Rose Sophie Eisman Boyarsky ‘44 was the first in her family to go to college. Born in Jersey City, N.J., in 1924, Rose spent a comfortable childhood alongside her parents and one younger sister.

When it came time for college, Rose felt the weight of being Jewish under the global rise of antisemitism. At the time many colleges and universities had a 10 percent quota on admitted Jewish students. As she watched her gentile friends get whisked away by other universities, Rose felt her college dreams slip away. But then UVM came through.

“UVM took me in when no one else would,” she recalls. “Oh, I couldn’t be happier.”

Rose recounts in vivid detail how her aunt and mother saw her off at Camp Abnaki as she began her UVM journey. It would lead to a rich and colorful career as a clinical psychologist—including work with the renowned sex research pioneers William H. Masters and Virginia E. Johnson—and eventually her own private practice.

At 101, she now lives independently at a retirement community in Durham, N.C., where she reflects on her remarkable life, shaped by the tumult of the 20th century.

Rose met her husband, Saul Boyarsky ‘44 M.D.’46, during her Catamount days, after a friend played matchmaker. Saul had grown up in Burlington and would eventually become a urologist. He passed away in 2019 after 73 years of marriage.

Her bachelor’s in chemistry—and passion for science—led Rose to a master’s program at Columbia University. There, she encountered the adversity of a woman in a male-dominated field.

“There were three women and two men. Until the head of the department, or the head of the new graduate students, stood up and looked at us very sternly and said, and I quote, ‘You women better behave yourselves, the only reason you’re here is because there’s a war on and we can’t find men.’ I will never forget that.”

After Saul completed his medical degree at UVM, the two married and would welcome three children. Rose set her career aside and devoted herself to her children. Saul’s medical career would take them to Nuremberg while he served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps. A urology residency would land them at Duke through the early 1950s. There would later be moves to New York, back to Durham, and St. Louis.

Years passed. Somewhere in the mix, with the children out of the house and the in-laws moved in, Rose decided to get a Ph.D. She graduated in 1969 from Duke with a doctorate in Clinical Psychology. In St. Louis, Saul was Urologic Surgeon-in-Chief at Barnes Hospital and Washington University. Rose began her work alongside Drs. Masters and Johnson before starting her own practice. Now retired for 30 years, her life stands as a testament to perseverance in the face of adversity. Whether navigating a male-dominated field, balancing familial obligations and back-burner passions, or living through some of the most defining moments of the 20th century, Rose continues to move through it all with grace and eloquence.