Manny Bernstein

The following portrait is expanded from the one that appeared in the 50th Anniversary publication in 2018.

Dr. EMMANUEL M. “MANNY” BERNSTEIN, Jr., was a fixture at MLC in its second to fourth years, from 1969 to 1972. Many of us remember him in a cast, and on crutches, from an injured ankle!

Manny and his family came to Oregon for him to pursue a PhD in Counseling Psychology at the University of Oregon. With an intellectual and professional interest in “non-coercive teaching,” the very approach taken by MLC and its revolutionary model, Summerhill, Manny found the school and made it his laboratory, his place of work, and the subject of his dissertation. His thinking became integrated with that of MLC's founders, who are quoted at length in his work.

Manny's daughters Bobbie and Vauna were early MLC-ers’ fond classmates, and his wife Meg was active among the parents.

Manny was born in 1930 in Baltimore, Maryland. His family moved to Saranac Lake, New York, when he was two, for his father’s tuberculosis cure. He graduated from Saranac Lake high school in 1948.

Manny attended the University of Pennsylvania, SUNY Plattsburgh, and Columbia University, also receiving training at the New School for Social Research, the Colorado State College of Education, Boston University, and the University of Hawaii. He had jobs as a psychiatric recreation worker, interviewer, caseworker, and researcher, and as an elementary school teacher and guidance counselor, before MLC.

In addition to significant pre-PhD writings, especially on Summerhill, his passion for which pointed him toward MLC, after the family's Oregon years Manny continued to publish, most prominently a book on education, The Secret Revolution, and articles in the journal he founded, Alternatives in Animal Experimentation.

Manny was funny, droll, and beloved. He passed away peacefully at his home, surrounded by family and close friends, on November 13, 2015, at age 85. He was survived by Meg, Bobbie (Karp), her sons Joseph and Joshua Karp, and the Bernsteins' son Arthur and his wife Christine. Vauna, sadly, died too young.

Remembrances were directed to the Humane Society of the United States, Physicians for Responsible Medicine, and PETA.

As his obituary described him, “Manny’s purpose in life was to relieve the pain of both humans and animals. He founded the local humane society in his teen years and always believed that the lives of animals were as important as people .... He especially loved being at his camp on Upper Saranac [Lake] and feeling the motion of being on water. He loved anything that moved which included biking, sailing, driving houseboats and motorcycles. He loved to tinker with others to learn. He valued conversations with everyone, and embraced life and a good martini with extra olives and onions.” Manny’s motto was from Einstein: "Logic can get you from A to B. Creativity can get you everywhere.”