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The Family of the Late
ANNIE KLEINMAN
Announces the unveiling of a monument in her loving memory
12:00 p.m., Sunday, September 24, at Hebrew Memorial Park.
Rabbi Rosenzzeig will officiate.
Relatives and friends are invited to attend.
A Champion's Life
The Family of the Late
DAVID SACHS
StaffWriter
SIDNEY NICKIN
Announces the unveiling of a monument in his memory 2:00 p.m.,
Sunday, September 24, 2000, at Oakview Cemetery. Rabbi Bitran
will officiate. Relatives and friends are invited to attend.
BLANKA OPAS
The wife of Michael Opas (Holocaust Survivor)
Announces the unveiling of a monument in his memory
11:00 a.m., Sunday, September 24, 2000,
at Hebrew Memorial Park. Friends are invited to attend.
The Family of the Late
LOUIS WECHSLER
Announces the unveiling of a monument in his memory 9:00 a.m.,
Sunday, September 24, at Clover Hill Park Cemetery. Rabbi Loss
will officiate. Relatives and friends are invited to attend.
In Loving Memory of
In Beloved Memory of
ERVIN GOLDING
CARL SATTLER
Who passed away August 21, 1999,
Who passed away
September 15, 1996.
You are always with us in our hearts
and always remembered and loved by,
Kathy, Howard, Janis, Ronny, Diane
and grandchildren.
the 11 Tishri 5760.
Sadly missed and always
remembered by his wife,
children and grandchildren.
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DIITROCT
AIME inn=
iTN
y
uri Rabinovich was a brilliant
fencer — a child prodigy and
junior Soviet champion.
At age 20, he defected to
the West and ultimately found a home
in the fencing hotbed of Detroit, win-
ning national champi-
onships at Wayne State
University. In the
more than two
decades since as a fenc-
ing coach, he used his
expertise, charisma
and love of the sport
to spawn a new gener-
ation of champions.
Mr. Rabinovich,
49, of Beverly Hills,
died of a stroke Aug.
31 while on a golfing
Yuri Rabinovich
vacation to South
Carolina. The trip
was to celebrate what would have been
his 50th birthday Sept. 3 and 20th
wedding anniversary Sept. 6.
More than 150 people, many of
them students and friends from the
Fencing Academy of Michigan,
attended a memorial service Sept. 10
at WSU's McGregor Memorial
Conference Center.
"When Yuri fenced, he was incredi-
bly intimidating, incredibly intimidat-
ing," said longtime student Bonnie
Topper of Southfield. "Then he would
take off his mask and charm the per-
son he'd just beaten the hell out of.
"He was not intimidating to the
youngsters, though," she said. "He
became almost an uncle to them."
Mr. Rabinovich began his fencing
odyssey in Odessa, USSR, where he
started training as a 6-year-old.
According to his wife Suzanne, he also
excelled in boxing and karate while in
the Soviet Army. He defected from the
Soviet Union during a fencing tourna-
ment in 1970 in Paris and wandered
through Europe for three years.
While staying in Netanya, Israel, he
joined the Israeli Olympic fencing
team. He was devastated when he
took ill at the time of the Games and
had to be left behind. The team went
on without him to the 1972 Olympics
in Munich, Germany, where his coach
Andre Spitzer was one of 11 Israelis
murdered by Arab terrorists.
Mr. Rabinovich came to the United
States in 1973 and caught the eye of
renowned Wayne State fencing mae-
stro Istvan Danosi, who offered him a
scholarship. Mr. Rabinovich went on
to win two NCAA championships in
saber fencing, a format that targets the
opponent above the waist. He was also
a master of the two other fencing
weapons, foil and epee, qualifying him
as a maestro.
Toward the end of the
decade, Mr. Rabinovich
became assistant coach of the
WSU team and later spent
three years as fencing coach at
the University of Detroit. He
eventually opened a studio in
his house to give private
lessons and served as master of
the nonprofit Fencing
Academy of Michigan.
Mr. Rabinovich sought to
convey his love of fencing to
children. "My son started
when he was 8," said Topper.
"He watched me fence and wanted to
give it a try. He was a natural from the
beginning and Yuri was his teacher.
"Yuri was like a Pied Piper. People
would come to the academy and be
drawn to the sport just because of the
strength of his personality."
Topper's son Mike received a fencing
scholarship to Brandeis University and
was NCAA champion for two years.
Connie Whitmer of West
Bloomfield was a fencing student
whose son Darrin began 10 years of
daily lessons at age 8. Darrin began
classes at St. John's University in
New York City on a fencing scholar-
ship this year and hopes to compete
in the 2004 Olympics in Greece.
Ann Marsh, a former student of Mr.
Rabinovich, is currently competing
in the Olympics in Sydney,
Australia.
"Yuri not only taught the kids fenc-
ing, but he also taught them life,"
Whitmer said. "He instilled his values
in the kids and taught them how to
win, how to lose, and how to make
decisions in life.
"He was such a wonderful man,"
she added, "kind, intelligent, talented.
All he wanted to do was to pass on his
love and knowledge of fencing to the
next generation."
Yuri Rabinovich is survived by his
wife, Suzanne Weller Rabinovich, and
sister and brother-in-law Rimma and
Haim Aaron of Israel.0