Jennifer "Jenny" Lynn Spiker

She was born on March 27, 1945, in Grand Island, Nebraska to Geneva Louise Swiatoviak and Leon Williard Swiatoviak.

She is survived by her husband, Steven Spiker, her son Ben Spiker (Lauren Carter), and her brothers, Tom Swiatoviak and Jerry Swiatoviak (Ann).

Preceding her in death were her mother and father and her brother, Jim Swiatoviak.

A Celebration of Life will be held for Jenny on Sunday, November 3, 2024, from 3 to 5 p.m. at the Five Points Center for Active Adults, 2000 Noble Road, Raleigh, NC. There will be opportunities to relate anecdotes about Jenny’s life.

The family requests a contribution to Triangle United Way ( https://unitedwaytriangle.org/donate/ ) or The American Red Cross ( https://www.redcross.org/donate/donation.html/ ), in lieu of flowers.

Jenny grew up in Grand Island and graduated from Grand Island High Senior School. She went on to get a bachelor’s degree from Hastings College and a master’s degree in journalism at Kansas State University. She had a long and rewarding career, starting at East Lincoln High School in Lincoln, Nebraska, where she taught English and journalism and served as advisor for the yearbook. She also taught journalism and served as advisor for the yearbook at Kansas State, while she was studying for her master’s degree. Jenny and Steve met at Kansas State and were married in 1971.

Then, in part to satisfy what has sometimes been called Jenny and Steve’s “globe-trotting” instincts, they spent two years in Beirut, Lebanon, where Jenny taught at the American Community High School and Steve was a professor at the American University of Beirut.

Upon return to the States, they spent a year at the University of Georgia where Jenny taught English. Following that short stint, they moved to Corvallis, Oregon, where Jenny taught journalism and public relations and served as advisor for the student newspaper at Linn-Benton Community College. Steve was a research associate at Oregon State University.

Jenny and Steve lived in Oregon for six years. During that time, their son, Ben, was born. Their last move was in 1981, to Raleigh, North Carolina, where Steve became professor of genetics at North Carolina State University.

In Raleigh, Jenny had several interesting and challenging positions. These included: North Carolina State University (communications instructor); Saint Augustine's College (Adjunct Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications), William Peace University (Director of Public Relations), North Carolina Symphony (Director of Marketing and Public Relations), Communities in Schools (Director); North Carolina Center for Non-Profits (Director of Marketing and Public Relations), Cooperating Raleigh Colleges (Director). Of these, her longest tenures were at the North Carolina Symphony (14 years) and Cooperating Raleigh Colleges (13 years). She also started her own business (Spiker Communications). Jenny retired in January of 2020.

In addition to working at non-profit organizations, Jenny was an active participant in several public-service organizations. She frequently served as a board member on these organizations including: Triangle United Way, WCPE (a classical music radio station), Raleigh Civic Symphony, Raleigh Chamber Music Guild, and ROAR (Raleigh Organization Against Racism).

Jenny had a strong interest in travel, as evidenced, in part, by her being the main instigator in the move to Beirut, Lebanon. Most of her colleagues at the American Community School (ACS) in Beirut came there because of the travel opportunities the location provided. Jenny was motivated by these colleagues to make trips during breaks in the teaching schedules. She visited (with Steve or her colleagues or both) Egypt, Iran, Syria, Jordan, Israel, Turkey, Greece, and Cyprus. Some of the most memorable trips were taken aboard the Sea Hawk, an old, wooden 42-foot sailboat purchased by Jenny and Steve along with two other couples. The purchase price was low, but more was spent on refurbishing the boat, even though the three couples did most of the work themselves. They spent the summers of 1973 and 74 sailing to Cyprus, along the coast of Turkey and to Rhodes and other Greek islands. In July of 1974 they were temporarily stranded in Cyprus at the sudden outbreak of the civil war but managed to escape and continue their journey.

In addition to the two years living in Lebanon, Jenny, Steve and their son Ben lived in Cologne, Germany for a year (the year the Berlin Wall came down). It was a sabbatical year for Jenny and Steve. But for thirteen-year-old Ben, it was back to school. He did well in the German school, made a lot of friends and (by necessity) learned German. Jenny and her family did a lot of traveling during their year in Germany. They visited almost every country in western Europe plus Poland, Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic and Slovakia), Hungary and Austria.

Although Jenny did not sing or play a musical instrument, music was a very important part of her life. She was a member of PineCone, an organization for preservation of traditional music, which for many years sponsored the International Bluegrass Music Association festival in Raleigh. She and Steve attended dozens of concerts and festivals including Merle Fest and Ocrafolk, the annual music festival on Ocracoke Island. In the last two years of her life, when dementia was beginning to creep in, Jenny enjoyed frequent outings to listen to open mics in Raleigh. In fact, she and Steve attended an open mic almost every evening, so often that the regular performers noticed them in the audience, and Jenny and Steve became friends with many of them. She especially enjoyed the time when her brother Jerry, her son Ben, and her husband put on an act themselves.

Jenny loved to read and got a great deal of enjoyment as a member of two book clubs. At one time, Jenny and Steve were members of a gourmet club, where they made many life-long friends.

Jenny also loved to walk. She and her friend Marilyn Stevens took neighborhood walks nearly every weekday morning for almost forty years. As if the neighborhood walks weren’t enough, Jenny and Steve took daily greenway walks. They covered every mile of every Wake County greenway, including the Neuse River Trail all the way to Clayton.

Jenny was a very outgoing person. People she met could sense that she was more interested in them than she was in herself. That made them feel valued and appreciated and endeared her to them. Perhaps because of her unassuming personality, people were often surprised by her energy and her organizational skills the first times they had an opportunity to see her in action. She is loved and will be sorely missed.

Arrangements by Brown-Wynne, 300 Saint Mary's Street, Raleigh.