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Rosemary Birky Hoffmann
August 25, 1943 - January 11, 2025
Chapel Hill, North Carolina - Rosemary B. Hoffmann passed away peacefully at Carol Woods Retirement Community on January 11, 2025.
Rosemary was born to Margaret May Jones Hoffmann and Arnold E. Hoffmann in Youngstown, Ohio on August 25, 1943. When she was six years old, her family moved to Raleigh, NC where her father took a position as State Supervisor of Music and her mother began a career as a children's book author and organist.
After graduating with honors from Needham Broughton High School, Rosemary attended the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a BA in English and German. She spent her Junior year abroad in Heidelberg, Germany, and following graduation spent a year in Vienna on a Fulbright Scholarship. She returned to the US in 1966 and went on to receive an MA & a PhD in German Literature at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
She then returned to Germany and for four years worked for the University of Maryland Global College as a Lecturer in German. In 1976 she joined the administration full-time with shared responsibility for UMGC's entire program at 25-28 US military bases, mainly in the Mediterranean area.
In 1984, Rosemary left Germany and enrolled in Architecture at the College of Design at NC state University. During that time, she took a summer architectural studio in Aegina, Greece. After completion of her degree, she joined GGA architects to begin her three-year architectural apprenticeship; unfortunately, this was a time when the economy was tanking and architectural firms were closing daily. By chance in 1992, she learned that a position for hiring stateside faculty to teach in Europe and Asia was open at UMGC in Maryland. She returned there where she remained until her retirement in 2012. But four years later, in 2016, UMGC called again, and Rosemary worked part-time archiving material from the program in Europe, after which she was granted Administrator Emerita status.
In 2020 she returned to Chapel Hill NC and shortly afterwards moved into Carol Woods Retirement Community. She immediately immersed herself in committee work, social events, bird watching, walking and croquet tournaments. Her love of music, nature, and community and social engagement may be attributed to her upbringing as the daughter of parents who were actively involved in music, civil rights and social issues through their membership in the Community United Church of Christ in Raleigh.
Having traveled extensively throughout her adult life, she had friends all over the world who were her family. She kept in touch and visited regularly and was loved by many people who will dearly miss her.
She is survived by her brother Ted Hoffmann and his wife Mary Henri, several nieces and nephews in the Carolinas, and her sister-in-law Linda Streyer, and family in Heidelberg, Germany.
Rosemary wholeheartedly supported many charities, human rights organizations, and the arts. Memorial gifts are gratefully appreciated. https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/newsobserver/name/rosemary-hoffmann-obituary?id=57859605&utm_source=MarketingCloud&utm_term=%%%3dRedirectTo(%40Ob
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Mark Fountain
Rosemay was one of the musicians in our era. Her mother was organist at, I believe, the United Church when it was still downtown, near the old Catholic cathedral. After her graduation her family moved into the old Clingman house on Gardner, just off Wade Avenue. Her brother was Teddy Hoffmann of "THoff" fame--Downtown Boulevard. I last saw her at Holy Trinity Lutheran Church when the Simonsens were memorialized--she appeared in very good health at that time and remarkably recognizable despite the passage of more than 60 years. Mark Fountain (1962)
John Shelburne (Shelburne)
Oh no, oh no, oh no---I am just profoundly sad--John Shelburne 919-475-2663
John Shelburne (Shelburne)
I just learned that there will be a ceremony on Friday, March 7 at 2pm in the Assembly Hall at Carol Woods Retirement Community in Chapel Hill, NC.
Ann Bennett (Rogers)
Thanks for that information, John. Rosemary attended our last luncheon at the High Park Grill. I offered to pick her up at Carol Woods and give her a ride, so we were able to catch up a bit. She seemed to be doing well.
Her brother, Teddy, lives in Durham and still restores old cars. He has built a 1950's style soda fountain, complete with juke boxes and old gas pumps out front. We held our reunion there in 2017. You can see pictures on our Photo Memories page.
