Fellow Traveler

It is a memoir about Esther Rowland’s journey through the Twentieth Century, from the perspective of a middle-class Jewish, politically involved woman. Her stories, about her family and her friends, her work and her engagement into the conflicts and moral dilemmas of the time, are provocative, and often funny. The book is also about her marriage to Lewis P. Rowland M.D. and the efforts they have made to live out their values.

It is a memoir about Esther Rowland's journey through the Twentieth Century from the perspective of a middle-class Jewish, politically engaged woman. The book contains funny and revealing stories about family and friends--all set in the context of the times: the Depression, World War II, as well as the struggles for civil liberties, civil rights, women's equality and peace. The book also describes Esther's marriage to Lewis P. Rowland, M.D. and their efforts to live out their values and pass them along to their children and grandchildren.

Esther Rowland was born in New York City in 1926. She grew up in the Bronx, attended Walton High School, City College of New York, and received her B.A. Degree from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in 1947, with a major in Political Science. She continued her studies at Columbia University in the Department of Public Law and Government, receiving the M.A. in 1948 and M.Phil in 1984. She taught in the Political Science Departments at City College, Mt. Holyoke College, and later at Drexel University. In 1952 she met and married Lewis P.(Bud)Rowland M.D., a marriage that has lasted 63 years so far. They have three children: Andy, Steve, and Judy (Joy). When Dr. Rowland became chair of the Department of Neurology at the University of Pennsylvania in 1967, the family moved to Philadelphia. In 1971 Esther was hired to share the job of Health Professions Advisor at the University of Pennsylvania. When Bud became chair of the Department of Neurology at Columbia University, the family returned to New York where Esther became the Pre-Professional Advisor at Barnard College and later Associate Dean of Studies. In 2014 her former pre-health-professional students at Barnard funded and named a scholarship in her honor. After retiring from Barnard in 1995, Esther studied for a certificate in Biomedical ethics at Columbia, became a volunteer ombudsman at the Isabella Nursing Home in Manhattan, took classes in American history at Columbia, and served as a volunteer proofreader for Monthly Review, a political journal. After taking a memoir-writing class at the 92nd Street Y, she started writing this book. Esther, Bud, and their children, and now their grandchildren, have identified themselves as “more than liberal”. They have been active in the civil rights movement, the feminist movement, the movement against the war in Vietnam, and the movement for universal health-care in the United States. Their children and grandchildren continue in the ongoing struggle for social justice and equality.