Alfred Slote

Alfred Slote, beloved husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather and friend, died Sunday, April 26th. He was 99. Born in 1926 in Brooklyn, NY, to Jewish immigrant parents, Alfred earned a bachelor and masters degree in English at the University of Michigan and later returned with his wife Henrietta Howell Slote and young family to Ann Arbor in 1956 to begin his “day job” writing and producing educational television shows at the university’s Television Center (now Michigan Media). He was also a prolific author, best known for his novels for pre-teens, many set in “Arborville.” He published 28 books in all, two of which (Jake and Finding Buck McHenry) were made into movies. He was a man of a million stories, of enormous energy, funny, smart, generous, athletic, curious and kind. Not surprisingly, he has written his own obituary:

“As a kid I did two things, I played sports and read books. When I got older I played sports and wrote about them. I was born lucky and lived lucky. My parents, Oscar and Sallie Slote, had great love and great expectations for me and my sister Gretl. Fun went hand in hand with expectations. My second piece of luck was meeting and marrying Hetsy Howell from Philadelphia. We met four times and got married the fifth time, though it was a year between the fourth and fifth time. I was in Europe and we wrote letters. She was a wonderful human being, pretty, vital, athletic, a beautiful thinker, and a writer, and the world’s most generous soul. We were married 63 years and it wasn’t long enough. She died in 2014. My third piece of luck was our having kids who gave us a lot of fun as they grew up and became smart and strong adults: John Slote (married to Nancy Cohen), Elizabeth Gilbert (married to Michael Bonislawski), and Benjamin Slote (married to Susan Slote). My fourth piece of luck was their giving us seven strong and smart grandchildren and one great-grandchild: Sophia (Grant Gordy), Frances, Miranda, Audrey (Jeremy Orosz), Joseph, Irene, Henry, and great-grandson Elias. My fifth piece of luck was leaving Brooklyn, NY where I was born and grew up and going to college in Ann Arbor where I had two great teachers: Roy Cowden and Garnet Garrison. Later I had the luck of having a great editor, Bob Amussen, who became a close friend. In Ann Arbor, where I always felt I came of age, I produced educational programs, taught screen writing, and wrote novels for adults and kids. I had also taught at Williams College, a joint I could never have gotten into as a student. Long before all this, there was a stint in the U.S. Navy toward the end of World War II. My last piece of luck was at the age of 89 meeting Susan Darrow again and falling in love with her. That’s enough luck to last a lifetime . . . and it did. Cheers.”

Special thanks to the wonderful caregivers who made Alfred’s last days comfortable. And thanks as always to Alfred’s cousin, the incomparable Dr. Richard Prager.

A gathering in Alfred’s honor will be held Sunday, June 7th, from 2-4, at the Nature Cove community room, 2115 Nature Cove Court, Ann Arbor, MI.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to Ann Arbor District Library (https://aadl.org/donations).