Irwin Fishbein, a World War II Army interpreter who helped Holocaust survivors, has died at the age of 101
Irvin Fishbein, an attorney who used his translation skills to help Holocaust victims during World War II, died of congestive heart failure April 27 at his home in Baltimore County. He was 101 years old.
Irwin Louis Fishbein was born in East Baltimore and was the son of Russian immigrants Joseph Fishbein and Bessie Seidman.
His mother was a seamstress and his father was a house painter. He grew up with a family that moved from Baltimore to New York City and back. He graduated with honors from the City College of New York.
Mr. Fishbein enlisted in the Army and served in World War II and the Korean War. He rose to the rank of first lieutenant and worked in intelligence and military administration in Germany. Fluent in Yiddish, he assisted Holocaust survivors who were unable to return home and were in displaced persons camps in countries such as Germany, Austria and Italy.
He re-enlisted and served a short tour of duty during the Korean War.
In June 1953, he married Irma Beverly Cohn, daughter of Nathan Cohn, owner of a hosiery factory in downtown Baltimore, and Ethel Josephs Cohn, a pianist and saxophonist at the Peabody Conservatory of Music. They were married at the old Belvedere Hotel in Mount Vernon.
They met on a blind date and eventually settled at 110 Slade Avenue in Pikesville.
As a young man, Mr. Fishbein became a CPA and graduated from the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law.
He opened a law and accounting practice in an office in downtown Baltimore. He worked in the Knickerbocker Building and shared an office with Leon A. Rubenstein, who was a city councilman at the time.
In the early 1980s, Mr. Fishbein moved to Pikesville where he was joined by his daughter, Debra Fishbein Holtzman. Ms. Holtzman took up an accounting practice while he continued to work in a law office.
Mr. Fishbein was president of Congregation Beth Tfiloh from 2002 to 2004, and past president of the Jewish Free Loan Association and the Old Hebrew Nursing Home.
"Irwin was the quintessential gentleman", said Rabbi Mitchell Walberg, rabbi in residence at Beth Tfiloh in Pikesville. "He was a man of integrity, character and purpose. He lived by those principles. It was a matter of practicing what you preach, and he practiced".
"Like King Solomon, he found grace and favor in the eyes of God and his neighbors", the rabbi said.
He was also chairman of the legal department of The Associated: Jewish Federation of Baltimore; board member of Israel Bond; board member of the Baltimore Council of Orthodox Congregations; attorney for Chimes, an advocacy organization for people with disabilities; and board member of the Levindale Jewish and Geriatric Center.
Mr. Fishbein also served as a volunteer interviewer at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and conducted video interviews with Holocaust survivors.
He is survived by his four daughters, Joan Fishbein Feldman, Debra "Debi" Holtzman and Ruth Levenson, all of Baltimore, and Ellen Fishbein, of Vienna, Virginia; eight grandchildren; and 17 great-grandchildren. His wife, Irma Beverly Cohn Fishbein, died in 2006.