Suzanne Waller, a Howard County activist who was a founder of the Columbia Jewish Congregation and served on the Columbia Association Council, died of complications after a fall Sept. 12 at Gilchrist Center in Howard County. She was 85 and lived in Columbia.
Born Suzanne Lynn Sirota in Brooklyn, New York, and raised on Long Island, she was the daughter of Albert Sirota, who owned a bicycle store, and Adeline Warratt Sirota, the co-owner of the store.
She was a graduate of Wellington C. Mepham High School, where she was active in sports and drama, played violin and clarinet, and was a majorette in the school’s marching band.
She earned a degree in English and psychology from Russell Sage College, where she served as class president. She was also a pioneering member of the female cheerleading squad at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.
“My mother was an energy machine. She loved people and being active and engaged. She acted on her convictions and morals,” said her son, Andrew Waller. “She was a dynamo.”
She married Robert Waller, an environmental engineer, in 1959. They later divorced.
She and her husband moved to Baltimore in 1962, and she taught English and briefly co-owned an art gallery on Main Street in Newark, Delaware.
After moving to Columbia in 1969 to the Bryant Woods neighborhood, she attended the University of Baltimore School of Law and became a management consultant.
“Suzanne was the quintessential example of the kind of person who came to live in Jim Rouse’s Columbia,” said former Howard County Executive Elizabeth “Liz” Bobo. “She believed, as Jim Rouse did, that it was the kind of place where the CEO could live next to the janitor.”
She involved herself in community activities and embraced women’s rights, gun control, civil rights and drug abuse prevention.
She was honored by the Howard County Jewish Federation as “Woman of the Year” and later became a longtime volunteer docent at the Walters Art Gallery.
She and her husband were among the founders of the Columbia Jewish Congregation. She served on its board of directors and committees.
Ms. Waller served on the Town Center Village Board and as the Town Center representative to the Columbia Council.
She spoke French and participated in the Columbia Association’s Sister Cities program with Cergy-Pontoise, France.
She was an organizer of the Columbia International Music Festival and helped organize juried art shows for the Columbia Association’s Art Center.
She worked with Rabbi Martin Segal on national and international issues.
Survivors include two sons, Andrew Waller, of Grasonville, and Elliott Waller, of Upper Saddle River, New Jersey; a daughter, Pamela Waller Arlotta, of Garden City, New York; a brother, Gary Sirota, of Massapequa Park, New York; a sister, Ellen Sirota Krieger, of Baltimore; and seven grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 10 a.m. Sept. 21 at Oakland Manor, 5430 Vantage Point Road in Columbia.
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