Molly Albert, quintessential Philadelphia volunteer, dies at 98
She embraced action and camaraderie and never met a challenge she wouldn't take on. She called her battle with cancer a "small annoyance."
Molly Albert, 98, of Philadelphia, an award-winning volunteer who lifted spirits at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, played Betsy Ross for hundreds of downtown tourists, read to blind students at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, organized bus trips to Broadway shows for seniors, and contributed to countless other endeavors, died Saturday, Feb. 5, of cancer at home.
Though she had two children of her own, took motherhood seriously, and was married for more than 50 years, Mrs. Albert could not contain her desire to make life better for others as well.
She was in charge of the landscape, Christmas tree, and library committees when she lived at the Philadelphian on Pennsylvania Avenue. She was active in get-out-the-vote drives and local and national Democratic political campaigns, and, when her children were young, it was at her house that all their friends gathered.
Mrs. Albert was featured in a 2017 story in the New York Times about her bus trips to Broadway. She won an award from Jefferson Hospital for her volunteer work with cancer patients, taught tap dancing in her 90s, and her friends nicknamed her the unsinkable Molly Albert.
“Molly Albert was one of the most exceptional women I have ever met,” a friend wrote in an online tribute. “She was a model to all of us.”
Said her son, Marc: “Everyone gravitated to her. She never let a day go by that she didn’t find something great going on.”
Born Oct. 21, 1923, in Philadelphia, Molly Segal was the daughter of Russian immigrants. Her father died when she was 7, and her mother knew little English. But Mrs. Albert did not let such challenges stop her, and she and her siblings helped her mother run the family grocery store.
She also rode horses, played tennis, skied, studied dance, and played a part in the Nutcracker ballet. She graduated from West Philadelphia High School at 16 in 1940 and got a job on Jewelers Row.
She married Sidney Albert in 1947, and they raised son Marc and daughter Andrea in Mount Airy and Broomall. The family moved to Munich, Germany, for two years when her husband opened a life insurance company there and then relocated to Cheltenham in 1960.
She and her husband moved to Philadelphia about 40 years ago, after her children left home. Her husband died earlier.
Mrs. Albert was a competitive bridge player and gardener who specialized in peonies. She was active in just about every group to which her young children belonged, and she admired educators so much that she quizzed her son’s fourth-grade teacher constantly about her experiences.
She liked to swim, was organized and neat, and, known as an elegant dresser, modeled for photography shoots. “She had pizzazz,” a friend wrote in a tribute. She traveled to England alone on one journey, and made the rounds of Europe in her 80s.
Mrs. Albert battled cancer over the last 15 years but referred to it as a “small annoyance” to family and friends. She met Harold Myers at a bridge game a few years ago, and they traveled together to concerts, movies, the theater, and elsewhere.
In a tribute, her family wrote that Mrs. Albert “enriched Philadelphia, delighted a community, and enhanced the lives of countless people.”
In addition to her children and partner, Mrs. Albert is survived by three grandchildren, seven great-grandchildren, and other relatives. A brother and three sisters died earlier.
A celebration of life is to be held later.