She was born in New York City, in 1913, to Sydney and Benjamin Gruenberg.
Her father was a University Professor and writer of text books in Biology. Her mother wrote child development books.
She grew up in an apartment on Central Park South.
She was the only daughter with four brothers.
She attended the Ethical Culture school at the same time as a young woman Jean Rosenthal who would one day become a hero of her grandson.
She once traveled to England with her mother.
She went to Swarthmore College.
During the Depression she took a road trip with one of her brothers across country. They had adventures.
She spent a year studying Psychology at Berkeley during which time she lived at International House.
The Psychology grad student who ran her discussion section used to “pick on me” and so she asked to be switched to another discussion section.
She wrote two novels.
She briefly lived in New York City’s Greenwich Village, but the bohemian lifestyle was not for her. She would one day recount stories of friends who had Indian tapestries on their walls and how silly it all was to a grandson who would think of his friends with Indian tapestries on their walls.
She had a love affair with an English royal.
She kept being pursued by that grad student now PhD.
She was a studio assistant to the photographer Paul Strand.
She married that PhD., now professor.
They had one son, Richard, born in Bryn Mawr, PA.
She edited and co-wrote several psychology text books with her husband.
In the 1950′s she lived with her husband and son, for a time, in Norway when her husband lost his teaching position due to not signing the McCarthy Loyalty Oath at Berkeley.
She read the New Yorker every week.
Her favorite drink was a Jack Daniels on ice although one evening she would get drunk on red wine with her grandson and tell him wild stories of raising his father.
Her first grandchild was born in 1967.
Her husband died in 1977.
Her second grandchild was born in 1978.
Her third grandchild was born in 1980.
At the age of 80 she married a man, ten years her senior who referred to her as his “child bride,” by eloping to New Mexico.
She moved in to St. Paul’s Towers shortly after her second husband died.
She lived there until 8 October 2009.
She had one son, three grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.
Her name was Hildy Krech.
