Blanche Speicher's Obituary
Blanche Speicher died peacefully in her sleep on Wednesday, February 14, 2024. She was 94, and was a resident of the Boston area for the last year and a half but had previously been a long-time resident of Aventura, Florida. She leaves her son Howard (Lisa McRae), her son Ronald (Karen), five grandchildren, Joshua (Ramie), Benjamin, Tonia Harrington (Michael), Cory (Eve), and Jenna, and six great-grandchildren, Luke, Noah, Huxley, Brooke, Mason and Brayden. Blanche was predeceased by her husband of 66 years, Marion Speicher.
Blanche was the last of her extended family cohort of Holocaust survivors. Blanche was born on May 20, 1929 in Worwolince (now Vorgulintsy) in the Eastern Galicia region of eastern Poland, presently part of western Ukraine. As a young teenager, Blanche spent World War II in hiding with her mother Sylvia, father Israel, and brother Julius, including ten months hiding in a cave from June, 1943 to June, 1944 when they were liberated by the advancing Soviet army. After a period in a refugee camp in Prague, the family emigrated to Brooklyn, where Blanche attended Lafayette High School, and later met Marion, a fellow Holocaust survivor. They were married in New York in 1951 and raised their two sons in Bayside, Queens until moving to Florida in 1993.
During their long, happy life in New York and later Florida, Blanche and Marion were devoted to their family and close-knit group of friends, traveling together, spending time at their beloved cottage in the Catskills, and doting on their grandchildren. Blanche was a master of many card games, and spent happy evenings and weekends playing canasta or bridge. Even toward the end of her life, as dementia set in, she could spend hours playing board games.
Services will be held at the chapel at Beth David Memorial Gardens in Hollywood, Florida on Monday, February 19, 2024 at 10:00 A.M. Located 3201 N. 72nd Ave Hollywood, Florida 33024. Arrangements by Levitt-Weinstein Blasberg Rubin Zilbert Memorial Chapel.
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