Raye Dinnerstein
June 24, 2025

Raye Dinnerstein, 103, died June 24, 2025, at Wexford Healthcare Center, McCandless, Pennsylvania.

Born in The Bronx, New York City, Raye Metzger was the daughter of Abraham and Beckie Metzger. The family moved to Detroit, Michigan when Raye was a toddler.

She graduated from Central High School in Detroit and earned both a bachelor's degree in history and a master's degree in psychiatric social work from what now is Wayne State University in Detroit. She was a social worker at the North Side Clinic and the U.S. Veterans Administration, or VA, in Detroit. At the time, single adult daughters typically lived with their parents, so to be able to move out on her own, she requested a transfer to a VA site in New York City but told her parents the VA was requiring her to go there.

She met Howard Dinnerstein while on vacation. They married in 1959, and she moved to New Haven, Connecticut, where he was living. He owned a dry-cleaning business and then College Book Store, later Book World. Their daughter, Madelyn Dinnerstein, was born in 1961. While in New Haven, Raye worked the bookstore and also was a social worker.

After her husband's death in 1969, Raye and Madelyn moved back to the Detroit area, where Raye was a social worker, first at the former Kingwood Hospital, which was a psychiatric hospital for adolescents, and then at the former Sinai Hospital of Detroit, where she supervised students and eventually became assistant director of the social work department. She retired from Sinai in the mid-1980s and spent a year in Israel shortly after.

Raye loved reading, traveling, and going to the theater and she was an avid bridge player. She visited more than 30 countries. In 2011, she moved to the Pittsburgh area to live close to her daughter. She lived at Cumberland Woods Village and Cumberland Crossing, both in McCandless, and moved to Wexford Healthcare Center this spring.

She belonged to two synagogues, Beth Ahm in West Bloomfield, Michigan and Adat Shalom, near Fox Chapel, Pennsylvania.

Raye's daughter and nieces, nephews and cousins survive.

Services at Adat Shalom, 368 Guys Run Road, Indiana Township, on Friday, June 27, 2025 at 12:00 noon. Visitation at Adat Shalom one hour prior to services (11am - 12 noon). Interment B'nai Israel Cemetery, Penn Hills. Memorial contributions may be made to the American Civil Liberties Union or your local food pantry or food bank. Arrangements entrusted to Ralph Schugar Chapel, Inc. www.schugar.com

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