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# Eleanor Ipson, wife of Holocaust survivor and museum founder Jay Ipson, dies at 87
- URL: https://www.richmonder.org/eleanor-ipson-wife-of-holocaust-survivor-and-museum-founder-jay-ipson-dies-at-87/
- Published: 2026-10-08T16:53:25.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-08T16:54:04.000Z
- Description: She worked from a young age as a bookkeeper at the watchmaking company run by her father, who had fled Europe ahead of the Holocaust.
- Author: Daniel Payne
- Tags: Obituaries, #the-bridge

Eleanor Gaffen Ipson, the wife of Virginia Holocaust Museum founder Jay Ipson and a longtime Richmond-area resident, died on Oct. 5, her family said this week. 

Ipson’s daughter Esther told The Richmonder that the 87-year-old had been “a wonderful wife, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother.” She and Ipson had been married for 67 years at the time of her death, Esther said. 

Born Nov. 1, 1938, in Montreal, Eleanor Gaffen worked from a young age as a bookkeeper at the watchmaking company run by her father, who had fled Europe ahead of the Holocaust. She also worked as a fitness instructor at the Y.

Esther said her parents first met when Jay — himself a Lithuanian native who survived the Holocaust before immigrating to Richmond — visited Canada to briefly work in a cousin’s hosiery factory. 

At a party during the visit, “he saw her dancing, and he said to his friend, ‘That’s the woman I’m going to marry,’” Esther said. His friend responded: “That’s a Gaffen girl, you’ll never get close to her.” 

“Watch this,” Jay replied. 

Esther said that her father began courting Eleanor; at one point he became so distracted while talking to her on the phone while working in the hosiery factory he inadvertently made “the longest hose ever.” Yet he soon had to return to the United States to serve in the Armed Forces; as a result he proposed to Eleanor and asked her to return to the U.S. with him.

“Her dad said no, she said yes, her dad said no, she said yes, and she left,” Esther said. They were married in Worcester, Massachusetts, after just a few months of knowing each other. 

“My dad met her in May, they came to the states in June, and married in July,” she said. 

“And she got pregnant with my sister in August,” she added. “That’s a typical Jewish thing — on your honeymoon you’re supposed to get pregnant.” 

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/99/06/99067822-fdfd-42b1-ab19-555c33eefb89/content/images/2026/10/unnamed--1-.jpg)

(Family photo)

In the U.S., the Ipsons for years ran American Auto Parts in Hopewell. Eleanor served as the company’s bookkeeper and controller. She was very active in Jewish organizations in the region as well. 

In a Facebook post written by his daughter on his behalf, Jay Ipson described Eleanor as “the love of his life.” The family said it would be holding a traditional shiva minyan for Eleanor. 

She is survived by her husband, Jay, her three children, four grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.