge Community College, and Beth El Congregation of Harrisonburg.

JAY BLACK OF JAY AND THE AMERICANS

(JTA)—When Jay Black wanted The New York Times to understand that he was a hell-raiser, he said he was thrown out of New Utrecht High School in Brooklyn.

When he made the same point to The Forward, he added that he was subsequently tossed out of three yeshivahs.

“Three yeshivas,” Black said twice for emphasis in a 2014 interview. “I was a bad kid.”

Black, born David Blatt, died in Queens, New York, on Oct. 22 at 82, of cardiac arrest brought on by pneumonia.

He was selling shoes in 1962 or 1963 at Thom McAn when a buddy, Marty Kupersmith, who knew Blatt from the Jewish doo-wop circuit, asked him to take the place of Jay Traynor, who had quit Jay and the Americans, a group that had scored a single hit in 1962.

There was a condition: Blatt had to take on the first name Jay.

There are differing accounts of how he got the name Black; there’s evidence he was using it professionally before he joined Jay and the Americans, but he insisted he muttered “Jay Blatt” when Mike Douglas, the daytime talk show host, asked him his name, and Douglas repeated “Black” and it stuck.

Black, raised in an Orthodox family, had sung as a youngster with the choir of Cantor Moshe Koussevitzky. He became known for his powerful reach-for-therafters voice and his dramatic delivery. Bandmates dubbed him “The Voice” and it stuck.

With his dark good looks and his operatic delivery, he affected a Latin persona; one of the band’s most popular numbers was Cara Mia, in which he pledges to his presumably Italian object of adoration that “I will be your love until the end of time,” escalating into a heart-stopping falsetto. The song peaked at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

There were other hits: Come a Little Bit Closer (which peaked at #3 on the charts), about an encounter with a seductress in a Mexican border town that ends badly; and their cover of the Drifters’ This Magic Moment (peaked at #6). The group was big enough to open for the Beatles in 1964, at the Fab Four’s very first U.S. concert.

The band wore sweaters and were clean-cut, but Black liked to project a mysterious, bad-boy affect: he boasted of his friendship with the Mafia boss John Gotti, and in a 1994 profile refused to tell The New York Times what his name was before “Black”—in fact, nothing in the long profile refers to his Jewishness. (He also made sure the reporter knew that female fans were, in his sixth decade, still delivering panties to him.)

He toured across America for decades, but New Yorkers loved their native son best. He sported a flag on his jacket, and said he was proud of the band’s 1963 hit, Only in America, recorded just when the counterculture was about to take off.

“Only in America can a guy from anywhere go to sleep a pauper and wake up a millionaire,” he sang.

In his 2014 interview with The Forward, Black seemed taken aback that the reporter even knew he was Jewish. But then he went all in, noting that the interview was taking place hours before the onset of Simchat Torah, and saying that he would light yahrzeit candles for his parents to mark the day.

The group broke up in 1973, but Black continued to perform under “Jay and the Americans” until 2005, when a chronic gambling habit drove him into bankruptcy. Debts forced him to sell back the name to three original founders of the group, who were ready to reunite and take the show on the road.

The revived group let him continue performing as Jay Black, but he never quite forgave them for taking the band name from him.

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OBITUARIES

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“We shared both wonderful and very contentious times, and much like an ex-wife, we are so proud of the beautiful children we created,” the group said Saturday on its Facebook page. “We’ll always remember The Voice.”

Taking his place fronting the band is a younger guy named John Reincke. Now known as Jay.

Jay Black, thrice-married and thrice-divorced, is survived by three sons, a daughter and five grandchildren.

MORT SAHL, JEWISH COMEDIAN WHO FUSED STAND-UP WITH POLITICAL SATIRE AND INSPIRED THE LIKES OF LENNY BRUCE

(JTA)—Mort Sahl, a Jewish satirist who was credited with making caustic political and social satire popular in stand-up comedy, died Tuesday, October 23 at 94.

