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Enrich your life. Support arts and culture in Maine. Become a PMA member. Membership at the PMA puts you at the heart of Portland’s arts community through unlimited museum admission, invitations to openings and events, the award-winning PMA Magazine, discounts in the PMA Store and PMA Café, and much more. Join today, and discover all that’s going on at your museum. Call (207) 775-6148 or visit PortlandMuseum.org/Join.
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE
PUBLISHER
David. S. Nealley EDITOR IN CHIEF
Ellen L. Spooner CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Ian J. Marquis EDITORS
Catherine N. Zub Mark D. Roth
Lois N. Nealley Sheila D. Grant
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Dear Advertisers and Subscribers;
I
t is loaded with inspirational stories about folks we call Prime Movers. To qualify as “Prime Movers”, these folks have had to do something that goes above and beyond to improve the human condition within an organization, a community, or throughout Maine… or at the very least, they must have done something that can be inspirational for others.
I
wanted to take a moment to introduce myself and our staff, and to thank David for his thoughtful transition of Maine Seniors to my family of newspapers, magazines and specialty publications.
Maine Seniors has a proud history of serving the state of Maine with toprate, and interesting feature stories about the people in Maine who make this place a destination for seniors. Our parent company, RFB Enterprises, includes Masthead Maine—6 daily newspapers, 20 plus Maine weeklies, and specialty magazines like Maine Women Magazine. RFB Enterprises includes other niche publications like travelMAINE, Downeast Dog News, and The Real Estate Magazines of Mid-Coast and Portland Maine. Our state-wide network of publications will allow us to continue to build on the Maine Seniors brand. David will finish up the “Best of”…. issue, which promises to be a very special good-bye from Dave and hello from us. We are in the process of naming a new Publisher and Sales Manager who will introduce themselves to you in the near future. In the meantime, hello and thank you to all of you who have made Maine Seniors the premier senior publication in Maine. Safe travels David, this will always have your stamp on it and we’ll do our best to make the road wider and longer in the months and years ahead.
Recycled paper made in Maine
1 • MAINE SENIORS
Please enjoy this “Best Of” Collectors Issue.
Joe Sawyer
SALES & DISTRIBUTION
Christine Parker Randall Nichols Dale Overlock Larry Allen Jim Gorham A. Peter Legendre Clyde Tarr Jim Nute David Poirier Cornell McLellan
David S. Nealley
Reade Brower, Owner, RFB Enterprises
Onward! Sincerely,
Reade Brower
—Reade Brower, Owner, RFB Enterprises
This “Best Of” Collectors Issue was the most difficult magazine to work on for two main reasons. The first reason is that we have had so many great articles from our talented group of contributors over the years that cherry picking a few led to excluding so many other worthy stories. So, needless to say, our readers should enjoy this issue knowing that it is only a “readers digest” minimal sample of the many good articles from our state-wide contributors. The second reason that this issue has been a difficult one on which to work, is that this will be the last issue in which I will be involved.
CHUBBY CHECKER
Maine Seniors Magazine has been sold. Fortunately, its buyer Reade Brower has the resources necessary to grow the magazine with a very capable team of media professionals.
FRIDAY, SEPT 13, 7 p.m.
It has been my pleasure to collaborate with our group of talented and passionate contributors (mostly seniors) to provide Maine Seniors Magazine to all of you, our senior partners.
When he appeared on American Bandstand in 1960 and performed “The Twist,” it was the dawn of a new era in Rock & Roll. Chubby stands alone as a one-of-a-kind rock icon. Bring your friends and see him perform live! GET TICKETS TODAY!
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Cheers! —David S. Nealley BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 2
TABLE OF CONTENTS
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 ISSUE 2 Publisher's Note
BY READE BROWER & DAVID S. NEALLEY
5 Prime Mover: Francis Perkins
BY DONNA HALVORSEN
7 Prime Mover: Harold Alfond
BY WANDA CURTIS
11 Prime Mover: Senator Olympia Snowe
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
15 Sage Lens: Volunteering
E n j o y O u r Va c a t i o n l a n d !
