Anna (Chana) Tilow z” l, passed away at the age of 95 on July 2. She was passionately devoted to Labor Zionism and Yiddish culture as well as her family. Her children include Aki Fleshler, former President of Congregation Kesser Israel in Portland. After living in New York, Ohio, and Connecticut, she moved to Portland in December 2022 and resided at Rose Schnitzer Manor. 
She was born Oct. 19, 1927, in New York City, the only child of Pearl (Perel) and Samuel (Shulem) Weiner. Her parents were activists in the Farband, an organization of Yiddish-speaking Labor Zionists. When Mrs. Tilow was young, they moved to Akron, Ohio, where her parents became Farband leaders in the Midwest, and Shulem taught in one of the organization’s schools. She spoke proudly about the time her family hosted a fundraising event for a fiery young Zionist named Golda Myerson, who eventually became Prime Minister Golda Meir.
When she was 12, her family returned to New York City, where she became active in Habonim, a Labor Zionist youth organization. She was so inspired by the idea of a Jewish state that she joined a small group of American Jews planning to start Kibbutz Gesher Haziv. After getting an Associate’ Degree in Nutrition, she planned to run the kibbutz kitchen.  
Her plans changed in 1948 after she fell in love with Maurice (Moishe) Fleshler in a training camp for would-be kibbutz pioneers. They married, and after becoming pregnant, they decided it would be too difficult to give birth and raise the baby on a new kibbutz, so they stayed in New York City, where they had two sons, Aki and Dan, and Mr. Fleshler got an engineering degree. They subsequently lived in several small towns in Pennsylvania, where Mrs. Tilow began a career as a hospital dietician. In her limited spare time she also ran a small catering company with Eastern European recipes she’d learned from her mother, including pot roast,tongue with tomato sauce, kasha varnishkes and huluptzes (stuffed cabbage).
In early 1967, the Fleshlers moved back to New York City where, tragically, Mr. Fleshler died from a heart attack at age 40. In 1970, she married William Tilow, who had three sons from a previous marriage, and moved to Woodbridge Connecticut, a suburb of New Haven. After handling the daunting responsibility of managing—and cooking great meals for—a household filled with rambunctious boys, she was widowed again in 1984. 
Undaunted, Mrs. Tilow rebuilt her life yet again, moving to Hamden, Connecticut and working in several hospitals in the New Haven area. She became the president of the local chapter of Na’amat, an Israel-focused organization dedicated to uplifting women and children. After retiring in her late 60s, she travelled extensively, was an active participant in the New Haven Yiddish Club and read stories to disadvantaged children at the Hamden Library. At the age of 80 as a member of Temple Beth Shalom in Hamden, she studied for and celebrated the Bat Mitzvah she’d never had in in her youth.  
In addition to her sons, Aki Fleshler and Dan Fleshler and stepsons Seth Tilow, Josh Tilow and Adam Tilow, she is survived by grandchildren Eva, Shoshana, Lillie, Julia, Kaniel, Dylan and Jessica and great-grandchildren Ayla, Zoe, Yehezkel and Eliora.
Burial was July 3 in the Congregation Kesser Israel Cemetery. The family suggests memorial contributions to Na’amat USA (https://naamat.org/waystogive/).