Silver was diagnosed with brain cancer in September and had been fighting a brave battle until she died Wednesday at her sister Lynne's home in San Francisco. She was 60.

On her last blog on Dec. 29th, she said she had spent the week planning her funeral. "It will be fun and I wish I could be there," she wrote. She asked that people wear bright colors and she lined up a program that was vintage Silver with a positioning statement that summed up her life, "May the Memory of the Righteous be a Blessing."

Her "army of friends and colleagues," as one speaker put it, turned out for the service on the afternoon of Super Bowl Sunday. Lee Houskeeper, the press agent who successfully promoted many of her ambitious projects, put the number at around 500.

People wore bright colors and there was even a Hawaiian shirt in the second pew. Peter Coyote, a cousin, wore a bright coral shirt and there were plenty of beads and jangles. The mood was celebratory and inspirational and quietly joyful, like all of Silver's programs, even when the subject matter in her Holocaust and hate crime programs were somber. The sun shown brightly through the skylights. And Silver's touch, ever the feminist, was evident down to the reading of the 23rd Psalm. Rabbi Rosalind Glazer inverted the he to a she and sang, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. She maketh me to lie down in green pastures; She leadeth me beside the still waters. She restoreth my soul, She leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for her name's sake..." Even in death, Silver was breaking new ground.

Lani picked her favorite readings that illustrated her life and times. Alvin Fine's "Birth is a Beginning," with the ending, "Birth is a beginning, and death a destination; But life is a journey, A sacred pilgrimage Made stage by stage From birth to death To Life everlasting." And Ecclesiastes: "For everything there is a season, a time for purpose, experience under heaven: A time to be born and a time to die...A time to tear and a time to sew, A time to keep silence and a time to speak."

And she picked the speakers that she thought could best lay out her life's path. Her sisters Lori and Lynne pulled the program together. Speaker after speaker described her long career as a political activist, cultural entrepreneur, artist, musician, opera composer, bridge builder, journalist, documentary producer, collector of friends and colleagues, an organizer of events for her organizations that produced funds, friends, and much press attention, founder of the Holocaust Oral History Project and James Byrd Hate Crime Project, and a woman who lived large and became "famous for all the right reasons."

She became most famous for her Holocaust project. She traveled throughout the world to conduct l,700 interviews of Holocaust survivors and witnesses. They are now in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C., and help insure that the Holocaust will never ever be forgotten. She was, as the speakers emphasized, an institution for social change.

Lori Silver told of how her sister Lani started out as a young Republican. She went to South Africa at 19, visited Soweto, and saw scenes like those from the "Slumdog Millionaire" movie. That was the turning point in her life and ever after she dedicated herself to political activism and liberal and social justice causes.

Lynne told of how Lani started early by becoming the president of the three sisters' group when they were kids and met in the closet of their home. Later, Lani became president of her elementary school class, "just the beginning." Lani went to see the Lettermen at the Fairmont Hotel and invited them home to dinner. "And they came."

"Stand up for what you believe and stand up for your neighbor," Lani told her sisters.

When she was dying, she lived in Lynne's home. "For the first time, Lani did not have to work," Lynn explained. "She could spend all her time with her family, going to museums, reading, resting, manicures (yes, Lani) and spending every day immersed in Joy Therapy. Every day, she was our big sister, checking in with Lori at 3 p.m. and Lynne at 10 p.m."

Lori said that Lani blessed their children. "Dare to be different, burn your bra, burn your draft card, improve the world around you, listen to your mother, although Lani never did."

Jennifer Bryce sang "Amazing Grace" and kept emphasizing the term "amazing" over and again.

Morton Stein, a friend from elementary school, spoke of Lani's early days as a reformer.

Corky Wick, a colleague of Lani's in the Women's Study College of San Francisco State University in the 1970s, talked of their "protesting years" and their women's rights battles and :"yes, burning our bras."

Bill Spooner, from the Blue Bear School of Music, performed a song written by Lani from her Sugihara opera, with music by Spooner. Lani had put to music her incredible discovery in her Holocaust research. It was the story of Chiune and Yukiko Sugihara, a Japanese ambassador and his wife, who assisted in the escape of more than 2,000 Lithuanian Jews by issuing them exit visas. Lani dramatized the story and, with the help of Houskeeper, got international attention for the Sugiharas with more than 500 media stories. Sugihara was discharged after the war for the "Lithunanian incident." But thanks to Lani, there is now a monument in his honor in Tokyo.

Donn Harris, executive director of the Oakland School for the Arts, told of how Lani
operated when she was an assistant principal for a spell at the San Francisco School of the Arts. Her idea of discipline, he said, was to make students do community service on campus.

Lavonne Harris represented the James Byrd Foundation for Healing, which was founded by the Byrd family in memory of the infamous Byrd hate crime. He was in l998 chained to the back of a truck by three white supremacists and dragged to his death in Jasper, Texas, raised funds for the foundation, established an oral history project, and conducted 2,600 interviews pertaining to racism in the Bay Area. Harris, sister of James Byrd, detailed how much the family appreciated Lani's work on combating racism. She was accompanied to the service by family members by Clara Byrd Taylor and Tiffany Taylor from Jasper.

Niece Sara Silver Jacobs and nephew Justin Shaber sang the John Lennon song "Imagine."

The crowd was diverse even by San Francisco standards and spanned Lani's interests and causes.There was Knud Dyby, a famous rescuer from Denmark, who saved Jews by ferrying them to safety in Sweden. His daughter, Suzanne Dyby, who has just finished editing Lani's memoirs and has them ready for publication. Public Defender Jeff Adachi, Sup. Eric Mar, former supervisors Jake McGoldrick and Carol Ruth Silver. Ron Kaufman, the real estate man who allowed Lani to use space in one of his building to house her Holocaust project. Bill Hoskins and Sunny Schwartz. Rachel and Mike Kesselman from the Jewish Family Children's Services. High school friends Morton Stein, Gail Donsky, Linda Tillery, and Robert Bleiweiss of Beach Blanket Babylon fame. John Angell Grant, her Holocaust project partner for many years. Deidre English from the UC-Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. Actor Ed Asner called to pay his respects.

From two of Lani's latest passions came Sandy Close and Robert Rosenthal from the Chauncey Bailey Project (where Lani was a passionate participant in this critical media coalition investigating the murder of an Oakland editor) and Ricardo Sandoval Palos, Sally Lehrman, Dori Maynard, Linda Jue, Diane Keaton, Michael Stoll, and Lisa Chung from the Northern California chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists (where Lani was a passionate board member).

After the service was over, Housekeeper and I adjourned to Lefty O'Doul's, another San Francisco institution, to watch the Super Bowl game and toast Lani with a bottle of Anchor Steam beer. I think Lani Silver would have approved.

For more on Lani Silver, her endless causes, and good results, see my obituary. B3

Lani Silver was buried at Hills of Eternity Memorial Park in Colma. The family suggests donations may be sent to the Jewish Family and Children's Services, 2l50 Post St., San Francisco, Calif. 94ll5.