Obituary - Ruth Berenson, R.I.P.

Ruth Berenson had it in her all along to be a liberated woman, but she didn't get to the starting line until age 64, when Norbert Muhlen-her excessively German, but also excessively engaging, husband of many years-died, leaving her with very little money, a large dark old apartment on New York's Upper West Side, and the world's largest collection of Middle European beer coasters. Norbert, a stalwart anti-Communist, was the American correspondent for Die Welt and NR's expert on German affairs in the Cold War years, but his journalistic efforts never brought in a great deal of cash.

Ruth, who was related to the Berenson, Bernard Berenson, was a graduate of Smith College with a doctorate in art history from Radcliffe. She filled in as NR's art editor for a number of years. Her taste was impeccable, and she wrote with style and panache. But her major role was that of the obedient and supportive housewife. She was a marvelous hostess. One met the most interesting people at Ruth and Norbert's, and sat late at the dining-room table talking of this and that. But then, suddenly, Norbert was dead, and Ruth's friends worried about her future. She was at an age when most people are looking forward to retirement. But we didn't know our Ruth. She took hold. Did she ever take hold!

She sold the apartment, she sold the collection of beer coasters for a quite astonishing sum, she sold the other clutter Norbert had collected over a lifetime of collecting. She took back her maiden name and moved to Washington. She applied for, and landed, a job as associate deputy chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, and was very soon recognized as one of the most effective advocates of American culture in the international art world. Nothing was too much of a challenge for the new Ruth. Her friends reveled in her transformation, in the assurance she brought to her job at the NEA, and later with the U.S. Information Agency's bureau of educational and cultural affairs. Ruth Berenson died August 14 of lung cancer, age 83, having conquered every hurdle life had placed in her path but the last.