Her life
Toby spent her last years cataloguing the history of her synagogue — naming, dating, and preserving the record of a community so that no one in it would be forgotten. In 2022 they named the archive room after her. This page is made in that same spirit: a careful record of one life, kept with care.
He was a very sweet, kind person. He never complained and never said mean things about other people.
On her son Soren · 1964–1990
I did not remember the words, but I started to cry as I realized I had deprived my children of close connections to one of the world’s great civilizations.
On hearing “Etz Chaim” sung again · 1973
No one to remember her… Then I remembered that she left us something very precious.
On her aunt Clara, a forgotten person
A life
Ninety-two years
Toby Pearl Carliner Sanchez was born on January 3, 1934, in St. Louis, Missouri, the daughter of Lillian Hillary Friedman and Lewis Mordecai Carliner. Her parents divorced when she was an infant, and she was raised in St. Louis by her mother and her grandmother, Rose, in a close Jewish community of aunts, uncles, and cousins. Her mother began as a clerk in a department store book section and rose to become a vice president of Brentano’s booksellers — books ran in the family.
She graduated from the City College of New York, magna cum laude. In 1954 she married Dr. Ramon Sanchez, a professor of education; together they raised three children — Rachel, Joseph, and Soren — and founded the Campus Road Garden on the grounds of Brooklyn College, which still grows today. After a secular middle age, a Shabbat melody heard by chance in 1973 drew her back to Jewish life. She and Ramon found their community in Flatbush, first at Progressive Shaare Zedek and then at the East Midwood Jewish Center.
In her later years Toby became the center’s archivist, assembling its history for its hundredth anniversary — board minutes, bulletins, the names of every president since 1924. She was honored with an archival room bearing her name. Her husband Ramon predeceased her on September 30, 2007. She died on March 28, 2026, at Sunrise of Sheepshead Bay, in Brooklyn.
She is survived by her children, Rachel and Joseph; her grandchildren, Takoda, Ariel, and Lilli Sanchez, and Sean and Sonia Ledwith; and her great-grandchildren, Maya, Evie, and Alexis Sanchez, and Layla Ledwith.
Obituary
Toby Carliner Sanchez died on March 28, 2026, in Brooklyn, New York. She was 92. Besides raising a family with her late husband Ramon Sanchez, Toby built an expansive career as an administrator, fundraiser and archivist for nonprofits and community organizations in New York, and served as president of the East Midwood Jewish Center. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, she was raised by her single mother, Lillian Friedman, an executive in the book business. She is survived by her daughter Rachel and her son Joseph, five grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. She was predeceased by her husband in 2007 and their beloved son, Soren, in 1990. Toby also leaves behind a grateful community of friends and colleagues across New York City and beyond.
Published by The New York Times on April 26, 2026.
Photographs
A family album
From her writing
In her own words
Toby wrote constantly, and quickly, in her nineties. Her spelling is kept exactly as she left it — it is part of her voice.
About my son Soren
Soren was born with a serious heart deformity… He was expected to die at 13, 14, or 15, but he lived a normal life. When he was 26, his system became too weak. The extra tubes could not supply enough oxygen and his heart had to work extra hard. I could hear it beating.
Many people came to his funeral and wrote us letters about him. I gave money to Brooklyn College for a scholarship and many people contributed. He was a very sweet, kind person. He never complained and never said mean things about other people.
On coming back to Judaism
One Saturday in 1973, while living in the Bronx, I attended a Shabbat service at what was probably the last synagogue at our end of the Grand Concourse, where I heard the melody of “Etz Chaim” for the first time since childhood. I did not remember the words, but I started to cry as I realized I had deprived my children of close connections to one of the world’s great civilizations.
Remembering a forgotten person — my aunt Clara
Recently, while walking to an off-off-Broadway theatre on Tenth Avenue, I passed 357 West 55th Street, a pre-war apartment building where my late aunt Clara lived for many years… no one in my family remembers Clara except me.
So walking along I thought about her disappearance. Then I remembered that she left us something very precious — not just my memories, which will fade away when I die, but she took the trouble to write down many anecdotes about her parents, my grandparents, about their early days in America… So I hope her memory will live and be discovered by others.
1934 to 2025
i was born on January 3, 1934 in St. Louis’ Jewish hospital… I grew up in St. Louis with my mother and my grandmother, Rose Zalman Friedman, and close by Friedman aunts, uncles and cousins… My grandmother, Rose, was a very important part of my upbringing, giving me a Jewish education, telling me the folktales about the wandering mischief maker, Herschel Ostropolier, plus getting me dressed up with hat and white gloves no matter how hot the temperature, to attend the weekly services at our synagogue.