Free Speech Movement organizer and lifelong educator Michael Rossman passed away from leukemia May 12 at his home in Berkeley. He was 68.

Friends and family said Rossman was a dynamic man who had a wide variety of talents and interests.

"He loved being alive and exploring things," said Lynne Hollander, the widow of Free Speech Movement leader Mario Savio, with whom Rossman had been good friends. "He just had a lot of zest for living."

Rossman, who was born in Colorado in 1939, was a member of the Free Speech Movement Steering Committee.

Rossman is credited with designing and organizing efforts to publish a research report analyzing the progressiveness of the UC Berkeley administration. Rossman and other members of the Free Speech Movement wanted to show that the university was not as liberal as was commonly believed, Hollander said.

"It was believed that this was a very liberal institution and people had all the rights that they should have," said Hollander, who became friends with Rossman when she served as his assistant for the project.

Hollander said Rossman recruited 40 to 50 UC Berkeley students to write articles for a report about issues they felt showed that the campus administration was not liberal, such as the use of compulsory ROTC programs, the loyalty oath and rules governing speech on campus.

"I don't know whether (the report) had any impact or not," Hollander said. "But what he saw was the need. With his energy, he got a lot of people to work on it."

Rossman graduated from UC Berkeley in 1963 with a degree in mathematics. He then enrolled in the campus graduate mathematics program, but left UC Berkeley in 1966 to travel the country to give speeches about the Free Speech Movement and educational reform, about which he was passionate, said his wife Karen McLellan.

Rossman eventually returned to live in Berkeley, where he taught science at elementary schools for more than 30 years. Rossman was a natural teacher and taught for many years at the Ecole Bilingue in Berkeley, McLellan said.

"(He was) deeply involved in education. You couldn't go for a walk with him without learning something," McLellan said.

He would take students to natural areas and vacant lots to just learn about the life in them, she said.

She said that since Rossman's death, she has received more than 70 letters from past students expressing how Rossman made the world exciting for them.

Rossman first became interested in science and the natural world while growing up at the foot of Mt. Tamalpais in Marin County, McLellan said. From a young age, his parents gave him "tremendous freedom to roam the countryside" and his love of exploring nature remained with him for the rest of his life, she said.

McLellan said Rossman was also a prolific writer. He wrote about a myriad of subjects, including the Free Speech Movement, politics and education. He also wrote poetry.

McLellan said Rossman's brother, Jared Rossman, best summed up Rossman's curiosity about the world and energy in his epitaph: "He turned over every rock looking."

A memorial service for Michael Rossman is scheduled for June 23 at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley in Kensington.

Tags: MICHAEL ROSSMAN, FREE SPEECH MOVEMENT