October 22, 2015
Ruth Helen Weinstein Spiegel lived in San Francisco for almost a decade starting in 2001, and died outside Washington, D.C. at age 88 on October 22, 2015. Ruth's San Francisco relatives include son, Charles; son-in-law, Jim Emery; and granddaughters Nora Emery Spiegel (Hofstra University) and Frances Spiegel (UC Hastings College of Law, 2010). Ruth retired as managing editor of the Smithsonian Institution Press after the September 11 attack on Washington, and moved to San Francisco to help raise her granddaughter, Nora. She proudly purchased the family's burial plot in the Congressional Cemetery in Washington, D.C. and had its corners marked with four pink granite triangles. A Washington PFLAG member, she was buried there October 25 near Leonard Matlovich, Frank Kameny, Clyde Tolson, some of Harvey Milk's ashes, J. Edgar Hoover, and others. Memorial service to occur Martin Luther King Jr. weekend 2016 at Congregation Sha'ar Zahav in San Francisco.