Biography

Lillian Schwartz was born in 1917 in Chicago, Illinois, to Louis and Anna Schwartz. She grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in Chicago where her parents owned a cleaning and tailor shop. She attended Anshe Emet synagogue and taught classes in the Sunday school. Schwartz graduated from Lakeview High School in Chicago in 1935 and received a scholarship from Anshe Emet to attend college classes at the College of Jewish Studies (later the Spertus Institute of Jewish Learning and Leadership) where she received her teaching degree in 1940. In the early 1940s, Schwartz became involved with the Brandeis Collegiate Institute and was hired as Assistant Director and Field Secretary. From 1942 to 1946, she worked as national organizer for the American Zionist Youth Commission traveling throughout the country conducting trainings for local Hadassah and Young Judea chapters.

In 1946, Lillian Schwartz married Norman Brodkey and moved to Sioux City, Iowa, where she became active in the Jewish Community Center and Young Judea Youth Activities and continued to be involved in the Brandeis Camp Institute. Over the course of 70 years, Brodkey recruited more than 130 Jewish young adults from Sioux City to attend the Brandeis Bardin Collegiate Institute. As a parent of three children, she was involved in many community organizations including the Education Chair of the Parent Teachers Association, the Executive Director of the Sioux Trails Girl Scout Council, cofounder of the Sioux City Bicycle Safety Club and was been active in the Sioux City Lioness and Lions Clubs for more than 30 years. Brodkey returned to college and received a degree in Humanities and Education from Morningside College in 1967. She also joined her husband in his optometric practice and continued to be heavily involved in the Jewish community as the first woman president of Shaare Zion Synagogue and president of the Sioux City Jewish Federation in 1989. The Brandeis Collegiate Institute Scholarship Fund, was established in her honor at Beth Shalom Synagogue in Sioux City.

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