Anna J. Hahn

Anna Josephine (Sandler) Hahn was born on May 31, 1919, and died peacefully at the age of 99 on Wednesday, November 21, 2018. The youngest of three daughters of Samuel and Elizabeth (Corig) Sandler, who had emigrated from Odessa and Kishnev at the turn of the century. Anna grew up in the triple-decker neighborhoods of Dorchester, Roxbury, Brighton, and Jamaica Plain. Her father owned a small window-shade business in Brookline, where the family ultimately lived, and her mother was a skilled seamstress whose allergies led Anna and her sisters to spend many summers in the Jewish hotels of Bethlehem NH.

Anna attended Girls Latin School and earned a degree in sociology at Radcliffe College. Throughout her life she was an active member of the Class of 1940, co-chaired the 25th reunion, and was class treasurer until 2005. Following college, she first worked doing statistics at Harvard’s Littauer Center.

She met and fell in love with Arnold Hahn and traveled across the country with him as he entered the army and was stationed in San Bernardino CA. They married in March 1942, and shortly thereafter Arnold was sent to India for over three years. Anna returned to Boston and worked for Dr. Isidore Rabi and Dr. L.A. Turner at MIT.

Arnold and Anna bought their first home on Hartman Road in Newton, and Anna became a full-time mom raising three sons while Arnold operated a wholesale meat business. They enjoyed painting, the theater, ski trips, and summers with good friends near Good Harbor Beach in Gloucester, as well as extended winter months in Longboat Key, Florida. When the children grew up, Anna and Arnold traveled abroad frequently. Both became active supporters of Brandeis College. In the ‘60s and ‘70s Anna took courses in sensitivity training, which led to being an active volunteer for the non-profit Community Sex Information.

While enjoying grandchildren, Anna cared for Arnold whose health began to fail in 1980. After his death in 1985, she continued to travel and eventually sold the Hartman Road house and moved to a condominium in Chestnut Hill, where she lived until moving to the Hillsboro House nursing home in New Hampshire in 2015. Throughout her life Anna was a voracious reader and a reflective and insightful writer, leaving behind many hand-written journals and photographs.

Pre-deceased by her husband, Arnold, her parents, sisters Sophie Horwitz and Frances Borofsky, she leaves behind her three sons, Steven and his wife Trim of Peterborough NH, Robert and his partner Denise Corby of Oak Beach NY, and Fredric of Concord MA, seven grandchildren, Nicholas, Joshua, Noah, Rebecca, Dianna, Talia and Sage, six great grandchildren, Colin, Julian, Ramona, Samuel, Anna, and Chloe, a niece and several nephews.

Graveside services will be at Sharon Memorial Park, 40 Dedham St., Sharon on Friday, November 23 at 1:45PM. Remembrances may be made to the Newton Free Library, Development Office, 330 Homer St., Newton, MA 02459.