Dear FOL,
Judee Blohm, my former wife, died unexpectedly on July 10.
Judee Blohm teaching in Liberia as a Peace Corps Volunteer
A members of FOL, we served as Peace Corps Volunteers in Liberia from the late 60s to the early 70s and then as trainers for Peace in Liberia and Southern Africa.
In Liberia we were teachers in Gbechon, then a small village of 48 houses on a side road, about two hours from Gbarnga. An experienced primary school teacher in the US, Judee was given a kindergarten class of 60 to teach. She excelled in the classroom and in the garden that she developed in the community. I suspect that some of the recipes that you have in the FOL Cookbook are from her.
After two years in Gbecohn, we extended and were assigned to the ZorZor Rural Training Institute to teach methods classes to Liberia’s prospective teachers. We became involved in the training of new Peace Corps Volunteers with Judee serving as the technical director for multiple programs during the next two years.
Judee is remembered with affection by many who served with her in the Peace Corps and afterward worked with her in Peace Corps Washington and elsewhere.
On Facebook, “Judee Blohm-Celebration of an Incredible Life” can be found.
Below are remarks posted on that website made by the Deputy Peace Corps Director:
Judee Blohm teaching as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Liberia
TO: Peace Corps Global
FROM: Carrie Hessler-Radelet, Deputy Director
SUBJECT: Judee Blohm,
OPATS Staff Member… I am deeply saddened to inform you that Judee Blohm, a well respected and valued staff member in the Office of Overseas Programming & Training Support (OPATS), passed away unexpectedly on Wednesday, July 10. Judee had a long and illustrious career with the Peace Corps and will be remembered as a good and dear friend to many of us at headquarters and at our posts.
Most recently, Judee had served as the food security publications expert, but her history with the Peace Corps began long before, in 1968, when she served as a Volunteer in Liberia for four years. In every decade thereafter, Judee returned to the Peace Corps in one capacity or another. Her passion for the agency’s mission to spread world peace and friendship was unparalleled, and she made a lasting imprint, both literally and figuratively, within OPATS.
Judee Blohm
Serving as a writer and editor for numerous training manuals, workbooks, and handbooks, Judee’s work was instrumental in the Peace Corps’ recent initiative, Focus In/Train Up. Her institutional knowledge and ability to steer sector experts to proper sources and auxiliary material was invaluable.
Before her recent tenure at Peace Corps headquarters, she served as a cross-cultural educator and training consultant with Peace Corps posts in Liberia, Botswana, Swaziland, Lesotho, Ecuador, Jamaica, Panama, Paraguay, Suriname, Guyana, and Jordan.
A publisheJd author noted for her expertise, Judee wrote or served as senior editor of five books, the most recent being The NASAGA Training Activity Book in 2012. She also served as a trainer and contributed to publications for AmeriCorps, American University, the Foreign Service Institute, the Federal Labor Relations Agency, the Department of State, the United Nations, and Youth For Understanding.
Judee will be greatly missed and forever valued for her friendship and for all that she accomplished during her long and devoted service to the Peace Corps. She touched our lives in so many ways, and we mourn her passing.
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Thanks for forwarding the news about Judee Blohm. I knew Judee and Bob during one of the first Peace Corps training programs I worked on – at the Zorzor Teacher Training Institute. The two of them were both quite knowledgeable in the training of teachers – Liberians as well as new PCVs. They were also very professional in their administration of that training program (unlike me at that time!); in future training programs where I worked, when faced with a difficult decision, I would ask myself, “What would Bob and Judee have done?”I am not at all surprised to read about Judee’s many skills and accomplishments. Although we will miss her physical presence, she will continue to be very much alive in the lives of those whom she touched.
[client_name]Tom Wheeler [/client_name]