Frances G. Peskind

Visitation

Biondi Residence
1450 McDaniels Avenue
Highland Park, Illinois 60035

Following the service through the
evening

In lieu of flowers, the family would like
to encourage support to local school
music programs for children and to
music therapy programs for the elderly

After a long illness, my mother and my friend, Frances (Fran) Gray Peskind, 92, passed away at her residence in Grand Rapids, Michigan on August 17, 2017. Born in Chicago, Illinois on April 18, 1925 to William and Naomi (Gutman) Grochowsky, Fran was the youngest of seven children. As a young girl, she was an avid reader and visited the local library often, routinely walking home with an armful of books. As a student at Manley High School she was active in school groups and was her class’s secretary. Popular with her classmates and known for her facility for writing, she was asked to pen her senior class poem. After graduating in 1942, she went to work as a secretary for the Army Corps of Engineers. A short time later, she took a position at the Chicago Sun Times which enabled her to pursue her passion for journalism, working with well- known columnist Irv Kupcinet. Part of Fran’s job during that time was to respond to servicemen who wrote to the paper. One of those servicemen was a young man named David Peskind, then a captain in the US Air Force. One day in 1945, Captain Peskind, tall and handsome in his class A uniform, paid a visit to the offices of the Sun Times to thank her personally for her response to a letter he’d written. As it happened, she and a friend were hosting a reception for officers that evening and so she, petite and dressed in a stylish little black dress “with a cute little bow bouncing in the back” as she described it, invited him to attend. Needless to say, he was smitten and that meeting was the beginning of a beautiful courtship that culminated in their marriage in 1948. Fran left her job at the paper in 1951 when she was expecting their first child, my brother Steven. I was born four years later. In 1957 Dad’s work took our family first to Dayton, Ohio and then to Shaker Heights, Ohio. When Dad, at age 50, came home one day and asked my mother if she thought he could start his own advertising specialties business, she said yes without hesitation and supported him in that endeavor every step of the way. Fran’s first priority was raising her family, but she also maintained her interest in journalism and advertising, and in 1968, when my brother and I were older, she went to work for several years as the Advertising and Promotion Manager for WKYC radio in Cleveland. When my father passed away in 1990, Mom took over his business, which she managed with great success up to her retirement in 2008. During those years she also continued to pursue her writing with a column that appeared biweekly in the Cleveland Sun Press. My mother’s other passion was music. Her most beloved possession was a baby grand piano on which she played beautifully and often for over thirty years. Mom’s great gift was to be able to play by ear; she had an amazing capacity to hear a tune and be able to transpose it to the keyboard, complete with harmony. She retained this gift well into her later years, and brought joy and comfort to many before she was no longer able to play. She also had a knack for adapting popular songs for purposes of celebrating family and friends. Throughout her life, she remained an avid reader, and enjoyed exploring many subjects including comparative religions, philosophy and psychology as she strove always to understand the human condition. Many were the nights, when I would visit her, when we would talk into the wee hours of the morning, discussing the state of the world and what we could do to make it better. In 2012, when her health began to fail and she could no longer live alone, I had to move her out of her home of 47 years to a continuing care retirement community 300 miles west in Grand Rapids, Michigan nearer to my home. Traveling this road with her taught me the true meaning of patience, tolerance, and compassion. Through it all, she never lost her love of music, her desire to help others, and her capacity for laughter. My mother was a loving and devoted wife who put her family first always. We had our differences over the years as mothers and daughters do, but I never doubted her love; she was always my fiercest champion and I will carry her heart in my heart forever. Fran was preceded in death by David, her beloved husband of 42 years, her son, Steven, her sisters Ethel, Gertrude, Sylvia, Ava and Mary and her brother Isadore. She is survived by her daughter, Dr. Jennifer Peskind Cochran (Dr. Richard M. Cochran), and many nieces and nephews. The last years of Fran’s life were made more bearable by the loving, gracious, and compassionate care of the staff at her residence, Clark on Keller Lake Oxford Manor, and the staff of Emmanuel Hospice. To them her family offer their most grateful thanks. Graveside service 11 AM Tuesday at Shalom Memorial Park, 1700 W. Rand Road, Arlington Heights. As music was such an important part of Fran’s life right up to the end, as pleasure and as a means to heal, in lieu of flowers the family would like to encourage support to local school music programs for children and to music therapy programs for the elderly. For Information or to leave condolence: 847-255-3520 or www.shalommemorial.org

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Service Information

Service : Tuesday, August 22nd at 11:00 am
Service Location: -Graveside Service

Interment:
Shalom Memorial Park
Arlington Heights, Illinois