Ciel Bottomly

Ciel Bottomly, April 4, 1942 - November 11, 2024

Ciel Heim Bottomly passed away peacefully on November 11, 2024, at Colorow Care Center, Olathe, Colorado. 

Ciel was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on April 4, 1942. She is survived by her husband, Bill Bottomly of Montrose, her son Charles (Charley) Freeman Burch, of Colorado Springs, and her daughter, Mielle Rose Bottomly, also of Montrose. 

A love of all the arts was infused in Ciel by her parents, and throughout her life she nurtured that love in many ways. Her photographic, watercolor, performing, and written art enriched her and those around her. 

She graduated from High School in Waukesha, Wisconsin in 1960, and the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1964, with a degree in Education and Drama. After graduation, she worked in the New England states in a variety of jobs until moving to Prince Frederic, Maryland, where she began a 12-year love affair with teaching special education, pre-school, elementary, middle, junior high, and high school students. She spent most of her teaching career in Vinton and Roanoke, Virginia, where her son and daughter were born, and where she and Bill met. 

Ciel ended her 12-year teaching career in June, 1977, when she, Charley, and Mielle migrated to Denver, Colorado, where Bill had taken a job with the Bureau of Land Management. She taught at a pre-school and worked in restaurants in Denver. They were married there on November 10, 1979, shortly before they moved to Montrose, Colorado. 

In Montrose, Ciel taught pre-school at the former Tiny Tots. She also became active with the Magic Circle Players theatre company (MCP), where she performed and directed for many years. Her first role with MCP was ”Golda” in Fiddler on the Roof, in the early 1980s. She also enticed Bill, Charley, and Mielle into many MCP projects. One of the highlights of her theatrical art was when she and Co-Director Dr. Richard Shannon in 1999 took 32 actors from Montrose to England to perform Guys and Dolls in Christchurch. She and Bill also worked on, and performed, in many productions together over the years.

In 1984 Ciel earned her Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling from Western State College in Gunnison, Colorado, and started her 30-plus years career as a mental health counselor.. She retired in 2015.

The family requests that those wishing to, please consider making a donation to the Care Giver Support Foundation that Bill helped found at https://family-caregiver.org in her name, or to your favorite charity. A celebration of her life will be held at a time and place to be announced.