Life in the Later Lane
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
By the time he was 12, Arthur Indenbaum had been playing the piano for four years and...
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...
Circus Bella veteran juggler and ‘right-hand man’ keeps his family in on the act
Lots of parents talk about juggling responsibilities when it comes to their kids. Not so many literally...
Retired scientist, avid cyclist, and world traveler faces the challenge of Alzheimer’s
For many high school biology students, dissecting a frog is an unpleasant rite of passage. But for...
A tale of love and lighting on Divisadero Street
How deeply did Yury Budovlya fall for Liya Klets, an 18-year-old Siberian beauty? When she traveled to...
“Mr. Mahjong” teaches San Francisco to love a 19th-century Chinese game
When Andrew Keeler was five, he would fall asleep in his living room to the sound of...
Practicality atop an adventurous spirit has Potrero Hill resident contemplating eventual move even as she continues to build community
Contact her at robinevans@sfseniorbeat.com. Even as she speaks, calmly, about uprooting herself from the neighborhood she’s lived in...
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It’s the little things that count for Margaret Lew, swept up in the world of miniature craftmanship
If you think dollhouses are just for children, you haven’t met the artisans and collectors, like Margaret Lew, who play in the Lilliputian world of miniature furnishings and accoutrements. Lew’s passion for miniatures surfaced in childhood – she “always liked the little things for my dollhouse” – and reignited in 2003, when at 60, she ...
Desire to learn mah-jongg helped Stephanie Riger overcome her own biases toward seniors
SENIOR BEAT GUEST COLUMN – Even though I’m 78 years old, I have resisted seeing myself as a senior. It’s not just age, it’s accepting the negative image I have of seniors. Even though I’ve never experienced ageism myself, I nonetheless defined being a senior as being elderly, frail, sweet, and a little dotty. I ...
Retirement can be scary. Library worker hoping the end of his career will be the start of a happy new chapter
Seventy-one-year-old Richard Marino is on the cusp of retirement. And it’s making him anxious. He’s gone through other transitions, from coming out as gay, moving from his family home in the Bronx to New York’s East Village, and then leaving New York City for San Francisco. He traded a rambunctious gay lifestyle for a rather ...
German Gonzalez, the maestro of Golden Gate Park, has spread music and joy for more than 50 years
He was in the sixth grade and really wanted to be in the school band. But his parents told him there was no money to buy or rent an instrument. His older sister was dating a guy whose brother had a trumpet in his closet. The horn soon made its way to the wannabe musician ...
At 67, Lauren McNamara has embarked on a new career and she’s charming customers at a downtown hotspot.
Lauren McNamara makes sure to remember where the regular clientele at Sam’s Grill like to sit. She Googles them to learn their interests so she can “engage in good conversation.” That’s just a sample of the people skills she’s employed over a long career in the competitive world of merchandising, sales, and interior design. She’s ...
You can get — almost — anything you want at Joseph Omran’s Nob Hill grocery store
LeBeau Market calls itself Nob Hill’s Community Grocery Store, where you can get almost everything: from Lay’s potato chips to Spanish truffle chips. It offers online shopping, home delivery and keeps up with the latest food trends. Yet its owner, Joseph Omran, feels lucky to still have customers. “The business environment hasn’t been friendly, a ...
