Elizabeth "Bookie" Hottensen Slugg

Elizabeth (“Bookie”) Hottensen Slugg, 96, died peacefully on February 19, 2021 at her home in Mequon, Wisconsin. Born January 20, 1925, her 96-year lifetime spanned through several wars, and profound changes in societal and social norms. Throughout her life she adapted, thrived on change, and affected almost everyone with her capacity for unconditional love and empathy. She is survived by her four children—Dorothy Hottensen, Brooklyn; Robert Hottensen Jr, Aiken, SC; William, (“Sandy”), Milwaukee; and Judy Hottensen, New York.  She had nine grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Both her husbands predeceased her. Robert Hottensen, Sr. died in 1970, and Hugh Slugg died in 2009.

Bookie grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and was the daughter of Edmund Shea, a prominent Milwaukee attorney and Dorothy Thigpen, a southerner with roots in Alabama and Charleston. Her parents' courtship was the subject of Mingled Souls, a book written by her sister, Sheila Harvey Tanzer. In the book, Tanzer captured the love and drama connected with the marriage of Edmund, a Harvard law school student from Ashland, Wisconsin who was introduced to Dorothy by his Montgomery- born Law school roommate while on vacation in Alabama. Following Edmund’s service in WWI, the Sheas married, and took up residence at “White Woods” in Fox Point, their longtime residence where Bookie grew up with her three siblings, Charles Shea (deceased 1998), Sheila, Hanover NH; and Wendy Randall, Milwaukee. Bookie, a graduate of Downer Seminary and Northwestern University, remained close to her parents and siblings throughout her lifetime.

Her marriage to Robert Hottensen (“Hotts”) in 1948 brought together two different backgrounds. While Bookie was influenced by her southern roots, Robert graduated from Riverside High School in Shorewood, prior to graduating from Amherst College. Hotts’s parents died before Bookie and Hotts met. Their children were raised in Fox Point, near Bookie’s childhood residence, where she found her passion in gardening. 

Following Hotts’s death, Bookie married Hugh Slugg in 1972. Over the course of her life, Bookie was a member of The Town Club, The Milwaukee Country Club, The Green Tree Garden Club, Collector’s Corner, The Antiquarian Society, The Women’s Club of Milwaukee, and The Colonial Dames. In college, she was Northwestern University’s Homecoming Queen in her senior year and was a member of Delta Gamma Sorority. 

A lifelong Catholic and a longtime member of both St Eugene’s and St. Monica’s, her faith was extremely important throughout her life and clearly accounted for her resilience and capacity for love in her daily life.

Family will greet friends on Friday, October 8, from 10:00 AM to 10:45 at St. Monica’s Catholic Church, Whitefish Bay, family remembrances will begin at 10:45 followed by a Memorial Mass at 11:00 AM. Interment was private for the family.

Throughout her life Bookie was an enthusiastic gardener, a love which she shared with her mother Dorothy. She was a life-long member of The Milwaukee Green Tree Garden Club. The family requests that donations and remembrances be directed to the Green Tree Garden Club at, 10936 N Port Washington Rd, Mequon WI. 53092. For more information: www.greentreegardenclub.com