Gail Philbrook Rosenberg
9/23/2014

Gail Philbrook Rosenberg, 67

Dateline: Mansfield, MA





Gail Philbrook Rosenberg — a retired nurse and inexhaustible wife and mother, whose decades-long devotion to the Mansfield Emblem Club helped raise funds for people in need and contributed to community improvement — died Tuesday, September 23, 2014, of cancer. She was 67.
The longtime Mansfield resident was known for providing family, friends, and strangers alike with lavish feasts on special occasions and for no particular occasion at all. To celebrate the wedding of her legal ward, Yuko Murata of Kyoto, Japan, she invited dozens of people over, made 27 desserts from scratch, and attached a hand-calligraphed label to each one, replete with lists of ingredients. For years, even when she was physically compromised, she made what became legendary coleslaw for the Mansfield Elks weekly Friday Fish-Fry Dinners. Thanksgiving was her favorite holiday, and to observe it she regularly hosted 25 or more people for a sit-down meal, usually including visitors from overseas. At her table, anyone and everyone always was welcome.
She also was known for taking care of the people around her. When her children, Matt Rosenberg of Apollo Beach, Florida, and Amy Rosenberg, of New York City, were young, the other children of the neighborhood always gathered at their house. If a child in the neighborhood was sick, the parents of that child called Gail. She volunteered at the Mansfield Senior Center, driving elderly citizens around, and she regularly donated time, goods, and services to local charities.
Gail sweated the small stuff. She was organized to an outrageous degree, prepared for anything. She loved word games, board games, and trivia games, and she always won. When she was a child, she dreamt of becoming the first woman to play for Major League Baseball. She had a sign in her kitchen that said, simply, “Laugh,” and she laughed deeply, frequently, and contagiously.
Gail worked for 25 years as a nurse at Norwood Hospital. Before that she was a nurse in the U.S. Army. She grew up in South Boston.
She will be deeply missed by her children, her ward, her grandchildren, her extended family and friends, her sister, Lynn Olson, of Hudson, Florida, and her devoted husband of 46 years, Ed Rosenberg, of Mansfield.
On Friday, September 26, from 6 p.m. till 9 p.m., her family will host a celebration of her life at the Mansfield Elks Lodge, 140 North Main St., Mansfield.
In lieu of flowers, donations in Gail’s name can be made to the American Cancer Society, 5 Manley Street, West Bridgewater, MA 02379
Arrangements are under the care and direction of the Sherman & Jackson Funeral Home, 55 North Main St., Mansfield.
To send the Rosenberg family a message of condolence, please visit www.shermanjackson.com
Sign
View Guest Book
Driving Directions
Print Page
Share
Sherman & Jackson Funeral Home
55 North Main Street
Mansfield, MA USA 02048
508-339-2000