Hrachik Bostwick, businesswoman-nurse

Hrachik “Ricki” Bostwick, a retired businesswoman and registered nurse, died Wedneday from complications of lung cancer at her Cockeysville home. She was 87.

The former Hrachik Ghazikhanian who was born and raised in Isfan, Iran, was the daughter of Haik Ghazikhanian, head of transportation for the British-Iranian Oil Co., and his wife, Sandookht Tatevosian Ghazikhanian, a homemaker.

She was 18 when she moved to North Wales in Great Britain in1950 in order to train as a nurse at Memorial Hospital, from which she received her nursing certificate in 1953.

Mrs. Bostwick then went to London, where she trained to become a midwife at the Royal College of Nursing, from which she graduated in 1955.

“She would go from neighborhood to neighborhood on a bicycle delivering babies,” said a son, Thomas H. Bostwick of Towson.

She then moved back to her hometown, where she worked as head surgical nurse at the British-Iranian Oil Co. until coming to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in 1957 as part of a nursing exchange program.

A registered nurse, Mrs. Bostwick became head maternity nurse at Rancocas Valley Hospital. While working at the Willingboro, N.J., hospital, she met and fell in love with John O. Bostwick, whom she married in 1962.

Mr. Bostwick, who worked for Master Builders Inc. at the time, was transferred by his company to Harrisburg, Pa., and then in 1967 to Lutherville. In 1969, they built a home on Hickory Hill Road in Cockeysville.

She became a U.S. citizen in Lewisberg, Pa., in 1964, family members said.

In 1970. she became a licensed real estate agent and worked for Grempler Realty in Towson during the 1970s and1980s.

In 1981, her husband founded ServiceMaster of Baltimore, a disaster restoration company, and she left the real estate field to take over and manage the company’s business office.

The couple turned over the business in 2000 to two of their children, who still operate it, and retired.

Mrs. Bostwick enjoyed attending Broadway musicals and sailing with her husband aboard their sailboat, the Ricki. They also liked spending time at a second home in Fort Myers, Fla.

Funeral services are private.

In addition to her husband and son, she is survived by another son, John O. Bostwick Jr. of Cockeysville; a daughter, Carolyn L. Bostwick of Timonium; two sisters, Seda Macintosh of Potomac and Alice Young of London; five grandchildren; and a greatgranddaughter.

—Frederick N. Rasmussen