BY DR. LEN KAYE
17 Prime Mover: Anne Roosevelt
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
21 Prime Mover: Edward G. Kaelber
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
23 Just Pondering: Lobster Loonies
BY WALDO CLARK
27 Prime Mover: Leon A. Gorman
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
31 Prime Mover: Elizabeth McLellan
BY DONNA HALVORSEN
33 From the Porch: A Place Called Camp
BY HUNTER HOWE
35 Prime Mover: Peter Vigue
BY SHEILA D. GRANT
41 Prime Mover: George J. Mitchell
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
45 Prime Mover: Jamie Wyeth
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BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
47 Prime Mover: Donato Tramuto
BY SHELAGH TALBOT
51 Prime Mover: Wreaths Across America
BY ELLEN L. SPOONER
55 Best Photos & Artwork: Retrospective
BY ASSORTED CONTRIBUTORS
57 Prime Mover: Noel Paul Stookey
BY BARBARA KENT LAWRENCE
61 A Look Back: End of the Innocence
BY BARBARA BEARDSLEY
63 Prime Mover: President George Herbert
Walker Bush • BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
65 Prime Mover: Barbara Bush
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI & SHELAGH TALBOT
68 Prime Mover: Bill Haggett
BY KITTY WHEELER
69 A Trail Less Traveled: Summers at Loon
Call Camp • BY BRAD EDEN
71 Prime Mover: Bob Crowley
BY LARRY GRARD
73 Prime Mover: Patsy Leavitt
BY CATHY GENTHNER
75 Bucket List: Up, Up & Away!
BY LOIS N. NEALLEY
77 Prime Mover: Stephen & Tabitha King
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
87 From the Porch: Memories in the Mist
BY HUNTER HOWE
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 4
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
Francis
Perkins The Lady from Newcastle, Maine and Social Security BY DONNA HALVORSEN
Unique hardcover journal and guest book designs created in Maine… “...For your stories, thoughts, prayers,
F
rancis Perkins is a mere footnote in U.S. history as the first woman in the U.S. Cabinet. Few people know that Social Security was her idea, not President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s. He simply told her to go ahead, that he wouldn’t stand in her way. Nor do they know that Perkins, as Secretary of Labor under Roosevelt for all 12 years of his presidency, was responsible for many of the administration’s New Deal reforms. She didn’t claim them. She was proud of Social Security but saw it as a reflection of the goodness of the American people, and an inevitable consequence of the Great Depression, and she knew what an achievement it was. “We will go into the future a stronger nation because…we have this basic rock of security under all of our people,” she said in 1960. The Perkins family’s 57-acre 5 • MAINE SENIORS
dreams, travels, photos,
Newcastle farm was a place of respite for Francis, says her grandson, Tomlin Perkins Coggeshall, her only surviving relative. He lives in the 1837 house, which is now home to the nonprofit Francis Perkins Center.“We want it to be a place for her history to reside and a place to carry on her work,” says Coggeshall, the center’s founder. Three years before Francis Perkins died, she declared, “One thing I know: Social Security is so firmly embedded in the American psychology today that no politician, no political party, no political group could possibly destroy this Act and still maintain our democratic system. It is safe. It is safe forever, and for the everlasting benefit of the people of the United States.” MSM This story originally ran in our August 2011 issue.
adventures, and more.”
(207) 738-2414
wanda-m.com BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 6
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors Become a CASA Guardian ad Litem and …
Though he was the recipient of honorary degrees from five colleges and universities, Harold Alfond never attended college. After graduating from high school in 1934, he got a job at Kesslen Shoe Company in Kennebunk, where his father worked. Alfond was a hard worker and did whatever odd jobs were assigned to him. Within a very short time, he was promoted from a shoe boy making 25 cents per hour to factory superintendent. In 1939, Alfond stopped to pick up a hitchhiker while enroute to the Skowhegan Fair. That hitchhiker shared some information which changed both Alfond’s immediate and longterm course. He told Alfond about a shoe factory for sale in Norridgewock. Alfond never made it to the fair but instead ended up touring the abandoned factory. About a year later, he purchased the factory for $1,000 with the proceeds from the sale of his car. Alfond and his father founded the Norwock Shoe Company where they manufactured mid-priced sturdy leather shoes, similar to the ones they had made at Kesslen’s.
Harold
Alfond
BY WANDA CURTIS
O
ne of Maine’s greatest philanthropists was the late Harold Alfond who founded Dexter Shoe Company and established the first factory outlet
shoe store.
