Ruth Cooper Reidbord was born in 1931 to immigrant parents who settled in a small mill town in Southwestern Pennsylvania. She attended public school in Leechburg and a tiny religious school. She met E.L. Konigsburg, then known as Elaine Lobl, at Carnegie Mellon University (then the Carnegie Institute of Technology). Reidbord later received a Masters Degree in Urban Planning and worked as City Planner for the Pittsburgh suburb of Mt. Leganon. She is a member of Temple Sinai in Pittsburgh and has pursued Jewish learning for most of her adult life.