Ms. Barasch was the daughter of the late Rose and Phillip Eskin of Lubbock, Texas.

She was born May 15, 1932, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and raised in Lubbock. After graduating from Lubbock High School in 1948, she headed to Austin to lend her unique blend of smarts, sass, and style to the theater arts department at the University of Texas, where she received a BFA in drama. Returning to Lubbock, she took graduate courses at Texas Tech University, worked as Coordinator of Volunteer Services and Public Information Officer for the Lubbock State School, and served on the Lubbock County White House Committee on Children and Youth. For her work, she was awarded an Outstanding Community Service Award by the Lubbock Women's Club.

Wherever she called home, Ms. Barasch contributed her gifts as an actress.  Friends remember with  fondness Ms. Barasch's  calls informing them that she was "treading the boards again" each time she landed a role in a community theater production.  In St. Louis she was a founding member and served on the board of directors of two local theater groups: Voices Fore and Act, Inc.  Most recently, she garnered critical acclaim from family and friends as a songstress for her drop-of-the-hat performances of "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes." 

She will be remembered for her love of music, poetry, literature, flowers, animals, and people, Republicans included.  Her acerbic sense of humor will be missed.  A voracious reader, she possessed a vocabulary so vast it often caused people to pause, awestruck. Those who survive her now stand a chance at winning a game of Scrabble.

Having hung on in the hospital for over a week, her final passing coincided with the sound of her sister reading from the Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson.  For those she loved, for those who loved her, may the Belle of Amherst's words prove true:  "Love is like Life--merely longer."

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Anne lied to me about the dishwasher. When I moved down here she told me it was broken and she didn’t want to replace it. So for 5+ years, every night I washed the dishes by hand. A few weeks ago I discovered that it was never broken. Anne loved the basics – and to her, dishwashers were too progressive. She simply didn’t like them. I view it as a joke on me – but every time I flip that switch, I get the last laugh.  Maybe.

My sister was exceptionally creative. 

            One example was how she dealt with her second mastectomy. Now she had a balanced flat (very flat) chest, and needed a pair of prosthetics. Every source she checked sold the prosthetics as a single unit and each unit is pretty expensive.  This really bothered her, so she took it on as a project – and ended up on the internet on a cross-dressers’ site, where she found the prosthetics by the pair, and at a significantly reduced price.

Anne was “there” for my entire life.

            There was never a moment when I didn’t have a sister.  When we lived in different cities, we had frequent long telephone conversations. When we lived in different countries, there were long, wonderfully descriptive letters. It’s so hard to believe that

I can’t pick up the phone and call her.

What do I miss most? 

I miss laughing. Almost every day something would send us into laughter so intense that we would race for bathroom with tears streaming down our faces. We called these our “Depends moments”.

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©Copyright 2001 by Marlene Eskin