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About 50 people gathered Thursday near where the 79-year-old was struck and killed by a driver that veered off the road. Schuman’s daughter, Rebecca, urged those with loved ones dealing with addiction to step up and prevent impaired driving.
Friend. Role model. Generous tipper. Happy house guest.
People who knew Sharon Schuman spoke Thursday, April 23, about what made her uniquely special at a memorial event on the first anniversary of her death.
The event was organized by her daughter, Rebecca, along Eugene’s Amazon Trail, where Schuman, 79, died when a drunken driver ran off the road, striking her.
The professional musician and former University of Oregon professor championed many arts and community efforts. A crowd of about 50 reminisced about her drive to help others while also sharing personal stories.
“All of us know the many, many things she supported with time, with her energy, with her fundraising ability,” said Lynn Frohnmayer, a longtime friend. “She just moved mountains during that lifetime of hers.”
The morning gathering began with Rebecca Schuman walking along the trail accompanied by her 11-year-old daughter, Halina “Lini” Schuman-Rohloff.
Then, standing near the edge of Amazon Parkway, Rebecca Schuman held up a sign for drivers to see that read, “Sharon should still be here.”
Her mother “hated alcohol,” going so far as to be “very annoying to all her friends” in telling them “even one drink is going to shorten your life,” Rebecca Schuman said.
“The fact that alcohol had anything at all to do with her getting taken from us would enrage her forever,” Schuman said.
Friends and loved ones of those with alcohol addiction must work to make them “uncomfortable” and seek treatment, Schuman said. They must also make sure those with alcohol addiction aren’t driving, she said.
She will remain angry, she said, not at any individuals but “at the disease of alcoholism itself, and the normalization of unhealthy drinking and binge drinking in our culture.”
“It is all of our responsibility to do what we can to stop enabling our loved ones who are in active substance abuse,” Schuman said.
‘A wonderful, wonderful gift’
Schuman said she wanted to share the message with her “captive audience,” also interspersing her own warm reflections about her mother.
She said she took her mother’s approach to “do it, then apologize later” when organizing the event on a public trail without seeking formal permission.
Rebecca Schuman also told of how her mother was quick to make new friends.
Schuman recalled how her mother once shared with her a fistful of Syrian currency after befriending “the nicest young man” on a flight. Her mother excitedly told her how she had been given “a standing invitation to stay at his house anytime I go to Syria,” she said, as the crowd laughed in appreciation.
Not a fan of pricey hotels, her mother “would stay at your house because of the unbeatable price of ‘free-ninety-nine,’” Rebecca Schuman said.
“She always says that. She loves ‘free-ninety-nine,’” Lini Schuman-Rohloff said.
Others smiled, too, when talking about Sharon Schuman.
Frohnmayer shared with the crowd a memory about one of many dinners with Sharon, this one at a restaurant where the bill for Sharon came to $19. Seeing her friend write “$19” on the bill, Frohnmayer said she spoke up to let Sharon know she was writing in a tip amount.
“And with that kind of annoyed voice that she could have when contradicted, she said, ‘I know that’s the tip. That was a great dinner. They didn’t charge us enough,’” Frohnmayer said, adding, “I had to increase my tip a little bit.”
Tom Barkin, another friend, told of how he came to meet Sharon when both were commuting by bus.
One day, Sharon — though he didn’t know her name at the time — invited him to join a group that got together with a common interest: food.
“And I said, ‘Why? We don’t know each other. Why are you asking me to join this food group?’” Barkin said. “And she said, ‘Well, I see you getting on the bus and reading cookbooks and food magazines, so I’m recruiting you,’” Barkin recalled, calling the introduction a “wonderful, wonderful gift” leading to lasting friendships over many decades.
Kristen Bell, a University of Oregon law professor, told the crowd she was a colleague of Sharon Schuman’s late husband, David, who died in 2019. She described them as helping her as a newcomer to Eugene.
Bell said she marveled at Sharon’s involvement in the arts, academics and athletics. Sharon Schuman was a dedicated runner who completed marathons.
“I would see her running, and I would stop and run with her for a little bit. And every time I thought, this is what I want to be like,” Bell said.
After the impromptu reminiscing, the gathered group strode onto the trail for a 1-mile walk or run to cap the memorial event.
“One thing I really love about Sharon is she brought people together,” Bell told a reporter as the group made their way forward on the trail.
The memorial “felt right,” she said, with “people coming together.”
About the loss of Schuman, Bell said: “I think that we’re all carrying that weight, and it’s better to carry it together.”
At the event, signs with QR codes linked donors to Chamber Music Amici, a group Sharon Schuman co-founded; SquareOne Villages, a nonprofit affordable housing organization where Schuman served on the board of directors; and the Fanconi Cancer Foundation, founded by Frohnmayer and Frohnmayer’s husband, David, and where Schuman served as a dedicated volunteer and fundraiser for more than 25 years.