Level Green woman met Mamie Eisenhower, learned Polish, bookkeeping, skated in her 70s
Stephanie Bozzick was the go-to member of her family for keeping track of bills and making sure the checking account was balanced.
She also put her skills with figures to work as a lead bookkeeper and auditor in the 1950s at the Atomic Energy Commission's Bettis Atomic Power Lab in West Mifflin.
As such, the Trafford native was among a select number of female staffers invited to a January 1954 luncheon with Mamie Eisenhower in Groton, Conn., where the First Lady christened the pioneering USS Nautilus nuclear submarine that the West Mifflin lab helped to create.
According to daughter Darla Johns, Bozzick thought Eisenhower “was a wonderful woman. It was just very impressive for my mother to take part in that.”
But the no-frills transportation the women were provided didn't match the high-profile occasion.
“They were all in their mink stoles and fancy dresses, and they packed them into a cargo plane,” Johns said. “They got them in there on benches and handed them parachute jumpsuits to put on — just in case.”
It was among many adventures Bozzick would experience in a life marked by abundant energy and caring for others.
Stephanie Bozzick, 92, of Level Green died Sunday, April 8, 2018, in her daughter's home in Aiken, S.C. She was born May 13, 1925 — a daughter of the late Peter and Mary Nowak, immigrants from Poland.
Mrs. Bozzick remained fluent in her parent's native tongue by taking Saturday Polish classes while attending public school during the week.
A 1943 Trafford High School graduate, she completed nighttime bookkeeping lessons and landed a job at the Westinghouse Trafford Works.
Leaving her subsequent job at the West Mifflin lab to raise her young children, she later reentered the workforce, retiring in the late 1980s as head teller at Mellon Bank's Trafford branch.
In retirement, Mrs. Bozzick and her husband enjoyed traveling to many states, including a month-long trip in a recreational vehicle to Victoria, Canada, and back. On her 70th birthday, she and a cousin visited a number of relatives during a tour of Poland.
A skilled ice skater since childhood, she taught the sport to her children and grandchildren, hanging up her blades as a septuagenarian, based on a doctor's suggestion.
In later years, Mrs. Bozzick battled two forms of cancer while caring for an older brother and her ill husband.
“If someone needed something, they knew they could count on my mom,” Johns said. “She was an extremely selfless person. She took care of everybody in the family, and she would always put herself second.”
In addition to her parents, Mrs. Bozzick was preceded in death by two brothers and Thomas, her husband of 66 years, on Jan. 18, 2018.
She is survived by her children, Thomas and his wife, Laura, of Princeton, N.J., Darla Johns and her husband, William, of Aiken, S.C., and William of Level Green; five grandchildren and a step-grandson.
Visitation will be from 4 to 8 p.m. Friday in the John M. Dobrinick Funeral Home, 702 Seventh St., Trafford. Parting prayers will be at 9 a.m. Saturday in the funeral home followed by a funeral Mass at 9:30 a.m. at St. Regis Church.
Interment will follow in the Good Shepherd Cemetery in Monroeville.
Jeff Himler is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 724-836-6622, jhimler@tribweb.com or via Twitter @jhimler_news.
