Norma Jane Ahlers (née Riczko), beloved wife, mother, neighbor, and friend, ended her life’s journey in Scranton, PA on June 6, 2026 at the age of 88. Born on August 12, 1937, she was the first daughter of Florence and Joseph Riczko, and lifelong sibling to younger sister Nancy.

Norma fondly spoke of her childhood growing up in Boonton and Wharton, New Jersey being part of a large extended family of Hungarian and Cornish immigrants, and watching how they overcame difficult economic conditions and local prejudices by working hard and helping one another. Blessed by being raised by loving parents and a supportive family, Norma was a kind soul who was filled with a warmth and generosity of spirit that would define every chapter of her long and full life.

Norma graduated from Morris Hills High school in 1955, and in November 1957, married the love of her life, Robert Ahlers. Together they built a home and family in Chester, New Jersey, where they happily lived for more than three decades. After Robert’s retirement, they moved to Pleasant Mount, PA in 1989, where they had built their second and final home together to enjoy their retirement years in the country. When Robert passed away in August 2001, Norma faced that loss with the same quiet courage she brought to every challenge, and began a new chapter of life on her own. She continued living in Pleasant Mount for several years before finally tiring of the harsh northeastern Pennsylvania winters. With the encouragement and help from her longtime friend Carol, she found a new home at the Zerbe Sisters retirement community in Narvon, Pennsylvania, moving in next door to Carol and her husband Charlie. She spent eighteen wonderful years there, making new friends, helping her neighbors, enjoying community activities, becoming part of a new church, and shopping at all of the numerous Amish stores and farm markets in the area. She spent endless hours toiling in her colorful flower gardens, which made her home one of the easiest to find in her neighborhood, a labor of love that brought her great joy and many compliments.

After being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2004, Norma dealt with and survived it with the same determination she brought to everything else, and was blessed to have no reoccurrence of the disease for the remainder of her life. When advancing age and health issues made taking care of her house too difficult, she moved to the Pines Senior Living facility in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania in November 2022, where she lived until her final hospitalization in April 2026.

Norma would tell you herself that taking care of her family was her greatest purpose and joy in life, something she put her heart and soul into every day. To help make ends meet, she began her working career as a secretary in the Public Relations department of Reaction Motors in Rockaway, New Jersey in the 1950s. After that, she worked as a secretary in the Special Education departments of the Chester, West Morris, and Randolph school systems until her retirement, work that was very much in keeping with her lifelong desire to help others. After her move to Pleasant Mount, she found yet another way to give back, volunteering as an EMT with the local ambulance service. It was a role that brought her tremendous joy and, as she would often relate, no shortage of memorable stories.

During her youth, Norma attended and became a member of Teabo Methodist Church in Mt. Hope, New Jersey, a church that held a special place in her heart for her entire life, and instilled in her an unceasing charitable nature. During her adult life, she was a devoted member of several Methodist and Presbyterian churches, always believing that the fellowship of a congregation mattered far more than its denomination. Wherever she worshipped, she made herself indispensable through her generosity and by volunteering for fund-raising dinners, rummage sales, church services, singing in the choir, and at her last two churches, managing the accounting books with her usual passion.

At an early age, Norma was bitten by the travel bug after accompanying her grandmother Lucinda on an adventurous cross-country drive to California to visit her Aunt Pearl. She also fell in love with Long Beach Island, New Jersey while on vacations there with her parents, returning every summer for years with her own family and friends. Her other travel adventures, though less frequent, continued throughout her marriage, often indulging her husband’s love of camping. After Robert’s passing, she increased her travel schedule, exploring destinations throughout the United States and Canada. She also looked forward to visiting her sister and family each year at their vacation home in Nags Head, North Carolina.

Norma somehow found time to engage in many hobbies throughout her life. Besides flower gardening, she also loved to knit and quilt, and left behind a treasure of blankets, hats, and sweaters that will keep the people she loved warm for years to come. She was also a voracious reader, always ending each day with a book in hand. However, nowhere was Norma more happy and contented than in her kitchen, where there always seemed to be something cooking on the stove or in the oven, and music playing in the house. She loved to entertain and to cook for family and friends, and no holiday season, special occasion, or simple visit passed without a bountiful table of assorted courses and desserts. No one who sat at Norma’s table was ever lacking for choices or left that table hungry. She also devotedly cared for the numerous dogs and other animals that became family pets along the way, never failing in spoiling the lucky ones who lived indoors. She always talked about her first dog, Buddy, who was given to her as a young girl by her Uncle Andy without permission from her parents, which she said led to an epic display of her father’s well-known Hungarian temper.

Norma is survived by her son William and his wife Nancy, her beloved sister Nancy Lamont, and other cousins, nieces, and nephews who were fortunate to know her love and generosity. She was preceded in death by her husband Robert, her parents Florence and Joseph Riczko, her in-laws Myrtle and George Ahlers, as well as many of her closest friends and relatives.

Per her final wishes, Norma was cremated and a small private service held locally. Some of her ashes will be interred beside her husband Robert at Locust Hill Cemetery in Dover, New Jersey with the remainder scattered at places that held special meaning in her life — a fitting farewell for a woman who left a little piece of herself, and a great deal of love, everywhere she went. The family would like to thank the staff at Pines Senior Living for caring for Norma over the past three and a half years, and the staffs of Green Ridge Care Center and Sacred Heart Hospice for making her finals days and hours peaceful and comfortable.

“And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.”

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