Decades of protest and partnership: inside a Riverdale couple’s enduring love story

After more than 32 years together, Riverdale residents Laura Klein and Dan Guenzburger remain firm in their love for one another — and for activism.

“It’s always been something that we shared, even when we had our differences,” Klein said. “Our political views have always been central to our lives.” 

Sixty-eight-year-old Klein and 74-year-old Guenzburger held signs opposing the Trump administration at the March 28 “No Kings” protest in Lou Gehrig Plaza. But decades ago — before they found each other through a politically progressive dating service — Klein and Guenzburger were advocates in their own right.

Klein, a now-retired scientific researcher and public school teacher, started protesting in her 20s. A doctoral student in Bethesda, Md. at the time, she and classmates would take the train into Washington D.C. They sat in on court hearings about U.S. involvement in El Salvador and Nicaragua, booing at officials such as Elliott Abrams, she said.

“I started becoming aware of the games that were played by people at the highest level of government,” Klein said.

She was also involved in the movement for women’s reproductive rights, as well as against former President Ronald Reagan’s policies that she said oppressed union workers.

Guenzburger, a lawyer who is also retired, said he started demonstrating in college during the anti-Vietnam War movement. After graduation, he volunteered with the labor union United Farm Workers in support of the Salad Bowl strike, and for more than 10 years worked for the Metropolitan Council on Housing to improve tenants’ rights, he said.

Guenzburger noted he was arrested three times in his life — twice for passing out literature in front of a supermarket during the Salad Bowl strike, and once in 2019 when he visited the Capitol with nonprofit Bend the Arc to protest against the Trump administration’s moves to rescind the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Back in 1990 — when Guenzburger was 38 and Klein was 32 — the two met through a matchmaking company called Concerned Singles that connects politically progressive people. Before signing up, Guenzburger ended an engagement with a woman who planned to vote for former Republican mayor Rudy Giuliani. He said he wouldn’t have been able to live comfortably without shared political values.

Both provided brief statements describing themselves to Concerned Singles. Guenzburger said he was a public interest lawyer and former tenant activist, seeking an “active, warm, open-minded Jewish female to share friendship, interests and explore new ground together.” Klein said she was “strongly opinionated and concerned about social justice” and looking for a “warm, supportive friend / lover / partner.”

Guenzburger sent his first letter to Klein in December, which said he would like to meet her, along with his phone number.

The next month, they met on a rainy Sunday in Grand Central Terminal — Klein coming in from New Haven, and Guenzburger from Brooklyn — without even having seen photos of each other. Guenzburger told Klein she was easy to spot, as she was the most frightened looking woman there.

The two drove to the Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side for an exhibit on media bias in coverage of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. They wandered through the museum, slowing to exchange thoughts on the articles.

“There were aspects of the Tenement Museum … that I thought were not done very well,” Guenzburger said. “I felt comfortable enough to say something negative, and that to me was a sign that I could be myself around her and accepted. I walked away with a good feeling.”

Klein said at the time, she had been on numerous first dates where she left exhausted from having to carry the conversation.

“That wasn’t the case with him,” Klein said. “I enjoyed talking with him and hearing what he had to say. It was a good conversation the whole time.”

Their wedding, which came as a result of an unofficial proposal inside a jewelry store where Klein made it clear she was fed up with Guenzburger’s cold feet, was held at an Italian restaurant in Stamford, Conn.

The two settled in Riverdale in 1995, and later had twins, Eli and Talya Guenzburger, who are now 28. While raising the twins, their activism slowed, though they went as a family to a few anti-Iraq War rallies, Guenzburger said.

But before President Donald Trump took office for the first time in 2017, they were galvanized. Guenzburger and Klein traveled to Bethlehem, Pa. to canvas for Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. As Trump’s second term progressed, their activism took on even more conviction.

In the last year, the two have hit the streets for all three “No Kings” protests, a series of nationwide demonstrations against the Trump administration. Klein spends time volunteering at Waldo Sanctuary, a migrant family shelter, helping teach English as a Second Language. Guenzburger is on the steering committee for grassroots group Northwest Bronx Indivisible, and is working with an ELLIS Academy student from Guinea on getting his green card.

Their motivation to stay active is rooted in Jewish history, the couple said. Guenzburger’s parents grew up in Nazi Germany, and Guenzburger recalled hearing the belief was “it’s going to pass.”  He said he’s scared of where the United States could be heading, but this is a crucial moment to intervene.

“This is a time where we can still save this country,” Guenzburger said.

Klein and Guenzburger don’t agree on everything, and have their differences politically too. But, they said respect and support for one another is what maintains their bond through the phases of life.