 Mesinai was born September 25, 1942 in Detroit, Michigan to Manuel Bromberg, war artist for the European Theatre (1943–45) and Jane Dow Bromberg.Her father’s career as a painter, muralist, and professor of art and design placed her as a child in North Carolina, Europe and Woodstock, New York where she graduated salutatorian from Onteora Central School.During these years she had personal contact with Buckminster Fuller, James Shotwell, Eleanor Roosevelt and Gore Vidal who each influenced her direction in life.