The Dutch Resistance Heroine (A San Francisco Obituary Found Poem) Poem by Bob Genevro

Elizabeth Steinbruner

Born February 23,1920 in Dulsburg, Germany,
passed November 17,2005 in Roseville, California.

Elizabeth spent much of her youth in Holland.

During the German invasion in 1940,
she became sympathetic to her Dutch resistance friends,
fearlessly confronting the Gestapo
who had jailed her fiancee's brother,
exposing herself to suspicion and arrest.
She lost her fiancee to the war,
but was married in 1947 to Fredric Steinbruner
whom she met in a refugee camp
at the end of the war. They emigrated to
the United States in 1954.

Elizabeth and her family
lived on Fulton Ave. in San Francisco for six years
where she washed and folded clothes
in the Busy Bee Lauderette.

She was active with many crafts, her yoga,
bird watching, hiking trails in West Marin,
and especially growing exotic plants
to new dimensions.

We'll remember the walks in Golden Gate Park.
We'll remember the Sundays water skiing in Lake Berryessa,
and exploring the dunes at Point Reyes.
We'll remember her kindness
to every stray cat in the neighborhood.
We'll remember her patience, understanding
and tolerance with her sons, who pushed
many limits on their adolescent journey.
Mom had a few extra bucks for us,
and despite her suffering during the war and thereafter,
she never let us go without.

Elizabeth was preceded in death
by Fredric, her husband of 58 years;
and survived by her two sons Peter and Walter
and her two grandsons
Alex and Andrew of Tahoe City.

Donations in Elizabeth's name
may be made to the Marin Humane Society.