Eunice Lundbeck (Mannheim) was born in Brooklyn, New York, on July 31, 1907. She became a member of Delta Gamma during her undergraduate years at Adelphi College. She previously attended the Packer Collegiate Institute. After graduation from Adelphi, she taught school for a few years.
She married Phi Gamma Delta L. Robert Mannheim on October 10, 1930. She wore a green chiffon dress and carried orchids and lilies of the valley. The ceremony took place at her mother’s home (her father had died the year before). The bridegroom was an alumnus of Columbia University. After the wedding the couple took a motor tour of New England.
The couple had three sons and moved to Amherst, Massachusetts in 1946. There, she was active in PTA and she served on the committee that affiliated the local parents group with the national Parent Teacher Association. She was also a resource chairman for the Little White House Conference on Education.
She served the community in many ways. Mannheim was a member of the Amherst Women’s Club. She belonged to the Hampshire County Business and Professional Women’s Club. She was on the state board of the American Association of University Women as well as the state organization of League of Women Voters. Mannheim was a member of the area Mental Health Center Association and as chairman of the Massachusetts Conference of Mental Health Centers. She was also president of the Delta Gamma Pioneer Valley alumnae organization.
North Adams Transcript, October 16, 1956
Mannheim won election of the Amherst Board of Selection in 1954 after serving eight years as a member of the Amherst town meeting. She was the first woman elected to the Board of Selectmen. During her early years in Amherst, she was a proponent of the town manager form of government and was a member of the committee that recommend the change. Mannheim was reelected to the Board twice and was elected chair in 1960. She was the Hampshire County Selectmen’s Association’s delegate to the executive committee of the Massachusetts Selectmen’s Association.
Recorder-Gazette, September 18, 1958
In the beginning of December 1960 she received the Citizen of the Year award. It was given by the Amherst Chamber of Commerce for “outstanding community spirit and service.” She died shortly thereafter, quite suddenly, on December 13, 1960, at the age of 53. Later that year, the Amherst League of Women Voters, of which Mannheim was president 1947-1949, established a memorial fund in her name.
A letter to the editor written by her friend appeared in the Transcript Telegram on January 7, 1961.
