To listen to Sue and Felix Warburg is to understand that their “retirement” never meant slowing down.
Both octogenarians are filled with infectious excitement and speak entertainingly about a wide variety of topics — from politics to local art to little-known episodes in Jewish history — making them the perfect couple to lead group tours.
Which they did — and do.
Following their retirement in 1987, the Warburgs founded Jewish Landmark Tours. At first, the couple specialized in Jewish history tours of Gold Rush–era California, covering cemeteries, landmarks, and the role of Jewish merchants, miners and financiers.
A couple of years later, when Sue was tasked with organizing a reunion of her family from New Mexico, the Warburgs became interested in Southwestern Jewish history. Soon, they began bringing groups to Santa Fe, Albuquerque and Taos on the trail of Jewish pioneers and Spanish Crypto-Jews, whose families were forced to convert but still maintained connection to Jewish ritual. Through this work, the Warburgs were also invited to curate a Jewish history exhibit at the Palace of the Governors Museum of New Mexico that ran from 2001 to 2005.
Throughout the 1990s, the Warburgs researched and planned dozens of other Jewish history tours, taking groups around San Francisco, Pittsburgh and several cities in the South.
“We went to Charleston and Savannah and talked about the fact that some Jews owned slaves and fought in the Confederate army,” Felix, 87, recalled in a recent interview. “Most Jews don’t know about that — or if they do, they’re ashamed of that part of our history.”
As the tours expanded, so did the couple’s interests. Sue, 81, who received a master’s in literature from San Francisco State University, started offering literary lectures in addition to her regular historical beat.
She became fascinated by the role of women in history and by the colorful characters she encountered in her research, many not Jewish. For example, Mabel Dodge Luhan, who married a Native American, settled in Taos and hosted a who’s who of early 20th century artists. Painter Georgia O’Keeffe, writer D.H. Lawrence, photographer Ansel Adams and frontier author Willa Cather all spent time in Luhan’s home — so the Warburgs stayed there, too, with a tour group.
From about 1990 to 2004, the Warburgs conducted four to five tours a year, each for about 20 people. Organizing a new tour could take up to two years, because they had to complete the research for their lectures, plan out all of the routes, reserve hotels and buses — and do the marketing.
“We never hired a tour operator. We did everything ourselves,” said Sue. Setting up accommodations was perhaps the most fun part of the job. “I got to bounce on all the beds, and we ate in every establishment to find the best food.”
They kept an office near Fisherman’s Wharf during the heyday of the company, but then moved all operations to the kitchen table in their light-filled Pacific Heights home, which overflows with modern paintings, Native American baskets and contemporary sculptures.
As an architect and planner, Felix sits on the board of several Bay Area cultural organizations, and focused many of his presentations on historic buildings and art history. He was raised speaking French and German, and had traveled extensively throughout Europe with Sue, always scouting out Jewish landmarks.
One of their trips was a Jewish-oriented tour of France, which was right up Felix’s alley.
“We took people to the Rothschild synagogue in Paris, and to a mikvah in Avignon,” said Sue. Felix pointed out facts that other tours wouldn’t have known.
“No one notices this, but in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, there are Stars of David in two stained-glass windows,” Felix said, speculating, “maybe those artisans were Jewish?”
Felix and Sue both are members of distinguished Jewish families from Germany. Felix is the grandson of Felix M. Warburg, who was born into a powerhouse banking family in Hamburg, and whose former residence, the Felix M. Warburg House in New York, is now the site of the Jewish Museum. Sue is the great-granddaughter of Willi Spiegelberg, who settled in Santa Fe in the mid-19th century and served as the town’s first Jewish mayor.
However, Felix and Sue never would have guessed that their roots were somewhat intertwined. But in the late 1980s, while preparing for one of their Southwestern tours, they came across a startling tidbit: Sue’s great-uncle and Felix’s great-aunt had married into the same family.
“We’re actually very distant cousins!” Sue quipped.
Felix and Sue have been married 46 years, and they raised five kids: four sons from Felix’s first marriage, plus one son they had together.
Though their tour and lecture schedule has slowed down, they gave a talk in March titled “Jews of the Historic South” at the Bureau of Jewish Education in San Francisco, and in April took a Reform sisterhood group from New York City on a tour of Jewish San Francisco.
And in six months, they will be traveling to the Mediterranean islands of Corfu, Crete, Cyprus and Rhodes to complete their research for a 15-person trip planned for 2013. In talking about what seems like such a Herculean workload at this stage of their lives, the Warburgs laugh.
“This will absolutely be the last tour we are designing and planning,” Sue said with a wink.