JoAnn was born on April 12, 1941, the first of four children of William and Marge Fitzgerald.
JoAnn went on to graduate from the Albany Medical Center School of Nursing as a Registered Nurse in 1963. She started her nursing career at Albany Medical Center in the Pediatric Department. She worked there until she married Thomas Pierce in 1966.
JoAnn lived in Vineland, New Jersey for most of her married life and worked as a pediatric nurse at Newcomb Hospital for over 28 years. She quickly became the head nurse of the Pediatric Department. When she retired in 2001, she was the Director of Maternal Child Health for the South Jersey Hospital System and Director of Nursing at their Newcomb facility. During that time, JoAnn wrote the grant to create the Our Kids (OK) Clinic that provided health care for thousands of children that otherwise would have had no access to health care. She also wrote the grant that created the Impact Center, which provides health care, infant day care, and a way for teenagers who are pregnant or have young children, to continue their high school education. She spent her last three years as the Practice Manager for the Pediatric Associates Office of Dr. David Rosenberg.
JoAnn and Tom had two daughters, Lisa and Kathy. JoAnn and Lisa were both victims of the Baltimore water taxi accident in 2004. The Last Rose is a book that Tom wrote about them after the accident. There are copies of the book in the school library if you would like to learn more about JoAnn.