Norm and Joyce Bottenberg: A couple with 136 years of service
By ARCAN member, Marianne Spampinato
Joyce’s more than 68 years of Red Cross service – 48 as a volunteer and 20 as career staff – also includes Junior Red Cross training and certification as a First Aid and CPR instructor, service on the Melrose, Mass. Chapter’s board of directors and development of babysitter course materials.
Norm was a Red Cross trained lifeguard as a teenager and an instructor until he was hired in 1965 as director of Safety Services of the Seattle-King County Chapter where he supported the expansion of Health and Safety Services to include CPR, Youth Services and HIV/AIDS education.
Both have earned Certificates of Merit for lifesaving efforts.
Nearly seven decades ago, Norm and Joyce Bottenberg began their American Red Cross service on opposite sides of our country. Together their combined 136 years of service – 68 years each – almost equal that of our organization to our country.
While 8-year-old Joyce knitted lap robes for a veteran’s home in Bedford, Massachusetts, teenager Norm took a Red Cross Lifesaving course and worked as a lifeguard and swimming instructor in Seattle, Washington.
Joyce’s more than 68 years of Red Cross service – 48 as a volunteer and 20 as career staff – also includes Junior Red Cross training and certification as a First Aid and CPR instructor, service on the Melrose (Massachusetts) Chapter’s board of directors and development of babysitter course materials.
She followed the example set by her father, who was a longtime volunteer Red Cross blood donor, instructor and board member.
In 1975, at age 30, Joyce was appointed executive director of the Melrose Chapter; two years later she was tapped to help coordinate services and fundraising of 29 chapters in the greater Boston area. In 1980, she led efforts of 11 other chapters to reorganize staff, governance boards and volunteers. She also served on a committee to consolidate Service to Military Families committees and centralize public relations.
“Such work involved dealing with personalities, governance, clients, multiple boards and changing staff and volunteer roles to make the required reorganization work,” she commented.
She was selected for National Headquarters’ full scholarship to the 1984 Simmons Graduate School of Management.
Meanwhile, Norm continued volunteering as a Red Cross instructor until he was hired in 1965 as director of Safety Services of the Seattle-King County Chapter; he retired as a Red Cross employee in 1997.
During his tenure, Norm supported the expansion of Health and Safety Services to include CPR, Youth Services and HIV/AIDS education.
“An underlying theme of the Red Cross is its ever-adapting organizational structure to meet emerging needs,” he noted.
One of Norm’s most memorable events involved adapting to the needs of a nudist colony that requested a water safety presentation at its pool, the first – and only – such class he taught.
His accomplishments include computerization of training records and streamlining the testing required for lifesaving jobs at area beaches, pools, government agencies and private businesses.
Norm and Joyce met in 1983 during a six-day National Headquarters Operational Management Training in Leesburg, Virginia. What started as required follow-up communications eventually expanded to the personal, and after they married in 1985. Joyce and her 13-year-old daughter, whom Norm adopted, moved to Seattle. Norm also had been the custodian of his twins, who were 21 at the time. They have seven grandsons and one granddaughter. Having homed 11 dogs and 10 cats over the years, they currently have two dogs and one cat.
In 1988, Joyce joined the Seattle-King County Chapter as its development director, a position she held for 10 years, overseeing planned giving, special events, capital campaigns, direct mail, telemarketing, major gifts and product sales.
One of her most enjoyable events was a MASH BASH the chapter held for two years. Such efforts resulted in the chapter experiencing the highest per capita giving nationally for three years during her service and in Joyce being recognized as the “Professional Fundraiser of the Year” during the 1994 National Convention.
Both have earned Certificate of Merits for lifesaving efforts.
Norm and a Red Cross volunteer performed CPR while operating a Red Cross First Aid Station at a parade conducted during an American Legion convention in Seattle in 1976.
In 1981, while living in Massachusetts, Joyce performed CPR on a neighbor, a 67-year-old father of seven with multiple heart issues.
Since retiring from their paid Red Cross positions, they have continued to volunteer on disaster relief operations, the Ski Patrol, and as members and in leadership roles of the American Red Cross Overseas Association, by virtue of the Seattle-King County Chapter’s sister-city relationship with the Shanghai Red Cross Society.
They are longtime members of the local Rotary Club, including leadership positions; entertain as Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus; and explore their families’ genealogy.
Both are ham radio operators, supporting local search and rescue efforts, Red Cross disaster relief assignments and other community events. He’s also a Red Cross blood drive greeter.
