Pearl Louise Berg (née Synenberg), the ninth oldest person in the world and the third oldest person in the United States, died in Los Angeles last week at the age of 114, The Jewish News reported on Monday.
Berg was born in Evansville, Indiana, on October 1, 1909, to American Jewish parents of Eastern European ancestry. (Berg’s parents, however, told young Pearl that her birthday was Valentine’s Day— a misconception that she only corrected at age 108, at which point the habit of celebrating in February was firmly set.)
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Initially raised in Pittsburgh, when the Great Depression took a toll on Berg’s father’s used car business, the family moved to Los Angeles when Pearl was 19. (Her parents had previously made a living as professional photographers and managers of a silent movie theater.)
There, Pearl met her future husband, the Jewish immigrant from Ukraine Mark Berg, and the two remained rooted in the city for the next near century, a devoted member of Temple Israel of Hollywood for more than 85 years.
A friend of Israel since the time of its founding
Speaking to the Jewish Journal in 2022, Berg’s son Robert recounted his mother’s commitment to the Zionist cause in the early days of the State of Israel:
“My mother was silent when my father and his older brother Mischa — then head of the Los Angeles Federation — arranged in 1947 for a shipment of ‘agricultural equipment’ to Israel via Mexico,’ Robert said. While the boxes were marked with those two innocent words, ‘agricultural equipment,’ the contents were actually airplane engines meant for the Israeli air force. “‘Neither of my parents ever spoke about this, said Robert.”
In a 2023 blog post celebrating Berg’s 114th birthday, Rabbi John L. Rosove of Temple Israel recounted an interaction he’d had with his most-senior congregant four years prior, when she celebrated 110:
“I added the traditional ‘to 120!’” Rosove recounted. “She quipped: Please God ‘NO!”
Berg is survived by her two sons, Robert Joel Berg and Dr. Anal Paul Berg, and her one grandchild, Belinda Berg.