Herman Mattleman, lawyer and longtime Philadelphia school board president, dies at 96

Herman Mattleman, 96, a civic giant, respected lawyer and longtime Philadelphia school board president, died of advanced dementia at his Center City home Saturday, April 2.

Mr. Mattleman was born in Strawberry Mansion, the only child of Mary and Emmanuel Mattleman, proprietors of a kosher butcher shop. He grew up in a close-knit Jewish community, centered on family and on school — education was stressed by Mr. Mattleman’s parents, who were Russian immigrants.

He graduated from Gratz High School and from the University of Pennsylvania and its law school.

The summer Mr. Mattleman was 20, working as a counselor at Camp Tel-Hai in Jamison, Bucks County, he met the person who would define his life: Marciene Schrieber. She was 16, a counselor-in-training but homesick, with plans to leave camp early. Mr. Mattleman convinced her to go on a date instead.

“As legend says, my father went around and said he was going to marry my mother that night. Needless to say, she didn’t leave camp,” their daughter Barbara Mattleman said. They were married for 68 years, devoted to each other in a way that both made people around them sigh and smile, and the city a better place.

In 1981, Mayor William J. Green III named Mr. Mattleman to the Philadelphia school board. Though he built a successful law practice specializing in health care, education was often the subject around the Mattleman dinner table — his wife was an education professor at Temple University, and the couple cared greatly about the fate of Philadelphia’s children.

Mr. Mattleman made a splash at his first meeting, grilling staff on why the school system was paying $30 a case for toilet paper when his research showed they could buy it for $24. He had been brought in by Green to clean up the school system, which was in academic disarray and hemorrhaging students. During the Mattleman years, the district stabilized, choosing longtime Philadelphia educator Constance Clayton as superintendent and implementing a standardized curriculum.

Elected board president in 1983, Mr. Mattleman spent eight years on the job. On his watch: Central High, which had been only open to boys, admitted girls. Mr. Mattleman felt strongly that the school district should not appeal a ruling ordering the district to admit young women, despite intense public pressure to do so.

Rosemarie Greco remembers Mr. Mattleman as a strong board president, but mostly, she remembers him as warm and kind. Greco, who rose to become president of CoreStates Bank, was the youngest member of the board when she joined in 1985, and Mr. Mattleman took her under his wing. They became fast friends. During long board meetings, if something humorous happened, Greco knew not to make eye contact with Mr. Mattleman.

Ralph Smith, Clayton’s chief of staff, said Mr. Mattleman was “a very good chair of the board, extraordinarily thoughtful. But he would have been a great stand-up comedian, a gentle Don Rickles. He had a joke for everything, and managed to keep the school board working through many contentious issues without being contentious himself.”

The board presidency was the highlight of her father’s professional life, almost a vocation, said his daughter Ellen Mattleman Kaplan.

He attended multiple school events a week, meeting people, delivering remarks, shaking hands and congratulating children. He received the Philadelphia Award, the city’s highest civic honor, in 1990.

After resigning his board seat, Mr. Mattleman remained active, both in law and in civics. He served on public boards and supported his wife in her endeavors as she founded and ran multiple education-related nonprofits. Marciene Mattleman disdained the concept of retirement; Mr. Mattleman did so only when his wife’s deteriorating health meant he wanted to spend more time at home. She died in 2019.

Though his professional life was important to Mr. Mattleman, nothing overshadowed his favorite roles: husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather.

“If you were with my dad, you felt safe,” said Jon Mattleman, his son. “He would say, ‘It’s going to be all right,’ and you believed it. He said it with meaning and integrity.”

He was the kind of father who volunteered for carpool duty, who sent daily letters to his children when they were at camp. He was low maintenance, loved when his wife had the spotlight, and was fiercely loyal.

Mr. Mattleman was a voracious reader; he read multiple newspapers a day until the week before his death. He had near-encyclopedic knowledge of the events of World War II. And he was a Philadelphia sports fan extraordinaire.

About the Eagles, “he was very vociferous, very knowledgeable, highly opinionated,” said Smith, with whom he watched hundreds of games over their decadeslong friendship. “He would fire the coach at least once a week. We could be 10 points ahead with two minutes to go, and he would be absolutely sure we were going to find a way to lose the game.”

In addition to his three children, Mr. Mattleman is survived by six grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.

Donations in his name may be made to the Anti-Defamation League, 1500 Market St., Philadelphia 19102.