“Hammer”ing Away at Life

David Hammerstein was born on August 18, 1950 in Washington D.C. into a family which grew to be four children and two parents. Five years after he was born, his family moved to Silver Spring, Maryland, and David remained there until he went to college at the age of 18. He was fortunate to spend a year of his undergraduate studying abroad at The University of Vienna! He returned to the U.S. and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Colgate University in New York and a Masters of Business Administration degree from The University of Chicago.

Following his education, he took to the work force, becoming a financial analyst for Time Inc., which later became known as Time Warner. In that position, he evaluated the operating performances, including budgets, of the various divisions of the company to compare their accomplishments. HBO was one of the major businesses that stemmed out of Time Inc. during David’s employment there. His career of more than 35 years was spent managing investments.

It was also at Time Inc. that David met his wife, Shuelin Ko. Shuelin was Chinese, having grown up in Taiwan, and interracial relationships were still somewhat novel at that time, but David said that his marriage into a different culture made him a deeper person. His parents, having been from Nazi Germany where they suffered prejudices of their own, understood and supported David’s marriage. The couple welcomed a son and daughter, whom David is very close with to this day, and made Pittsburgh their home. He now also has four grandchildren.

After 35 years of marriage, Shuelin passed away of cancer. Two years after his wife’s death, David retired, but began classes in creative writing and resumed studying classical piano, which he played as a child and young man. He taught investment management at OSHER, the adult education center at Carnegie Mellon University, and volunteered for the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, his synagogue Rodef Shalom and Community Day School in Pittsburgh. In 2016, David authored “Kelev’s Journey,” a children’s book about a dog discovering his Jewish roots and helping others to do the same. David is currently working on writing two other books as well, and he plans to keep “hammer”ing away at his goals! For David, retirement certainly came in like a lion!