Life in the Later Lane
Free speech and anti-war activist Sue Trupin found her niche caring for AIDS patients and supporting black grandmothers
Sue Trupin spent more than a decade living in a countercultural enclave in Canyon, a community in...
She’s a photographer and a flamenco dancer who fights to reduce maternal deaths in poor countries around the world
The difficulties that pregnant women face in impoverished parts of the world can seem overwhelming. But Stacey...
Cathedral Hill doctor became a leader in the treatment and prevention of AIDS.
As a boy, James Campbell spent after-school hours in his mother’s lab. Ruth Campbell was a doctor,...
Through one-man performances, son of Holocaust survivor shares history with high school students
It’s a shocking and head-spinning image: A Jew in a German officer’s uniform is being ministered to...
Being an ‘old soul’ isn’t just about age but an attitude – best nurtured by intergenerational contact
SF SENIORBEAT GUEST COLUMN – There’s a corner of Gen Z internet culture that has popularized the...
How a dedicated teacher of young children became a dedicated civic volunteer.
Sharon Yow’s father drove a truck and tried his hand at farming. Her mother worked a switchboard...
Famed boogie-woogie pianist embroiders her performances with her own hand-crafted art
Caroline Dahl has never forgotten the glamorous, red-haired woman in a sequined dress she saw at a...
The biggest, best walk – and bath of a lifetime.
Tina Martin SENIORBEAT GUEST COLUMN – I love San Francisco, and I love to walk. So when...
‘So hard, all the losses and pain:’ Personal and world tragedies led daughter of Holocaust survivors to life of helping others help others
Juliet Rothman was living in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1992 when her 21-year-old son Daniel attempted a double...
Rock ‘n’ roll and diamonds shaped the life of Arthur Indenbaum
WRITER'S NOTE: Arthur Indenbaum died on November 28, 2025, with his wife and daughter by his side....
A lucky phone call steered him into a 54-year career as a shipping executive.
Tony Hanley felt stuck. He’d flunked out of San Francisco City College and was working at an...
He rode the rails, he slept on the streets, Kevin Fagan spent decades reporting on the homeless for the San Francisco Chronicle
It's a Friday night at Chief Sullivan’s, an Irish-themed bar in North Beach, and The Irish Newsboys...
All Posts
‘Whatever happened to ‘that girl?’ Traveling while older offers challenges but nothing this former tour guide couldn’t handle
SENIOR BEAT COLUMN Whenever I go through airport security, I light up their machines like a Chernobyl chicken. “Female Assist!” the cry goes up for a pat down and I get that look. I explain that a car wreck in my youth left titanium holding my knee and hip together, but somehow my images show ...
Norms never held her back: Championship horsewoman, groundbreaking feminist, daring travel writer
Diane LeBow was a solo traveler when “one was an odd number for a woman traveler,” she has written. And she visited countries and people not on the typical tourist list: Libya, Morocco, Syria, Sulawesi, Indonesia, Mongolia, and Afghanistan. She stayed from weeks to months, got to know the locals, and had romances with some. ...
Buttons, strings and fabric scraps: Artist creates intricate designs and portraits from bits and pieces
Marie Bergstedt finds art in the everyday: buttons, fabrics, bits of discarded clothing, and string. She combines those mundane materials into expressive representations of a person she’s known or observed. Her subjects range from relatives, friends and associates to street people. A self-described fabric artist, she works with natural and synthetic fibers to create her ...
Senior dance troupe keeps cabaret alive in Chinatown; its director hit the world stage as a teen, after a surprise call from a famous landlord
Cynthia Yee’s mother got her started in ballet at the age of 10, getting advice on a teacher from their landlady. Yee practiced every day in her apartment building’s spacious lobby, dreaming of dancing on the world stage. Seven years later, the landlady, Dorothy Toy, called back. Toy was no ordinary landlord. She was a ...
Jerry Barrish had a knack for rustling: supplies in the Army, bail for ’60s demonstrators, and scrap plastics for his quirky art sculptures
On a glistening Sunday between January’s storms, Jerry Ross Barrish welcomed a throng of visitors to the opening of his sculpture exhibit at the M. Stark Gallery in Half Moon Bay. The lanky, 83-year-old San Francisco native and retired bail bondsman smiled broadly and said to a guest: “Usually, I know about 40 to 50 ...
Educator challenged the status quo at an early age, helped found SF Women’s Building and now active in California Senior Legislature
Anne Warren was never shy. In high school, she shocked school administrators at a public meeting. The integration they were proud to proclaim in her hometown’s sole public high school did not exist. As a young Black woman, she described deeply divided racial and economic divisions. “The kids who gathered in the front hall were ...