Alfond was born in Swampscott, Massachusetts on March 6, 1914. His parents Simon and Rose Alfond were Russian Jewish immigrants. He had five siblings: David, Anne, Bertha, Gladys, and Grace. According to http://lib.rollins.edu/olin/ oldsite/archives/golden/alfond.htm, Alfond exhibited a spirit of giving even as a child. The author of that website reported that his mother had trouble keeping him clothed because he’d leave home dressed in a nice sweater and good shoes but many 7 • MAINE SENIORS
The Man Who Loved to Give
times came home without those if he met another child in need. Alfond had a passion for sports and was an outstanding athlete in high school. His love for sports was later demonstrated by the generous contributions that he made for the construction of sports facilities. Some of those that bear the Alfond name include the Colby College ice arena and athletic center; the University of Maine sports stadium, hockey arena, and arena clubhouse; the Husson College baseball diamond; the Thomas College athletic center; the artificial athletic turf at Maine Maritime Academy; Kents Hill School athletic center; University of New England Athletic Center; the Eaglebrook School ice arena (in Massachusetts); as well as the sports center, swimming pool, baseball stadium, and boathouse at Rollins College in Florida… and the list goes on.
Interested in speaking up for a child? If so, we hope you can join us for our August 13th-16th volunteer training. Please contact us at casa@courts.maine.gov or 207213-2865 for more information.
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If you are searching for an audiology practice that cares about you and your overall hearing health – look no further. Contact us today at (207) 401-2313.
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BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 8
PRIME MOVER
In 1944, he sold the company to Shoe Corporation of America for $1.1 million. Realizing that Alfond could be an asset to their business, the new owner retained Alfond as company president for the next 25 years. Alfond’s nephew Peter Lunder joined him at Dexter in 1959 and with the additional help of Alfond’s three sons who later joined the business, they built a business that, at its peak, manufactured over 36,000 pairs of shoes daily and over 7.5 million annually. As Dexter Shoe continued to grow, corporate buyers approached Alfond seeking to purchase the family run business. Many of those were retail chains which emphasized foreign production that didn’t line up with Dexter’s philosophy of a family-run business. However, at age 79 Alfond decided to sell the business to Warren Buffet for Berkshire Hathaway stock. The transaction made the Alfond family the second largest shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway. In addition to significant philanthropy to numerous organizations involved in healthcare, education and athletics, Harold wanted to help all Maine children. On what would
It’s only natural to live life to the fullest. have been Harold’s 100th birthday, Alfond Foundation officials announced that all babies born as Maine residents will be awarded a $500 Alfond Grant for College. Harold Alfond, a Maine gift who keeps on giving.
MSM
This story originally ran in our March 2015 issue.
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9 • MAINE SENIORS
BATH GARDINER
Nature delivers.
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
At the age of 26, while working for Senator Bill Cohen, tragedy struck her again. Her husband, Peter Snowe, was killed in an auto accident on the way home from the Maine Legislature.
Senator Olympia
Still another devastating loss. Senator Snowe remembers,“My experience with loss informed my reaction. I had found that the best way to manage grief was to keep moving forward and make a positive out of a negative situation. I was persuaded by colleagues, friends, and family to run in a special election to fill Peter’s seat in the Maine House of Representatives, and I did. Though the circumstances were far from ideal, I felt extremely fortunate for the opportunity to dive into new work and pursue a career I was passionate about. Ultimately, that path took me through the Maine State Senate, the U.S. House, and the U.S. Senate as well.”
Snowe An Olympian for Women's Leadership BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
As a moderate member of the Republican Party, Senator Snowe considers her greatest accomplishments as a legislator to be those that benefitted, protected, or progressed the
S
enator Olympia Snowe was born and raised in Maine. She was a public servant from 1973 to 2013. During this time, she was the first woman in American history to serve in both houses of Maine state legislature and both houses of the United States Congress. She was also the First Lady of Maine during her husband, Governor John McKernan’s term in office (1987-1995).
Her mom died of cancer when she was eight and her father passed away soon after when she was nine. Before he died, her dad enrolled her at St. Basil Academy Greek Orthodox Boarding School in Garrison, New York where she learned independence and responsibility. During school breaks, she took the train back to Maine to spend time with her aunt, uncle and cousins.
Senator Snowe inspires everyone around her and continues to work on many bi-partisan causes to help solve serious national problems in order to improve the lives of all Americans. In 2015, she founded the Olympia Snowe Women’s Leadership Institute, a non-profit organization which delivers a three-year program designed to raise the aspirations and confidence of high school girls in Maine.
Classes at St. Basil’s did not go beyond 9th grade, so Senator Snowe returned to Auburn where she lived with her guardians, Aunt Mary and Uncle Jim Goranites and their children. Sadly, her uncle, who was in bad health, died in 1963, when she was 16. She finished her secondary education at Edward Little High School and then graduated with a degree in political science from the University of Maine in Orono. She married her fiancé, Republican state legislator Peter Snowe soon after college graduation.
