A hearty legacy of community activity

Myrna Bergman, who will be remembered most for her loving ways, died on Jan. 17. She was 96.

Born in the Bronx on Oct. 15, 1915, Bergman grew up in the Mosholu Parkway section of the borough near Hull Avenue. Her father, Frank Coe, was a tailor, who had a shop in the community. Her mother, Dora, was a garment worker.

Bergman graduated from Evander Childs High School. Though she Bergman possessed the grades and academic prowess for college, the tuition money her parents saved was directed to her older brother Max and younger brother Arthur. “Sending boys to college rather girls had meaning back in those days,” her son Bruce Bergman said.

Married to Larry Bergman for 68 years, the family, including children Bruce and Fern moved to the Elmwood Gardens development on Fletcher Avenue in Valley Stream in 1950. Their new home backed into the woods that continued all the way to Corona Avenue.

During a time when the social life revolved around the children and neighborhood, she knew all 50 families in the community and was a leading force behind all the backyard and basement skits, shows and dancing, including one performance at the old Paraglide nightclub in Franklin Square.

One production, written and directed by Bergman called “Oh Henry” had not only children from the community involved, but then Town of Hempstead Presiding Supervisor Edward Larkin and 4H Regional Director Dorothy Flint. The audience filled the Corona School auditorium, Bruce said.

“She left behind not only exquisite love for and from her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, but a hearty legacy of having been a part of a rapidly disappearing aspect of life in Nassau County,” Bruce said.

Bergman was committed to her children and Bruce fondly remembers when he and friend Jeff Kanew conceived of a submarine that could launch planes and built a model of the craft. His mother called Newsday which sent a photographer and the photo was printed in the newspaper. “Such neighborhood events were big news in those days,” said Bruce, who added that Kanew directed the movie “Revenge of the Nerds.”

The family moved to North Woodmere in 1959, Branch Boulevard was yet to be built, Bruce said, and Bergman worked as a legal secretary at the law offices of Irving Kaufman on Merrick Road in Valley Stream and then with David Goldberg on Central Avenue in Woodmere. “She was really a paralegal before the term was defined,” Bruce said.

Summers were filled with Myrna and Larry dancing up a storm from one club to another in Atlantic and Lido beaches, and winning dance contests, including being named the best dancers at the Atlantic Beach Hotel. They received a similar award from one of the clubs in Lido Beach, when that strip was filled with beach clubs, Bruce added.

In the late 1970s, the Bergmans moved to Cedarhurst and loved to stroll the village on Wednesday evenings when the stores were open. A few years later, they moved to Long Beach. To remain active, she was very involved with the local senior center, and local politics as well, after Bruce was elected to the city council in 1979.

After Larry died in 2003, Bergman moved into the Nautilus Hotel in Atlantic Beach. “People who met her said she always brought a special light to their lives,” Bruce said.

She is survived by Bruce and his wife Linda of Lawrence, her daughter Fern and her husband Dr. Martin Zipkin of Hewlett Harbor, grandchildren Jennifer and Jason Bergman, Julie Gold, Leslie Brog and Jordan Zipkin, and great grandchildren Logan, Brian, Jesse, Macy, Tyler and Cooper.

A funeral service was held at Gutterman’s in Rockville Centre on Jan. 18. She was interred at New Monteifiore Cemetery in West Babylon.