Member Highlight

  Dottie Bonnet

Born and raised in Newark, NJ
B.S. from Panzer College of P.E. and Health. East Orange.
Worked for Prudential Insurance for 4.5 years after High School. Attended College after the War.
Taught Physical Education in Livingston, NJ for 4.5 years then left to raise a family.
Returned to teach in Manville High School for one year, then to Madison, NJ Elementary and Junior High for 16 years. Retired in 1978
Married to Robert Bonnet in 1950 after having met in College. He also taught P.E. in Berkeley Heights. Married two months shy of 56 years.
Two sons, both have Physical Education degrees. The older has a M.A. In experiential educationand works for the Denver, Colorado Schools. Oldest son married. No grandchildren.
Before retirement we travelled and camped ALL over the USA and Canada with the boys. After retirement Bob and I traveled all over the world. We frequently did our own thing. I hiked through the Grand Canyon and rafted the Colorado River.Took a trip to Alaska to see the Iditarod Race. Spent three trip at Hudson Bay, to view the Polar Bear migration out to the ice. Our 50th wedding anniversary trip was made to the Polar Bears. (Good sport that Bob was, he endured it!). He also endured the whitewater raft trips I got him to try. I’ll go again!
Claim to fame: Swam competitively for the Newark Athletic Club (with some success.) Was a member of the first Synchronized Ballet Swim Team in NJ. (and no, we never did the stunts that they do now!). Have taught swimming at the Somerset Hills YMCA, as a volunteer, for over 25 years. Still at it!
I have been a volunteer for the Visiting Nurses Association for close to 25 years. I spend a month in the fall and the spring preparing for the HUGE Rummage Sale that is held at the Far Hills Fair Grounds. I have also become a Friendly Face Visitor, to a 91 year old ex fighter pilot of WWII who resides in a nursing home in Gladstone, for the VNA.
Now the Grange! I met Peggy Arnold through the VNA Rummage Sales. She invited me to a covered dish supper at the Meyersville Presbyterian Church. I enjoyed the people, the food and most especially the service and the minister. So I joined the church. Other calls from Peggy got me to put cherries on the Sundaes at the Granges Sundae Party, help with desserts at the Soup and Pasta Contest and the question, “ Why don’t you join the Grange?” Why not? I like helping people, I’ve enjoyed writing and doing things for the troops, sticking the stickers inside the dictionaries for the third graders, enjoyed the Soup Contests and all the other things we do. I’ve enjoyed all the people I’ve met and the support you all have given me after Bob died. I thought you had to be a farmer, had to know what and when to plant the crops (me of the black thumb). The Grange has given me an opportunity to serve others in the best possible way.