Remembering Joan M. Friedman


Cropped photo of audience members listening to an off-camera speaker. Those in the foreground are seated, while the people behind them are standing.

Joan M. Friedman (seated at lower right) at RBS’s 40th anniversary event in September 2024. Photo by Stephanie Gross.

It is with profound sadness that we announce the death of Joan M. Friedman on 14 February 2026. With professional talents spanning rare book curation and general accounting, Joan was an ardent early supporter of Rare Book School (RBS) and a long-serving Treasurer from 2007 to 2019.  

Her early association with RBS goes back to its Columbia University origins at the School of Library Service, co-teaching the illustration processes course (I-20) with Terry Belanger from 1983 into the late 1980s. That class annually made a highly memorable field trip to New Haven, where Joan was Curator of Rare Books at the Yale Center for British Art. 

In 2007, Joan volunteered to be a member of the RBS Board, and her twelve years of service were characterized by intelligent and discerning counsel to three Board Chairs, Founding Director Terry Belanger, and Executive Director Michael F. Suarez, S.J. She will be remembered as an exemplary Treasurer, who elevated the level of financial professionalism through her vigilance and expertise. 

Joan was a generous, perennial financial supporter of our School and its mission; she extended her commitment beyond her years as a member of the Malkin Society. 

The printing and distribution of the RBS Valentine has been a colorful and joyous tradition; the news of her passing makes this time of year more somber for her absence. Joan’s humor, wisdom, fortitude, intelligence, and good cheer will be greatly missed.