Eisenberg was born in New York in 1902 and grew up in
West New York, New Jersey. At the age of eight, Eisenberg had a few piano lessons, but at 25¢, her parents felt they were too expensive and she didn't have enough talent, so her lessons were discontinued. In 1923, she married
Jacob Eisenberg, a pianist, teacher and author. Eisenberg pestered his new wife to let him teach her how to play, but she didn't like to practice, so he agreed to do all the housework if she would practice the piano and she accepted the offer. Jacob wrote textbooks on piano technique and he wanted to use his wife to try out his methods. She toured the United States with him, playing at his lectures to demonstrate how adults could learn to master the piano using her husband's methods. After her husband died in 1964, she sold their piano, but later missed it and bought another one. The first day she had the new piano, she played for eight hours. In time, she was playing short concerts for local senior citizen groups. In 1982, she had a stroke. Although she learned to walk again and was able to return to her apartment in
Cliffside Park, New Jersey, she remained unable to use her left hand. In the spring of 1983, she began visiting a post-stroke group at Southeast Senior Center for Independent Living in Englewood, New Jersey. The program director introduced her to
Margaret Patrick, a black great-grandmother who had also played classical music until 1982, when she also had a stroke. A local reporter dubbed them
Ebony and Ivory and the name stuck. They were on television both in the US and abroad and appeared with
Regis Philbin,
Geraldo Rivera and
David Hartman.
Liberace, who was a fan of
Ebony and Ivory, made his last television appearance on the Hour Magazine with
Gary Collins and made it a condition of his appearance that if they would bring Eisenberg and Patrick on the program, he would come. Newsman
Morry Alter won an award for his CBS News report on them. They were featured on
PM Magazine,
CNN and
NBC Nightly News, with Tom Brokaw. Eisenberg and Patrick's story was included in a book by
Norman Vincent Peale} and in
More True Stories, an
ESL reader in its third edition. It is included in sermons and religious publications in the US and other countries. Eisenberg's daughter was the art historian
Jacqueline Moss. Her nephew is Canadian artist and musician
Mendelson Joe. == Partial list of television and radio appearances ==