Often walking on stage holding just a rolled up newspaper, Sahl liked to riff on the headlines of the day in extended improvised monologues. At a time when comedians tended to steer clear of politics, Sahl took aim at politicians and was known to end his sets with the line: “Are there any groups I haven’t offended?”

Steve Allen, the first host of The Tonight Show, once introduced Sahl as “probably the only real political philosopher we have in modern comedy.”

Though Sahl was not religious and did not discuss his Jewishness in routines or often in public, he inspired a wave of fellow Jewish stand-ups. Woody Allen named him as a major influence and commented in interviews how Sahl also influenced the fellow Jewish pioneer Lenny Bruce—who would take Sahl’s freeform style and cutting satire to crude new heights.

Sahl was born in Montreal in 1927 to Jewish parents from New York’s Lower East Side and eventually moved to Los Angeles. As a teenager, Sahl dropped out of high school there and tried to enroll in the ROTC program by lying about his age, but his mother found him out after two weeks and brought him home. Sahl was married three times and a had a son, Mort Jr., with his second wife. Mort Jr., died of a drug overdose at age 19 in 1996.

The elder Sahl got his break performing in San Francisco years after graduating from college, performing sets at a club known for attracting an intellectual crowd. His jokes about national politics eventually earned him a following and he started appearing on late night shows and performing in clubs across the country.

After appearing in several movies in the 1950s and early ’60s, his career took a dive after the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963, which Sahl came to believe had been orchestrated by the CIA. But he continued to act and perform stand-up into his 90s.

In 1982, Sahl played the role of Werner Finck, a German-Jewish satirist, in a 5-hour TV special. In 2003, the National Foundation for Jewish Culture honored Sahl with the Alan King Award in American Jewish Humor. But Sahl explained to J. The Jewish News of Northern California in 2004 that he never emphasized his Jewishness on stage because it wasn’t a major part of his upbringing.

“I never stressed it,” he says, “because I didn’t have those kinds of parents. I grew up in a homogenized neighborhood, and was a kind of a mail-order, cardboard Jew.”

Speaking with the paper not long after the premiere of Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ, Sahl opined on the movie and antisemitism.

“Terrible movie,” he said. “Two hours of unrelieved sadism. But the Romans are nice! I think everyone’s second nature is anti-Semitism, so all the anxiety [over the film] is justified.”

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TYLER HERRON, FORMER TEAM ISRAEL PITCHER

(JTA)—Tyler Herron, a former major league baseball prospect who pitched for Team Israel during their Cinderella run in the 2017 World Baseball Classic, died last month at 35.

No cause or exact date of Herron’s death have been reported. Several of the minor league teams he played for posted tributes to Herron on social media.

Herron, who grew up in Florida, was of Puerto Rican descent, according to El Nuevo Dia, one of Puerto Rico’s largest circulation newspapers. But a YouTube video from Team Israel explains that his aunt also discovered in 2014 that he had a Jewish grandmother, which made him eligible to earn Israeli citizenship and play for the team.

Herron appeared in three games during the 2017 World Baseball Classic and called it “the best experience I’ve ever had in baseball.” Team Israel finished sixth in the international tournament, despite being ranked outside of the top 40 countries in the world before entering.

Team Israel Baseball posted a note on social media: “He is remembered fondly by all his teammates and coaches from Team Israel. Israel Baseball sends its deepest condolences to Herron’s family and loved ones.”

A native of West Palm Beach, Florida, Herron was a standout high school pitcher. During his senior year, the right-hander led the country with a 0.25 earned run average, striking out 81 batters in 57 innings.

He was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in the first round of the 2005 Major League Baseball draft, and in 2007 was ranked by Baseball America as the organization’s 10th best prospect. But he never made it to the major leagues.

During a 16-year career, Herron played for several minor league teams in multiple organizations, as well as in foreign and independent leagues— including in Puerto Rico. The head of the Puerto Rico Players Association told El Nuevo Dia that an investigation into Herron’s death is underway.

This year, Herron pitched for the Fargo-Moorhead Redhawks of the independent American Association league, his fourth separate stint with the team.