I worked with Connie at M&I till she retired. Many blessings and prayers for Connie and family.

I wrote this profile of Connie for the May 2020 issue of the Nordic Ski Club of Milwaukee newsletter

Member Profile: Connie Nagel
“Making friends in the club was the highlight of my life,” says Connie Nagel, who joined the Nordic Ski Club of Milwaukee in 1979. That was when Bill McNamara was president. Forty years later, in 2019, “I went to his 70th birthday party.” Even though Connie no longer skis, due to a knee replacement, many of her friends are the cross-country skiers she met decades ago. “I still see friends I met in the club a couple of times a year.”

She didn’t know how to cross-country ski when she joined, but club members taught her. It was a way to enjoy the snow and Wisconsin’s cold winters. “Now, when I’m not skiing any longer, winter drags on. At the time, winter went so fast. I tried to go on every trip there was, and there was an event on most weekends.”

Known as a good organizer, Connie came to be a key leader in the Nordic Ski Club. She worked in the human resources department at Milwaukee’s old M&I Bank for 33 years. She also was involved with a group called Project Business, and for years she presented a weekly basic business program to students of history teacher Bill Heinzelman. Connie and Bill discovered they were both members of the Nordic Ski Club of Milwaukee. Connie had joined so she could do activities with her son, Jay, then 11. “Bill encouraged me to join the program committee, chaired by Georgene Voutila. She twisted our arms to co-chair the Club Expo sub-committee, even though I had never been to an expo.” The goal was to promote the club and bring in new members. The expos were open to the public and held at the Bavarian Inn or at Milwaukee colleges. For the next three years Bill and Connie took on the job with enthusiasm. “We got ski companies to show their wares at our events, staged ski fashion shows, put on ski clinics, and held events to sell used skis and equipment.”

With that experience, Connie went on to chair the program committee for about 10 years.. “I was on the board of directors for two years, and I was club president for the 1984-’85 year.” Officer terms last from March through March. What does Connie Nagel feel she accomplished in her leadership roles?

“A lot of the things the club is still doing now came from me. I drew up a list of what to expect on our ski trips, called Things to Know When Going on Your First Ski Trip.” She also started the idea of doing last-minute ski outings when there was a good snowfall; they were called “If It Snows, We’ll Go.” She created the board liaison system. “What they used to do before I was president, was to have every committee chair report in person at the Board meeting. That was considered time-consuming and inefficient. I changed it to have every board member be a liaison to a committee leader.” That way the board member could get details ahead of time and report to the board.

Connie has many good memories from the club’s social activities. She first met Patsy Coccia, club president in the 1989-’91 years, at a club Halloween party. “Patsy was dressed as a pregnant nun, but she had forgotten her key prop: the pillow to show her pregnancy. I had a pillow for my hunchback character, and I offered it to a grateful Patsy.” Patsy got a lot of laughs. On one weekend ski trip Jim Dieball (1991-’92 club president) forgot to turn off his car after loading his luggage and himself on the bus. His car ran in that parking lot till it was out of gas and it completely iced up. Jim and Georgene fought about whose fault it was forever.

“There was another ski trip when Vicki Comp left her purse at a restaurant our bus stopped at on the way back from up north.” Her car and house keys were in the purse; she wanted the bus to turn around and go back. After a call to confirm the purse was there, Connie recalled, “A sheriff ended up bringing the purse to the bus.” Can you imagine that happening today?

Connie, who turned 80 on April 25, 2020, still works at least 20 hours a week. She staffs the welcome desk at the YMCA in Oconomowoc, where she lives in a senior apartment. She is a lifetime member of the Nordic Ski Club, although she has not been active for years. “The reason I joined the club was because of my son, Jay, but he wasn’t into skiing and camping as much as I ended up being. He was into football more.” In 1990, her son died at age 21 of a brain aneurysm. “Club members were extremely supportive to me when my son died and for that I will be forever grateful. They even bought me new skis. And I stayed around for a few years. But when I left, I left completely. It had gotten too much to handle. Also, a lot of my friends had dropped out of the club over the years.”

Yet they kept in touch. Bill Heinzelman, Georgene Voutila, Jim Dieball (Georgene’s husband) are still Connie’s faithful friends. Connie and Pat Pomahoc formed a group of women ski-club members, most now retired. It started with lunch for four. “We both had coupon books with a buy-one-get-one-free meal.” So they each could invite a guest. “We asked Linda Cross and Patty Vaughn to join us. Now the lunch group has grown to about 30 women even though we don’t use coupons anymore.” Connie says another group of veteran Nordic skiers has an annual Christmas party. The friendships, she says–they are what have made the club special. The Nordic Ski Club of Milwaukee celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2021. Connie said she’ll see you at the celebrations, starting with the Dec. 18 (2020) holiday party.
By Paula Brookmire, Nordic Ski Club historian
Addendum: Because of Covid 19, the NSCM 50th anniversary was delayed till August 2022