PORT LUDLOW — Myron Vogt, the inspiration behind the Boeing Bluebills and their volunteer efforts to maintain seniors of their properties, has died after an extended battle with most cancers.
The previous Peninsula Day by day Information Coronary heart of Service award winner and Chamber of Jefferson County Citizen of the 12 months died Jan. 12. He was 85.
He’s survived by Valeria, his spouse of 56 years; his daughter, Jennifer Molloy of Issaquah; his sons, David Vogt of Atlanta and Joe Vogt of Vancouver, B.C.; and 6 grandchildren.
Vogt, who retired from Boeing after 34 years, was a part of the unique 17 members of the Olympic Peninsula Chapter of the Bluebills who’re nonetheless lively right now.
That chapter, shaped in 1998, has expanded its membership to 198 and merged with the Peninsula Help Group, a nonprofit that works to help each college students and households on the Peninsula.
“He was so influential to me,” mentioned Barbara Berthiaume, the PSO Bluebills’ board secretary.
“My husband was the primary Bluebill, however for some cause, Myron picked me to mediate a complete agency-wide (effort).”
The Bluebills work with faculties, church buildings, different nonprofits and teams similar to World Imaginative and prescient and the Seattle-based Museum of Flight to supply meals, provides, fall prevention for the aged and Okay-12 training in science, know-how, engineering and math (STEM) in Jefferson, Clallam and Kitsap counties.
“We have to hear from the businesses, what they’re doing, and what we will do to assist,” Berthiaume mentioned. “He requested me if I’d do it. He simply had such a knack for locating folks and wanting them to work and suppose it’s enjoyable and suppose it’s significant.”
Vogt led a bunch throughout the Bluebills referred to as The Builders, who’ve put in greater than 1,220 wheelchair ramps, 1,400 miscellaneous repairs and modifications and assisted greater than 5,000 folks with rails, seize bars, switch poles and redesigned user-friendly steps.
Robert Chanpong has taken on that management function, though Vogt by no means requested him to do it.
“He simply talked to me in the future very quietly,” Chanpong mentioned. “He advised me he was leaving and he simply mentioned, ‘Who do you suppose ought to do the job?’
“It didn’t take me lengthy, possibly a number of seconds, and I mentioned, ‘OK, Myron, I’ll do it.’”
A number of Bluebills members mentioned Vogt had a singular method of bringing folks collectively for a typical objective.
“Myron simply had a method with all people,” mentioned Ed Berthiaume, Barbara’s husband. “When he wished to do one thing, he may get it completed and make all people blissful. He was a great man and a number of enjoyable.”
Ed Berthiaume, like Vogt, was a Boeing govt. At one time, Vogt was a regional director in Tokyo and Berthiaume carried out the identical job in London.
“Myron was very good man,” Ed mentioned. “He may put a design collectively and promote it to a county or no matter.
“He was simply excellent with all people. He had a method about him.”
Chanpong met Vogt on the Port Ludlow Golf Course and joined the Bluebills after “a number of dozen rounds with him,” he mentioned.
“Myron actually likes to determine who you’re within the good sense,” Chanpong mentioned. “He likes to know what you’re able to doing in a great way. He was by no means judgmental, however every time we went out on a job collectively, Myron was all the time the type of boss the place he allowed you to suit into the group in no matter capability you would, whether or not it’s utilizing a hammer, utilizing a noticed, digging a publish gap.
“He mentioned, ‘Right here’s the plan. That is what we’re going to do, so let’s do it.’”
Chanpong mentioned Vogt had a “magical” impact on him.
“He’s eager about creating relationships the place he wished to assist no matter he may with whomever he may,” Chanpong mentioned. “It’s a generosity of spirit and coronary heart that actually affected me over time.
“I couldn’t imagine this man who was {golfing} with me would finally reawaken a spirit that was form of dormant due to the form of job I had,” he mentioned.
Jay Gilmour, who additionally labored for Boeing earlier than he retired in 1993, mentioned Vogt began the Peninsula Bluebills chapter with a $5,000 examine from Boeing. Now the group helps to supply practically $450,000 in money, items and providers yearly, Barbara Berthiaume reported.
“Myron was a conundrum in some methods as a result of he wasn’t very organized, however something he requested somebody to do, they wished to do it,” Gilmour mentioned. “He had an plain capability to establish who was prepared to do one thing, ask them to do it, and acquired it completed.”
Gilmour added that Vogt’s spouse, Valeria, was an integral a part of every part he did.
“They have been a workforce in lots of respects,” Gilmour mentioned. “She had the concepts of what ought to be completed, and he discovered a method to get it completed.”
After he died, Chanpong mentioned there was a procession in entrance of his home and drivers honked their horns to say goodbye.
The Bluebills plan to honor Vogt with an annual award to one in every of its members in his identify for the volunteer of the yr.
“He was an amazing man leaving an amazing legacy,” Chanpong mentioned. “We’ll proceed to do the work that he began.
“We serve the individuals who want it essentially the most. We make no judgements of the individuals who want the assistance. That’s what the Bluebills are all about.”
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Managing Editor Brian McLean may be reached by electronic mail at [email protected]