Charles Winton
I first met Rosemary after 6th grade at the Summer band camp being held at Broughton to encourage students in the elementary band program to continue with band. We became good friends, a relationship that continued thorughout the next 6 years, not only in band, but in a number of classes. After graduating, we went off to different universities, each with our own interests. She ended up with a Ph.D. in German in contrast to my degree in Mathematics. We later both had parents at Whitaker Glenn, where our paths crossed a couple of times and where we caught up with each other. At one point she was in charge of recruiting faculty members for an exchange program with German counterparts and asked me to apply. I had other professional obligations at that point but gave it some serious thought before declining. It illustrates the breadth of her academic career while in the professoriate. We re-engaged at the two reunions I was able to attend and had a great time reminiscing along with Stuart Holoman and Hueston Hobbs, including a visit to the band room at Broughton. There's a photo of the four of us on the risers that I cherish. Both being long time academics, we traded stories about what we were continuing to be involved in, in my case robotics, hers her love of teaching German. She related to me some work she was doing regarding an approach to teaching foreign languages that sounded really interesting. I hope she was able to finish it. For me her passing came out of nowhere, a bit of a shock. I regret not having at least one more occasion to talk with her, but will always cherish the memories of the many good times we shared.
Charles Styron
Rosemary, John Shelburne, Megan Stuart, and I often spent time together in our last year at Broughton, and all three remained friends with whom I’ve had intermittent contact over the years. In our senior year, the four of us would sometimes sit on the edge of my double bed at 920 Williamson Drive and listen to classical music. We were “so cool,” or so I hoped anyway. The last two times that I saw Rosemary were at Rick Suberman’s Memorial Gathering at his farm in Chapel Hill on Thanksgiving Weekend in 2021—Billy Marshall stood with us at the outdoor gathering during the many tributes—and just last Halloween at her Carol Woods Residence in Chapel Hill. It’s a beautiful place, and she said that wonderful musical performances were part of the ambiance. She was in a period of remission from multiple myeloma (I think) and was as charming and cheerful as ever. We had a wonderful period of reminiscence, and I promised to visit again, fully expecting from her bearing at the time that this would happen. My wife, Nancy, whose professional experience with cancer is quite extensive, was more cautious in her prognosis, however. Unfortunately, she was right.
Rosemary and I had a period of more frequent communication at some point in the 1980s—I think that’s when it was—when she was working with the Chapel Hill architect, Werner Hausler. In the early 1970s, I had helped with the construction of an addition to Werner’s house in Chapel Hill, and I knew him rather well. At the time, I was on leave from architectural studies at MIT. I cannot remember if Rosemary enrolled in formal architectural study herself, but she was quite serious about architecture for a substantial period, and she absolutely loved working with Werner. Then at some point, she left architectural practice—I think when Werner was laid low by cancer—and returned to earlier pursuits. I wish that I could remember precisely what they were, but I believe that they took her to the Washington, DC area for a while. Shortly after Nancy and I were married in 1989, we met with her in Raleigh at her mother’s nursing home on Wade Avenue during the Christmas Holidays. We had tea in one of the common areas, and it almost felt as though we were in High School again. She talked to Nancy, whom she was meeting for the first time, like she was an old friend. Nancy never saw her again, but she remembered her well and was sorry to hear of her passing. Me too.
HAIL ROSEMARY HOFFMANN HAIL
John Shelburne (Shelburne)
Rosemary and I were high school sweethearts and this continued into college. During our senior year of high school, we often hung out together with Charlie Styron and Megan Stuart, including picnics at Umstead Park. Unfortunately, late in our college days we slowly parted ways. I still do not understand how or why that happened. Rosemary was a gifted musician and a gifted linguist. Her father was the head of band education for the state of North Carolina, her mother was an organist and an author of several books, and so it is not surprising that Rosemary was an excellent flute player and an excellent linguist. She majored in German, studied in Heidelberg, Germany, and became a German professor at the University of Maryland. It is very impressive that she learned a foreign language as an adult so well that she became a professor at a major university in that language. She married a German astronomer who named one of the asteroids “Rosemary”---talk about an enduring legacy. During her life, she traveled extensively, not only in Europe, but also to places as far away as India (where she rode elephants) and Vladivostok, Russia. She especially loved the Greek islands. One of her favorite hymns was “O Tannenbaum”, sung in German. I am so sad that we have lost one of my best friends, ever.
John Shelburne (Shelburne)
Rosemary’s brother Ted Hoffmann and his wife Mary are putting together a collection of photographs of Rosemary that they will display at the memorial ceremony on March 7. If you have any photographs of Rosemary that you are willing to loan to Ted, you can send them to him at his home in Durham at 1212 Sherron Road, Durham NC 27703. You can call Ted at 919-418-5218 and you can call me at 919-475-2663. Thanks.