Ruth Westheimer (June 4, 1928 – July 12, 2024), widely known as Dr. Ruth, was an American sex therapist, media personality, and author. The New York Times described her as a “Sorbonne-trained psychologist who became a cultural icon in the 1980s,” noting that she “ushered in a new age of freer, franker talk about sex on radio and television” and was “endlessly parodied for her limitless enthusiasm and for having an accent only a psychologist could have.”
Born Karola Ruth Siegel in Wiesenfeld, Germany, she was the only child of Orthodox Jewish parents, Irma (née Hanauer) and Julius Siegel. Following her father’s arrest by the Nazis, her mother placed her on a Kindertransport to Switzerland in January 1939 to ensure her safety.
Her safe haven, along with that of roughly 100 other German-Jewish children, was made possible by Swiss activist Franzisca Goldschmidt. While coming of age in a Swiss orphanage, young Karola stopped receiving letters from her parents in September 1941. In 1945, she learned the devastating news that they had been murdered in the Holocaust, likely at the Auschwitz concentration camp.
While the Swiss orphanage kept her physically safe from the death camps, it was far from an idyllic refuge. The Swiss authorities did not allow the older refugee children to receive a formal secondary education; instead, they were trained as domestic maids and forced to do heavy labor.
Following the war, Westheimer chose to emigrate to Mandatory Palestine. It was there, at age 17, that she had her first sexual experience—an event she later recalled as occurring “on a starry night, in a haystack without contraception.” Reflecting on it to The New York Times, she admitted, “I am not happy about that, but I know much better now and so does everyone who listens to my radio program.” Shortly after her arrival, she joined the Haganah Zionist paramilitary organization in Jerusalem.
Standing at just 4 feet 7 inches tall, Westheimer’s small stature made her the perfect candidate to train as a scout and sniper.
“I don’t know how to kill anybody, but I was a very good sniper,” she later recalled in interviews. “I could put a bullet right in the center of a target from a great distance.”
Ruth learned how to throw grenades, dismantle firearms blindfolded, and handle a rifle with precision. She spent months patrolling the rooftops of Jerusalem, protecting the community from sniper fire and ready to defend it herself.
Ruth’s military career came to a sudden and violent end on her 20th birthday, June 4, 1948. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, an artillery shell struck the girls’ dormitory where she was staying in Jerusalem.
The blast killed several of her roommates and severely injured Ruth. Shrapnel tore through both of her legs, and she narrowly avoided having them amputated. A skilled surgeon managed to save her legs, but she had to spend months learning how to walk again. Her days as an active-duty sniper were over.
Ready for a fresh start, she moved to France in 1950 to immerse herself in academia at the University of Paris. After years of studying and teaching psychology there, she relocated to the United States in 1956, settling in Washington Heights, Manhattan—the neighborhood she would call home for the rest of her life.
She lived in the same cluttered, three-bedroom Washington Heights apartment where she raised her two children and became famous—in that order. She chose to remain in the neighborhood because of her deep roots there: she belonged to two local synagogues, served as president of the YW-YMHA for three years, and was a vital part of the area’s sizable community of German-Jewish World War II refugees. A true polyglot, she spoke English, German, French, and Hebrew.
Westheimer earned an M.A. in sociology from The New School in 1959 and an Ed.D. from Teachers College, Columbia University, in 1970. She later completed post-doctoral work in human sexuality at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, training under pioneering sex therapist Helen Singer Kaplan. Over her career, she authored numerous books on human sexuality, including Dr. Ruth’s Encyclopedia of Sex and Sex for Dummies.
A sought-after speaker, Westheimer delivered commencement addresses at the Hebrew Union College seminary, Lehman College of the City University of New York, and Trinity College.
Westheimer’s accolades included the 2002 Leo Baeck Medal for her work promoting tolerance and social justice, and a 2008 honorary doctorate from Westfield State College. She was married three times, most notably to her third husband, Manfred Westheimer, from whom she was widowed in 1997. She had two children, Miriam and Joel, and several grandchildren.
Sadly she passed away on Friday July 12, 2024, aged 96.
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sources
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ruth-Westheimer
https://www.webmd.com/bio/ruth-westheimer
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