[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 131 (Wednesday, August 2, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Page S4761]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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                       REMEMBERING BELLE LIKOVER

 Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, this week, the city I call home lost 
a great Ohioan, and Connie and I lost a friend, Belle Likover of Shaker 
Heights. Belle passed away at age 97, and over her extraordinary life, 
she saw the creation of our country's greatest social insurance 
programs: Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid--and fought to 
protect those lifelines for American seniors.
  Ms. Likover was born the same year as my mother and grew up in Beaver 
Falls, PA. She remembered her childhood as a happy one, with one big 
exception: the Great Depression. In an interview several years ago, she 
talked about the lasting effects those memories had on her, saying, 
``We saw everybody else suffer. I remember the shantytowns. I remember 
people living in what used to be packing crates. There was a constant 
stream of people who came to our backdoor for food. My mother never 
turned anybody away.''
  Those experiences would shape her activism throughout her life. In 
high school and later in college, at the Ohio State University, she 
said she was ``never bashful about speaking out.'' She joined the high 
school varsity debate team as a sophomore, as the only girl on the 
team, and learned how to marshal an argument. She told an interviewer 
that, ``Every position of leadership I've had, I owe to that debate 
coach.''
  In college, she put that training to use, first getting involved in 
political causes in 1937, when she and a friend helped organize an 
antifascist group at Ohio State. They saw what was happening in Germany 
and across Europe and how dangerous that was for the world.
  Growing up in that time of turmoil and as a woman at a time when her 
abilities would be constantly questioned, Belle faced setbacks. As a 
child, she asked for chemistry sets instead of dolls, but in college, a 
chemistry professor told her, ``If you want a Ph.D., you better marry 
one.'' Her first husband laid down his life for our country during 
World War II, leaving Ms. Likover with a newborn daughter to raise.
  She published papers without the Ph.D. that her male peers had and 
worked at the Cleveland Jewish Community Center's senior department, 
where she saw what a difference Social Security made in the lives of 
the elderly--and later how Medicaid and Medicare would change their 
lives. She went to grad school on a JCC scholarship.
  Throughout the years, she never ceased in her activism. She joined me 
at events many times to talk about the importance of Medicare. I 
interviewed Belle in the summer of 2015, marking the 50th anniversary 
of the passage of Medicare and Medicaid. She told me she was thrilled 
when it passed because she remember how poor older people were when she 
was growing up--``They didn't have Medicare, they ended up in 
poorhouses,'' she told me. And she added, ``Do you know how many people 
can't wait until they're 65 to get covered by Medicare?''
  Just last fall, she joined us on a call with Ohio reporters to talk 
about how devastating it would be to raise the retirement age. That was 
Belle Likover--an activist and advocate, full of compassion but never 
bashful, all the way through age 97. Our family's thoughts and prayers 
are with Belle's loved ones. We will miss her, and we will strive to 
carry on her advocacy for Ohio seniors.

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