Estelle Eisler

Don’t be afraid to experiment and do different things, I would tell a young person to “Be Brave”, a middle-aged person to “Perservere” and an elderly person to “Keep on Truckin.”

A Life Lived Fully, Fiercely, and Fashionably

When I first met Estelle in person, she opened the door, smiled, and cheerfully called out, “Happy Birthday!” I had no idea how she knew that. She was 96 years old and confessed that she had looked up my birthday on Facebook! She had learned email at 90. She kept up with politics, world events, and family history. Even as she approached 100, her mind was alert, curious, and unafraid to speak its opinions.

Estelle described herself to me as someone who had always been “afraid of her shadow,” yet her life tells a very different story.

A Girl from New York

Born to Isadore Rosenberg (from New York City) and Ida Feldman Rosenberg on February 16, 1922, in Brooklyn, New York, she grew up in the Crown Heights neighborhood.

On the Rosenberg side of the family, she remembered her Romanian-born grandmother rolling out strudel dough in the kitchen. Her grandmother spoke only Yiddish, but she made strudel that drew relatives — and even actors — to the house.

Before Jewish holidays, Estelle went with her mother to the fish market to choose the fish for gefilte fish. She remembered how they diluted milk with water to stretch it further — “ahead of her time,” Estelle would later joke, since skim milk became fashionable decades afterward.

During World War II, she saw a yeshiva boy standing on a street corner raising money to bring Jews to safety. That image stayed with her.

When JFK ran for president, Estelle, now living in Los Angeles, brought her children to the corner to wave as his parade passed through the neighborhood. She lived inside history — and paid attention to it.

Finding Her Way in Fashion

Estelle attended Girls Commercial High School because it offered fashion design courses. At 18, she landed her first job in a factory — and was fired. She called herself “a miserable failure.” But she didn’t stay down.

She enrolled at the Traphagen School of Fashion, where Ethel Traphagen recognized her talent and gave her a scholarship. She later worked for designer Adrian, making clothes for movie stars. A Greek classmate, Delanos, would go on to design clothes for Nancy Reagan.

After her husband died, she started her own fashion design business out of her garage. Estelle Eisler Ltd., in downtown Los Angeles. For many years, she designed and manufactured girl’s dresses for the likes of Neiman Marcus and Sacks Fifth Avenue.

She later received an Associate in Arts degree in humanities from West Los Angeles College in 1974 and a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Humanities, Magna Cum Laude, from California State University, Dominguez Hills in March of 1980. She taught fashion design at Los Angeles Trade Technical College in downtown Los Angeles and Westwood College. Former students never forgot her. One designed for The Golden Girls and Vanna White. Another became president of the Costume Guild in Hollywood. Decades later, they found her again on Facebook.

Fashion wasn’t just a job. It was part of her identity — creative, observant, stylish, and resilient.

Marriage, Motherhood, and a Pioneer Husband

Estelle’s three children

She traveled to Israel alone and once had a memorable meal in an Italian Jewish home there. She had no one to  travel with as her children were grown so went to Israel on her own and stayed with friends she had made from her husband’s work who had come to this country.  However, part of the tour included a hotel stay which she cancelled to stay with her friends.  When she got home, the hotel sent her a bill.  It seems she was supposed to room with  2 other women and because she wasn’t there, they had a friend come and stay and they charged everything to Estelle’s name.  She wrote them back and told what happened and never heard from them again.

She visited the Wailing Wall, the Old Gold Dome and other sights, staying in Haifa and Jerusulem.  Then she went to Moracco where she bought a rug to be shipped home  After months of not getting it, she assumed she had been swindled.  However, one day she arrived home and found a package on her doorstep – the rug!

Her first big overseas trip with her three teenage children was less idyllic. No one wanted to be there. One son had just met his future wife and resented leaving. Her daughter wanted to shop for her boyfriend. Her youngest snuck out to Amsterdam’s Red Light District while she slept. She only discovered it the next morning.

She told the story with equal parts frustration and amusement — motherhood in a nutshell.

A Devoted Mother and Grandmother

She was fiercely proud of her children and grandchildren.

Every New Year’s Eve, her granddaughter, Jackie, slept over so her parents could go out. Estelle would bake a cherry pie, and the two of them would sit together and eat it — their own quiet celebration.

She admired Nancy, her daughter, for her fearlessness. Nancy became a speech language pathologist. Her career consisted of working with both children and adults in the medical and private practice settings. She was a rehab manager for a number of years. 

When Nancy was in labor delivering Dani, Estelle insisted on being in the delivery room. She was deeply worried about her daughter and could not imagine waiting outside. Nancy, in the middle of everything, was startled to suddenly see her mother there — but of course, Estelle had come because that is who she was. It was classic Estelle — anxious, protective, determined, and right by her daughter’s side.

Of all the designs she created over the years, the ones she treasured most were the original dresses she made for her granddaughters.

Estelle marveled that her daughter and granddaughters seemed unafraid of anything — especially when the world felt uncertain.

Estelle with her two young great-grandsons ( Jackie’s boys) — her love for them shines through

Sharp Mind, Strong Opinions

Estelle was politically engaged and deeply troubled by what she saw happening in American democracy in her later years. She followed elections closely and worried about the country’s direction. Even in her late 90s, she read widely, did New York Times crosswords, quilted, listened to books on tape — Sue Grafton, Jane Austen — and watched PBS.

She loved conversation. She loved ideas.

And she loved family history. Without her, entire branches of the story would have remained unknown.

Humor, Humility, and Humanity

There were tender later chapters, too.

She decided to try Meals on Wheels after accidentally baking a quiche without eggs. She received oxygen but wasn’t quite sure how to manage it. In assisted living, she considered a shower and haircut a “treat.” She once told me her Hospice doctor was “so cute”.

When the railroad built tracks behind her house despite neighborhood protests — complete with bused-in opposition — she shrugged. “It doesn’t bother me,” she said.

She adapted.

She always adapted.

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She got to celebrate her 100th birthday party in her home. It was smaller than originally planned since COVID was just starting to let up.

Estelle and her daughter, Nancy