Gerson, Tove Gertrud Mueller, 1902-1998

Tove Gertrud (Müller) Gerson, émigré social activist, YWCA administrator, gymnastics teacher, and physical therapist, was born on September 18, 1902, in Munich, Germany, the daughter of Ellen (Dyhr) and Albert Müller. She attended a private elementary school in the village of Dachau, and went on to the Humanistisches und Realgymnasium in Munich, graduating in 1919. After spending a year in Denmark with her mother(s family, Gerson took courses at a business school, worked as a bank clerk and secretary, and in 1924 married Gerhard Gerson, a research engineer working in Essen.

Following a four-year course at the Bundesschule für Körperbildung und rhythmische Erziehung (Essen), Gerson worked as a teacher and physical education instructor. In 1938 Gerhard Gerson, who was half Jewish, left for the United States and went to work for Phillips Petroleum Co.; Tove Gerson joined him in 1939. Until she returned to Germany in 1973, Gerson lived in four states and led an active professional and volunteer life reflected in the following chronology:

In 1970 Gerson began to lose her sight. She returned to Germany in 1973. She is now blind and living in an Altersheim (old age home) in Essen.

From the guide to the Papers, 1919-1993, (Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute)