Thirty years of teaching English at Evanston Township High School helped prepare Syd Lieberman for a second career as a storyteller.
“When Syd … was in front of a live audience, you got pulled in,” said Sue O’Halloran, of Evanston, a fellow storyteller. “He was such a craftsman, and he took the right amount of time to get each character delineated. And he was a genius at figuring out how to structure a piece so that it had its rise and fall and its drama. He was an artist’s artist.”
A longtime Evanston resident, Mr. Lieberman, 71, died of complications from a stroke on Tuesday, May 12, at Evanston Hospital, said his wife of almost 48 years, Adrienne. He had a stroke several weeks ago, she said.
Born Sydney Lieberman in Chicago, Mr. Lieberman graduated in 1962 from Roosevelt High School. He starred as a halfback on Roosevelt’s football team, which won the 1961 Public League Blue Division championship. Mr. Lieberman received a degree from Harvard University in 1966 and a master’s degree in teaching the following year.
After marrying in 1967, Mr. Lieberman began work as an English teacher at New Trier West High School. In 1969, he and his wife joined the Peace Corps and taught in Sierra Leone.
Mr. Lieberman contracted malaria and the couple returned home, where he took a job teaching English at Evanston High School in 1970.
Mr. Lieberman became known for his alternative style of teaching writing. No fan of overhead lights, Mr. Lieberman and a colleague, Phil Roden, scoured alleys looking for discarded floor lamps to create a different classroom feel. They also filled the room with soft chairs.
“The idea was to create an ambiance where kids (didn’t feel like they were) in school,” said Roden, a retired Evanston High School teacher.
Mr. Lieberman took many students who appeared to be on the verge of dropping out and turned them around, Roden said.
“Syd believed that good writing came from what you care about,” Roden said. “And he had this passion where he made students care. Syd also believed very strongly that writing was a product to be shared, and he worked very hard with students on their writing, with fourth, fifth, sixth drafts, with the possibility that something written could be entered in a contest.”
Mr. Lieberman, whose teaching work won him a Golden Apple award in 1986, also taught a senior seminar course that took students out of the classroom. One program, called a “secret drop,” involved blindfolding students and dropping them off in Chicago and giving them a certain number of hours to get a story and make their way back to Evanston.
“Experiences like that helped kids to discover things they cared about and then to discover a voice,” Roden said.
After retiring from Evanston High School in 2000, Mr. Lieberman’s own voice came out loud and strong through his second career as a storyteller. On something of a lark in 1982, Mr. Lieberman took a course on storytelling. He quickly gained recognition for his work, which he initially used to help enhance his students’ writing.
“It’s important for kids to understand that they have stories to tell … that they have gold in their lives; serious moments, funny moments, meaningful moments that make wonderful material,” he told the Tribune in 1988.
Beth Horner, a fellow storyteller from Evanston, said Mr. Lieberman’s style was “unbelievably open and joyous.”
“The breadth of his storytelling repertoire was absolutely remarkable, from traditional Jewish tales to his incredibly humorous and touching and insightful family stories, and from his aged mother’s love life to his great-aunt’s experience during the Holocaust,” Horner said. “When Syd Lieberman got up on stage, he was so present and he clearly enjoyed the people to whom he was telling stories.”
In 2004, Mr. Lieberman became the first storyteller hired by NASA, which tapped him to document the landings on Mars by the rovers Spirit and Opportunity. This work culminated in a four-act story titled “Twelve Wheels on Mars: The 2004 Mars Exploration Rover Mission.”
“The story is about people, their humanity, their involvement in doing this incredible thing,” Mr. Lieberman told the Tribune in 2004. “With voice, body and words, I have to make that come alive and convey the feeling I got when I talked to (NASA scientists).”
Other clients included Walt Disney World, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and several museums. The Smithsonian Institution commissioned him to use his storytelling skills to discuss World War I fighter pilots. And the nonprofit Historic Philadelphia group, which promotes history through interpretation, interaction and education, hired Mr. Lieberman and his wife to collaborate on a story about the Declaration of Independence. Mr. Lieberman also performed original stories for the United States Holocaust Museum.
Not all Mr. Lieberman’s stories involved historical events. He delivered versions of classic literary tales, including those of Edgar Allan Poe and specialized in telling stories about finding meaning in seemingly mundane events.
Mr. Lieberman also enjoyed coaching storytellers, including Horner and O’Halloran.
“Syd was a very insightful storytelling coach,” Horner said. “And he was not afraid to be vulnerable in trying new material — difficult material, emotional material. He was a huge favorite at storytelling festivals across the country.”
In 2013, Mr. Lieberman got the National Storytelling Network’s lifetime achievement award.
O’Halloran noted that Mr. Lieberman never really retired.
“He always worked and couldn’t wait to do the next commission,” she said.
Mr. Lieberman also published two books and 15 CDs, and put most of his stories on his website.
Mr. Lieberman is also survived by a daughter, Sarah Weisz; a son, Zachary; three grandchildren; and a brother, Al.
There will be a memorial celebration at 1 p.m. June 28, at Jewish Reconstructionist Congregation, 303 Dodge Ave., Evanston.
Goldsborough is a freelance reporter for the Tribune.
