Norman Gelber

Norman Gelber (1917-2017)

Norman Gelber, 99, of East Stroudsburg, PA, died peacefully in Hilliard, Ohio, on Feb. 19.

He shared his story, with his son Ben, a meteorologist on NBC4 in Columbus, in “A Journey Through Alzheimer’s” to help support other families going through similar experiences. 

He was an English professor at East Stroudsburg University from 1961 until retirement in 1985, and continued to give guest lectures on writing and literature. Born in the Bronx, New York, on Nov. 15, 1917, he was the son of Benjamin and Mollie (Drucker) Gelber. 

During the 1930s, Norman Gelber joined the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s, before taking a position in advertising on Madison Avenue in Manhattan. 

In December 1941, he enlisted for flight training with the U.S. Army Air Corps, and later completed his military career in the B-29 engineering program, while working in Ontario, California.

After World War II, he attended the University of California, Berkeley and then traveled overseas for further academic work at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, where he earned a postgraduate diploma.  He went on to teach in the English department at the University of Frankfurt in Germany, before returning home to be with family in New York City, when his father was terminally ill. 

Norman later earned a master’s degree in English at Teacher’s College, Columbia University and enrolled in the doctoral program.  His specialization was Elizabethan literature.

He taught ballroom dancing while finishing his academic studies, when he met his future wife Judith Frisch at a park near Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.  They were married on June 27, 1954.

His teaching career resumed at Seaford High School in Delaware, before accepting a position as an English instructor at the University of Kentucky.

Norman Gelber joined the faculty at East Stroudsburg State College (now East Stroudsburg University) in the Pennsylvania Poconos in 1961, where he had a distinguished 25-year teaching and playwriting career, and was recognized for his endearing humor and academic standards.  He composed six one-act plays, one of which was produced on campus, and wrote “Reading Plays for Pleasure.”

He was also an avid model airplane hobbyist who built and flew planes, and enthusiastically shared his skills with friends and neighborhood children. He was a member of Temple Israel in Stroudsburg for 50 years, teaching and delivering sermons on theology and literature.

Norman Gelber was a loving, gentle father and deeply devoted husband of wife Judith, who passed away in 2010. He is survived by two sons, Ben of Hilliard, Ohio, a meteorologist with NBC4 (WCMH), and Daniel, a music teacher and band director, of Flower Mound, Texas; grandsons Austin Jacob, Justin, Joshua and Jordan, and granddaughter Rachel; niece Isrella (Frisch) Knopf; and nephews Michael Frisch and Mark Frisch.

The funeral service will begin at noon on Thursday, February 23, at Temple Israel, 711 Wallace Street, Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania.  Burial will follow at Temple Israel Cemetery in Middle Smithfield Township.

Arrangements by William H. Clark Funeral Home, 1003 Main Street, Stroudsburg, PA  18360 www.wmhclarkfuneralhome.com