Whale expert Joy Reidenberg was always entranced by nature.
The longtime Rye resident recalls stalking with her cat and grabbing a mouse before her cat could get it. And she would come home with a snake entwined around each arm.
Jacques Costeau was her hero and she longed to explore the inside of animals as Jim Fowler did on the television show “Wild Kingdom.”
Her parents warned her off “touching the dead things.” Yet they supported her. Her father told her, “No one will pay you to pet the animals.” Instead, he handed her the yellow pages and told her to see if she could find a career path. She stopped at “V” for veterinarian, and found an internship with a local veterinarian.
She was fascinated when she was able to observe surgery on a dog, but she felt so light-headed that she had to leave. She credits the vet for telling her that might not happen again, and it never did.
In college at Cornell, the chairman of the Department of Anatomy hired her as a work/study student to study toad fish, because they could sound like underwater spy submarines. It was her job to dissect the fish and draw pictures of what she saw. With her interest and talent in art, this was a dream job, something she pursues to this day. She studies mammals in extreme conditions and considers how that could be useful to people.
Reidenberg and her husband, Dr. Bruce Reidenberg, who has had a long career in the pharmaceutical industry, married while they were students. They lived in Rye Colony, then Montclair, N.J., and then back to Rye, this time in a home next to the Edith Read Wildlife Sanctuary.
For her, the location was perfect. She served as president of the sanctuary for eight years and is now an emeritus board member.
Their daughters Danielle and Ariella went to the Rye Schools and both now live in Florida. When her daughters were young, Reidenberg volunteered at the Rye schools — and even brough in “mystery skulls” for the students to study.
