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Esther "Eppie" Pauline Friedman Lederer, better known as '''Ann Landers''' ( July 4 , 1918 – June 22 , 2002 ), was best known for writing the famous Syndicated Advice Column "Ann Landers." For some 45 years, it was a regular feature in many Newspaper s across North America. In it, people wrote the columnist for advice and she answered. Lederer's writing style was direct, but often witty and sometimes acerbic. She would regularly upbraid an errant letter-writer with the quip, "Watch it, bub!" THE COLUMN The original "Ann Landers" was Ruth Crowley, a Chicago nurse who wrote the syndicated column for 26 newspapers from 1942 until her death (at age 48) on July 20, 1955. Lederer won a contest to take over the column, debuting on October 16, 1955, and wound up as owner of the , 1981 . Accessed online May 24 , 2007 . Ann Landers was not afraid to air unpopular opinions in her column. For instance, she repeatedly favored the legalization of Prostitution .http://www.sexwork.com/subcontents/annlanders.html The Ann Landers column has since been replaced by Annie's Mailbox , a similar feature written by Kathy Mitchell and Marcy Sugar, the longtime editors of Lederer's old column. LIFE Landers was an , who was 17 minutes younger than Esther, wrote the Dear Abby column as Abigail Van Buren . As children, they grew up in Sioux City, Iowa , the daughters of Russian Jewish emigrants, and went by the nicknames "Eppie" and "Popo", respectively. Both sisters are alumnae of Morningside College and both wrote for the college newpaper. They were very close and even had a joint wedding ceremony in 1939 at the age of 21. Eppie was married to Jules Lederer, a business executive. Lederer's home for many years was Chicago , where she owned a huge, well-furnished apartment. Lederer often said that she exercised regularly by walking the length of her apartment several times a day. In March 1940, she gave birth to her first and only child, Margo Lederer. Four years later, in 1944, Rebecca Friedman - Landers and Popo's mother - died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 56. When Landers' mother Rebecca died, Jules had been drafted for the war and Landers and her daughter Margo were living with her parents the Friedmans. Jules and Eppie's marriage ultimately ended in , 2006 . Accessed online May 6 , 2007 . As competing columnists, the sisters did not have a happy relationship. The sisters publicly reconciled in 1964, although some suggest the acrimony lasted. Ann Landers (1918-2002) by Robin Judd , Jewish Virtual Library. Accessed online June 21 , 2007 . Just a few years before Lederer's death, they were not on speaking terms; it is said that they reconciled before her death, although that may be subject to question considering that Popo (Abby) was and is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease . Daughter Margo Howard (who was formerly married to actor Ken Howard and kept her surname professionally) has three children of her own, whereas her cousin, Abigail Van Buren's daughter, Jeanne Phillips , is childless. Today, Howard writes an advice column of her own, ''Dear Margo'', for Yahoo! News . A collection of correspondence between Lederer and Howard was published after her death. In good health almost all of her life, Eppie died of Multiple Myeloma in 2002 at the age of 83. She was survived by her daughter, her three grandchildren and her three greatgrandchildren (ex-husband Jules Lederer died on January 21, 1999). After her death, Dan Savage , author of the salacious sex column '' Savage Love '' and editor of '' The Stranger '', bought her desk. In 2002, the Chicago City Council passed a two-page resolution to honor Eppie Lederer for epitomizing, "Chicago with her strong opinion, her sage advice, her impeccable manners and quick wit" and announcing that a street sign, Ann "Eppie" Landers Way, would be installed at the corner of North Michigan Avenue from East Illinois Street, in front of the Chicago Tribune Tower , her home paper since 1987 . CONTROVERSIES Recycled columns In 1982, Barbara Sandken, a part-time reporter for the Pontiac (Illinois) Daily Leader, discovered that some of the Ann Landers columns were recycled, in that they were rewrites of older columns. Sandken had been assigned the job of compiling "25 years ago in the Leader" columns, and recognized a letter in an older paper as being similar to one she had read more recently. Sandken's story was picked up the AP, which broke the story nationwide on May 3, 1982. Landers apologized in her column and pledged to stop the practice. Urban mythology Ann Landers wrote in a 1995 column, "In recent years, there have been reports of people with twisted minds putting razor blades and poison in taffy apples and Halloween candy. It is no longer safe to let your child eat treats that come from strangers." The vaguely-worded warning has drawn criticism for unnecessarily spreading fear, as there are no documented cases of children receiving Poisoned Candy during door-to-door trick-or-treating. {Link without Title} Mistaken legal advice Ann Landers also gave inaccurate legal advice. For example, in a column that appeared on March 28, 1965, she wrote that "the wedding gifts belong to the bride." She went on to state that the bride should " {Link without Title} onsult a lawyer about the cheques. In some states this could be considered community property." The advice was mistaken. If the cheques can be community property, why not the other gifts? The column has provided teaching material for law professors and law students for generations. See, e.g., Reppy & DeFuniak, Community Property in the United States at pages 137-138(Bobbs-Merrill 1975). SEE ALSO FURTHER READING
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