Boris Kofman, a local cobbler and retired proprietor of Kofman’s Shoe Repair in the historic Lexington Market, passed away on Friday, Oct. 31.
The Owings Mills resident and native of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv was 81.
A third-generation cobbler, Kofman and his family came to the United States in the late 1970s.
In 1979, Kofman took over the cobbler’s shop space at Lexington Market from another shoe repairman who had run the stall since the 1930s. The shop – which reportedly has been located at the market for nearly a century – is now owned and operated by Kofman’s son, Alex, who started working at the stall in 1989 and learned the cobbling craft from his father.
In the early 1990s, Kofman’s Shoe Repair was awarded “Best Shoe Repair Shop” by Baltimore magazine.
Boris Kofman retired from the business in 2021 in the midst of the pandemic.
“When I first started, I remember there was a [shoe repair] shop on pretty much every corner,” Alex Kofman told Baltimore magazine in an August 2024 profile. “And now you’ll struggle to name three in the city. … There was one around the corner from here; the gentleman passed away. There was another one that closed down after COVID. After COVID, so many people I know just retired.”
Boris Kofman is survived by his wife, Frida Kofman; his children, Aleksey Kofman and Daniela (Benjamin) Cavallaro; his sister Tsilya Kravitz; and his grandchildren, Kelly Kofman and Benjamin and Leonardo Cavallaro.
He was predeceased by his parents, Avraam and Pesya Kofman; and siblings, Jakov and Stasya Kofman.
Services will be held on Monday, Nov. 3, at noon at Sol Levinson’s Chapel, 8900 Reisterstown Road in Pikesville. Interment will be at Baltimore Hebrew Cemetery, 318 Berrymans Lane in Reisterstown.
A committed philanthropist and community leader, Russel was president of R&H Motors.
The mother of four was a native of Winchester, Virginia, who spent most of her life in Northwest Baltimore.
The Columbia resident worked on the Gemini and Apollo space missions.
A St. Louis native, Edelman served as ambassador to the central African nation from 1987 to 1989.