In Memoriam: Alice Wolf
December 24, 1933 – January 26, 2023
In the Summer of 1987, I got on my bicycle, attached a flag to the back of it, and rode through Cambridge with comrades from the National Organization for Women: Women on Wheels for Wolf, our flags declared. Afterwards, we gathered with the candidate whose run for office we endorsed. This was when I first got to know the wonderful, indomitable Alice Wolf. Over the years, when she was City Councilor and then Mayor for the City Cambridge, and when she served as its State Representative, we worked together on issues of women's rights, LGBTQ equality, combating racism and working for economic justice.
I had the honor of working with her when she gathered a group to draft and pass what would be landmark domestic partnership legislation. I saw her deep commitment to women's rights and to making sure that women's voices were heard in the political realm. I remember battles for economic fairness and her work to racial equality.
Over the years, I came to know and love the sincerity, the doggedness and the deep decency Alice brought to everything she did. Hers was never empty rhetoric left to one side when time came for the real work. Quite the contrary: She often forgot about the stuff that felt less real to her. I remember reminding her to draft a press release when the domestic partnership legislation passed. She needed to take appropriate credit for her amazing work, I told her. She shrugged; she just wanted to get the right thing done. So, in that instance and others, I made her sit on the phone with me as I drafted a press release for her. This was never her first thought. She made a difference in the world because she believed in doing that work. That was enough for her.
Alice loved the City of Cambridge, and she was clear eyed about its challenges. So, in 2008, when I needed a witness to explain City government at a trial against her beloved City for race discrimination and retaliation, the former Mayor stepped up. She was fabulous.
Alice also cared deeply about others. Some public officials do well in public space and perhaps not so well in private. That was not Alice. Her bond with her extraordinary husband, Bob, and her wonderful children and grandchildren was strong and wonderful to behold. And for those of us lucky to become part of her broader family, the warmth extended beyond shared political commitments. When I was pregnant and about to give birth in 2003, she proudly appeared at my door: she had the Wolf family bassinet in her hands. Your son, the child of two Moms, will be the first non-Wolf family child to sleep in this bassinet, she told me with delight.
I had sort of assumed Alice Wolf would live forever. Although we cannot escape the passage of time, with Alice, her energy, her drive to make a difference and her engagement in the world had never waned. At the news of her passing, I looked through emails and pictures; I quietly remembered. And I came upon her RSVP to the wedding celebration my spouse and I had twenty-five years into our union. She wrote this: Alice Wolf on Wheels for the Ellens! I could not believe it. Nearly thirty years after she and I had met, she remembered that event. But that was Alice. A woman with her eyes set on a better future who nonetheless remembered the importance of every moment. May we be enriched by her example – and may our wheels keep turning toward the justice she envisioned.
