Pitt and CMU professor Dr. Barbara Burstin will discuss and sign her biography of Pittsburgh Mayor Sophie Masloff

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It's fairly certain that Sophie Masloff never studied the writings of our founding fathers. She was a poor girl, not able to go to college, not steeped in the niceties of the American tradition, but despite this, Sophie in a very real sense, lived up to our founding fathers' standards She might not have been the incarnation of the person they envisioned as a leader. After all, she was a woman, a jew, not independently wealthy or with any pedigree or celebrated status, but by her values and by her deeds she would have ultimately won their respect.

For Sophie was all about the people, all about using her office to help others, to respond to their needs, to make things better. Whatever govermental or non-governmental position she held, she was there to serve her constiuents, never herself.

It was said by those who knew her that Sophie had three great loves--her family, the Democratic Party and the city of Pittsburgh.

Barbara Burstin

“Dr. B.” has been on the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University for over twenty-five years. She teaches on the Holocaust and the United States response, on Pittsburgh history and on the American and Pittsburgh Jewish experience. Her books include: After the Holocaust: The Migration of Polish Jews and Christians to Pittsburgh and several books on Pittsburgh Jewish history. They are Steel City Jews (2009) and two books recently published including a sequel to her first volume entitled Steel City Jews in Prosperity, Depression and War. She has also compiled and authored a picture book for the Images of America Series titled Jewish Pittsburgh and produced a documentary- “A Jewish Legacy: Pittsburgh,” now on DVD.

Barbara has won various awards for her writing, for the documentary and for her teaching and community service. She has served as Chair of the Hillel-Jewish University Center, the Pittsburgh Holocaust Commission, the Pittsburgh Chapter of the American Jewish Committee and the Greater Pittsburgh Jewish Federation. She has served on the Pittsburgh Human Relations Commission for twelve years. She has conducted teacher training workshops, and continues to lecture widely in the community and teach courses in the local Osher Program.

Barbara received her Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Vassar College, her Master’s degree in the Teaching of History from Columbia Teachers College and her Ph.D. in History from the University of Pittsburgh.