Leah Adler (1920 - 2017), born Leah Frances Posner, was the mother of famed director Steven Spielberg. She was a former concert pianist and painter.

Adler owned a kosher restaurant on Pico Boulevard in West L.A. called The Milky Way. ^[0]

Adler was born in Cincinnati and raised during the Roaring Twenties and the Depression with her older brother Bernard.

Leah Frances Posner developed a love of music when she learned piano at age 5. ^[0]

Adler studied at the Music Conservatory in town and graduated from the University of Cincinnati with a degree in Home Economics. ^[0]

In February 1945, she married electrical engineer Arnold Meyer Spielberg, and they had four children — Steven, Anne, Sue and Nancy.

From Cincinnati, Leah and Arnold moved to Haddenfield, N.J., where they lived for seven years before relocating to Phoenix in 1957.

In 1964, the family moved to Los Gatos, California. They built a house in Saratoga and lived there for two years. After her divorce, Leah moved back to Scottsdale, where she married Bernie Adler in 1967. Leah and Bernie remained in Arizona with Sue and Nancy until eventually moving to Los Angeles, where they opened The Milky Way (Kosher Restaurant).

Leah was known for her sharp wit.

"I told Steve, if I'd known how famous he was going to be, I'd have had my uterus bronzed," she said in a 1994 Los Angeles Times story. ^[0]

Her first husband, Steven's father, turned 100 this month.

Her second husband died in 1995 at age 75.

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At Louise Kerr’s studio in the Arizona city, Adler often did piano solos and performed with chamber music groups.

An accomplished painter, she owned The Village Shop in Scottsdale, Ariz., where she showcased the works of local artists.

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