'Moorie' Sydnor, 73, 'exceptional woman'

"WE DON'T EVER say goodbye in this house!" Moorie Sydnor would declare. "We say so long."

Then before sending her guests away, she would demand a hug. "You know we don't have strangers in this house," she would say, "Get over here and give me a bump!"

This reminiscence was part of a tribute written for Moorie by Jeremy Rogoff, who considered her to be a surrogate mom.

Moorie helped raise Jeremy and his sister, Lisa, but this remarkable woman influenced so many other lives with her special brand of compassion and wisdom, not only family members, but neighbors, friends and even total strangers.

Her admonition to one and all was simple, "Be kind." And those were the words she lived by.

Mooreisley"Moorie" Sydnor, who worked for 26 years as baby-sitter and housekeeper for Andrew Rogoff and his wife, Amy Ginensky, both lawyers, a former restaurant operator and unofficial mayor of the 4000 block of Spring Garden Street in West Philadelphia, died July 5 of a heart condition. She would have been 74 on July 21.

"In a neighborhood where residents rarely could recall the name of the family next door, there was one common link," Jeremy wrote. "Moorie knew everyone and everyone knew Moorie."

"She was exceptional," said Amy Ginensky. "Everyone she touched and all she hugged were changed for the better by Moorie. I have been lucky to know many exceptional people, but she was tops among them."

Yuhnis Sydnor, Moorie's son, said that after his mother's death, a neighbor came up to him to express her sorrow, and said, Moorie was "like my mom."

"She taught me how to wear makeup, how to wear perfume, how to set a table," Yuhnis quoted her as saying. "She taught me how to be a lady."

Yuhnis said his mother "was responsible for making me the man I am today. She taught me to always have manners, to be polite even in the most challenging situations. She was a lady."

"She was always out for justice," Yuhnis said. He said another friend told him of the time she was having trouble in school and Moorie "came up and stood up for me.

"She had a way of making everything OK," her son said.

Moorie was born in Philadelphia to Madeline Garner and John Gill. She graduated from the William Shoemaker School. She married Frank Hestor Sydnor in the late '50s. He died in 1978. She worked for a time for the former Esty's department store, where she developed an interest in fashion. In the early '70s, she owned a restaurant at Front Street and Girard Avenue, Fishtown. She went to work for Andy Rogoff and Amy Ginensky in Penn Valley in 1982.

Moorie obviously fascinated Jeremy, now 20, a student at Washington University.

"She could tell if a fish were fresh by looking into its eyes," he wrote. "She could cure a fever by holding a peeled potato to a child's head. When it was windy, she could hear the trees talk to one another.

"Unlike anyone else, Moorie put her unmistakable imprint on others' lives with just one exchange," Jeremy wrote.

Moorie loved to travel, and visited most of the countries of Europe. Her favorite city was Paris, where she enjoyed strolling the Champs Elysees and dining out.

Besides her son, she is survived by another son, Stephan; a brother, Frederick Weaver; three sisters, Beatrice Johnson, Fredericka Griffin and Justina Shelton; seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild.

Services: Funeral Mass 10 a.m. today at St. Ignatius Loyola Church, 43rd and Wallace streets. Friends may call at 9 a.m. Burial will be in Old Cathedral Cemetery. Contributions may be made to the Moorie-Marcie-Monday Scholarship Fund at the Academy in Manayunk, www.aimpa.org. *