CHICAGO — Martyl Reinsdorf, the wife of Chicago Bulls and White Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf and the designer of championship rings for both teams, died Monday afternoon after a long illness, the Sox announced. She was 85.
Reinsdorf designed five of the six Bulls NBA championship rings and was involved with creating the other. She also designed the 2005 Sox World Series ring.
As “Grandma Martyl,” she created and distributed more than 1 million coloring books, crayons, markers and toys to hospitals, orphanages and shelters, according to the Sox news release. Recipients included survivors of Hurricane Katrina, residents of Ronald McDonald Houses and patients at Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, Phoenix Children’s Hospital and the Spectrios Institute for Low Vision in Wheaton.
“My mother had such a heart for children,” Bulls President and COO Michael Reinsdorf said in a statement. “The joy she brought through her coloring books made me so proud to be her son. As a father, I loved seeing her being such an involved grandmother with my children. They had so many shared interests and spent time together developing computer programs, creating costumes and starting her coloring book program. These are memories that we all treasure as a family.”
She received the 2004 Clarence Troyer Volunteer of the Year Award and was recognized in 2011 by American Friends of Hebrew University with the Torch of Learning Award.
“I’ve often said that everyone’s goal in this world should be to make this a better place to live,” Major League Baseball Commissioner Emeritus Bud Selig, a lifelong friend, said in a statement. “More importantly, it is to help people who in a lot of cases can’t help themselves. Martyl Reinsdorf did that brilliantly. She’s a person you could say unequivocally made the world a better place to live.”
Born in Denver on March 4, 1936, she was the daughter of Milton and Vivette Rifkin. She went to George Washington University, where she met Jerry Reinsdorf. They married in 1956.
She worked for the Department of Defense at the Pentagon while in Washington and for the Department of Agriculture after moving to Chicago.
“My mother lived life to the fullest,” Susan Reinsdorf said in a statement. “A devoted artist, a big heart, a big personality, a strong woman, she always fought for the underdog and was so compassionate and thoughtful of others. She was such an influence on me, and as I was growing up, was always accepting of me and my friends, as if everyone was always part of the family.”
