Carl G. Bottcher & Sons, Painters

If you lived in central Massachusetts and wanted to freshen up your home or office with a clean, colorful coat of paint, there’s a good chance that you called the Carl G Bottcher & Sons painting company.

If a church needed to spruce up its rectory or a pharmaceutical lab needed to make those gray walls grayer, Carl G Bottcher & Sons would often get the bid call.

If a color or stain needed to be perfectly matched, Carl G Bottcher & Sons had the expertise and eye to do it, before the age of computer generated color matching.

The Carl G Bottcher & Sons painting company was renowned throughout central New England for painting the interiors and exteriors of fine homes, offices and churches. It was a union shop started by my immigrant grandfather in the early 20th century.

From Grandfather, to father and uncle, to brother, the Carl G Bottcher painting name survived and flourished, adding color and beauty to neighborhoods around the Worcester area for more than a hundred years.

My last surviving brother, Carl, recently passed. He was approaching 89 and was a proud successful 3rd generation painter using the same surname, Bottcher, a name that had been well known and respected in the local painting scene.

At various times, all four of my sibling brothers and I worked for the painting company. Upon learning the trade, Carl ventured off to begin his own company, propagating the painting Bottcher name into the 21sf Century.

Other Bottchers, including brothers, uncles, cousins and nephews, dabbled in the painting trade, as well, in Massachusetts and on the west coast, Oregon, but the Carl G Bottcher name was the progenitor of all to follow.

With my brother Carl’s passing, the name may have ended its run. However, when the Northeast fall season blesses us with its full palette of colors, I like to think the painting Bottchers in Heaven were enlisted for advice. And when the ‘pearly gates’ open to greet you, you might just see a few angels in painters overalls. Carl would be the newest with the cleanest pair.

R.I.P., brother…

Carl G Bottcher

Steve (022223)

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srbottch

Retired in 2013 after 5 years as an elementary school teacher and 40 years as a sales representative to begin anew as a school crossing guard. SMy essays/stories are a way to communicate through the telling of personal experiences. One reader said about my blog stories, "...these are like a cold sip during a marathon run, simple, real life events". Another offered about my blog, “it brings some sense of normalcy not easily found in the modern world.”

33 thoughts on “Carl G. Bottcher & Sons, Painters”

  4. Hi Steve,
    So glad to learn of your Family and its accomplishments. Professional on all counts.
    So sorry to learn of your brother’s passing.
    A life well lived certainly.
    Jim Murdock

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  7. I am so sorry to read of your brother’s passing, Steve. A legacy such as this truly tells the story of the American dream. My condolences to you and your family. May your brother rest in loving peace.

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    1. Maggie, thank you. When you’re at opposite ends of a big family, 7 kids, and spread far and wide, it’s not unusual to go years without seeing each other. That was us, however, we did write often, especially in recent years. I think that gave us peace of mind. Sort of like Jefferson and Adams 😉

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    1. Thank you, Liz. Carl was the 4th and I was 7th, 11 yrs apart. Basically, 2 diff families, so he had left home while I was growing up. We spent a lot of time writing back and forth the last couple of years. Before that, we hardly saw each other. As I mentioned to someone else, like Jefferson and Adam’s. We ended up on good terms, too.

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  9. My condolences, Steve. It’s pretty special when your family members are well-respected in the community. I’ve got a lot of respect for painters. I used to paint houses in the summer for about 20 years when I taught. It was a nice change of pace for a couple of months, but then I was ready to return to the kids.

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    1. There’s always a demand for good painters and other skilled craftsmen. A young person can make a good living at it if they learn the craft and the business end. But you need to show up everyday and work hard. I bet you learned some skill that you applied around your own house. Way to go, Pete. There’s a story in there waiting to come out. 😉

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      1. I finally let go and let someone else paint our house for the first time last year. My high-flying ladder days are over. I only had one serious accident over the years—ironically, at our own house. The ladder slipped and I got a compression fracture in my back. Of course, I finished pressure washing the house first before I went to ER. 🤣

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      2. Ouch! We had ours painted by a contractor last summer, as well. It pained me to watch someone do what I could do. The upside, they did it in a week instead of all summer. My wife wants me to get rid of my extension ladder. But who knows, I might need it to go on the roof and meditate…

        Be careful out there, Pete. Have a great day!

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      1. Mike, thanks for the note. I don’t see any reference to the Bottcher name in the picture you sent. Am I missing something? By 1950, my uncle Gus (Gustaf) and my father Malte (yes, that’s a real name ‘malt-e’) we’re running the business. I bet those brushes were made of genuine Chinese bristle, the best. Of course, today’s brushes are generally synthetic bristles. Let me know about the mag ad. And thanks very much.

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    2. Mike, thank you. Carl was an incredibly successful businessman in the painting business. He an i didn’t see eye to eye on lots of issues but we came together the past few years, settled our differences and enjoyed writing back and forth. He had a wide circle of friends and it all started with paying attention to customers. You and I know the importance of that. Have a great day!

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    1. Thank you, Robbie. I’m so glad, too. Brothers should always come together. We did and it did give us some peace. I had a great family inspire if some differences. Of 7, my older sister and I are the last two siblings.

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    2. My apologies for referring to you as Robbie. Too many things going on at one time and I’m trying to be nice to everyone, a long distance daughter in one ear and wife in the other, while typing a business letter. 😂

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  12. Hi Steve, I am sorry I missed this post earlier. My condolences on the loss of your brother. Losing a sibling must be a very hard thing. I still have both my parents and try not to ever think about the march of time and its inevitable consequences. Hugs to you.

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