Senator Snowe experienced tragic losses at a young age.
11 • MAINE SENIORS
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 1 2
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
lives of current and future Americans. Among those accomplishments, Senator Snowe:
and stubborn with a big heart and an amazing brain. She helped broker the deal for childcare funding during Welfare Reform, introduced the first bill on Alzheimer’s Disease, and fought against bad trade deals in the lumber, fishing, shoe and paper industries.”
• Worked with Senator Jay Rockefeller to create the E-Rate program, which ensured every library and classroom in the nation would be wired with Internet.
Well.
WELCOME TO T HE PA RK DA NFORT H.
Soon after retiring from the Senate, Senator Snowe joined the Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC), a non-profit, Washington,D.C. based think tank which is actively committed to seeing bipartisan policy solutions enacted into law. She states,“It is the only organization in Washington that brings together former government officials and distinguished experts, who have passionate viewpoints from both parties, to forge consensus on concrete solutions to our most pressing problems that have too long been neglected."
• Worked with Senator Blanche Lincoln to increase the amount of the child tax credit and make it refundable, which was the largest tax cut for working Americans in two decades and affected 37 million families. • Co-authored the landmark Genetic Nondiscrimination Act to prevent companies from making insurance or employment decisions based on genetic tests. It was referred to as“the first major civil rights act of the 21st century”. Jane Calderwood originally of Bangor (now in Brunswick) was an intern during her college years for then Congresswoman Snowe, worked for her in the House as her Legislative Director and was the Senator’s Chief of Staff from 20012004. She attests,“Senator Snowe moves heaven and earth to
WELCOME TO L IVING
make things happen if she thinks it is the right cause and can figure out how to make things work. She is determined, smart
In 2015, she founded the non-profit, Olympia Snowe Women’s Leadership Institute (OSWLI). She shares, “The Institute’s mission is to elevate the confidence and aspirations of high school girls in Maine, and that will always be the most important work we do. My goal is that Maine girls know they can build any skill and achieve any dream, and there is a network of women—and men—across the state eager to help each of them do just that.” Senator Olympia Snowe and her husband, former Maine Governor John (Jock) McKernan together have a total of 56 years of public service for the state of Maine and the United States. We want to thank them for all the good that they have done to make our state a more civil and pleasant place to live. During a Maine tribute to Senator Snowe upon her retirement from the senate, President George Herbert Walker Bush said,“I want to join everyone in congratulating Olympia for her wonderful service to Maine and to the whole country.“Olympia, we love you and Jock, too. Congratulations for all you have done.”
When your home is at The Park Danforth, you can feel secure knowing that caring staff are on-site 24/7. You’ll enjoy the conveniences of on-site services including a salon, weekly banking and fitness classes. And with scheduled transportation to shopping and entertainment you’ll have freedom to enjoy life. Gather for a meal with friends in the main dining room or the casual bistro. Take in a movie in the comfortable theater. View fireworks over the Portland skyline from the fifth-floor roof deck. Enjoy concerts in the garden courtyard, lectures in the auditorium and activities with new and old friends that share your interests. Visit www.parkdanforth.com or give us a call at 207.797.7710 to set up a tour and discover why our residents say
“I’m home for life!”
Former First Lady, Mrs. Barbara Bush commented for this story,“George and I admire Olympia enormously. She crossed party lines and put diversity into the senate. I wish we had more Olympia Snowes today.” MSM Personalized Senior Living Since 1881 | www.parkdanforth.com
This story originally ran in our May 2018 issue. 13 • MAINE SENIORS
207.797.7710 | 777 Stevens Avenue | Portland, Maine 04103
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 1 4
SAGE LENS
Volunteering S
ummertime fun and relaxation have drawn to a close and now it is time to get back into a more settled routine. For many that could mean running kids and grandkids to soccer games or getting the garden ready for the winter season. However, there are tens of thousands of older adults across Maine, and hundreds of thousands across the county, who utilize much of their free time volunteering in their community. Volunteering is considered a form of civic engagement. Civic engagement generally refers to a wide variety of activities that build on the collective skills, abilities, knowledge, and resources of citizens to improve the quality of life of communities.
SAGE LENS • The Best of Maine Seniors
is Good for You and the Community BY DR. LEN KAYE
The numbers are impressive. Some 30% of adults 65 years and over volunteer their time on a regular basis in Maine and an even larger proportion of baby boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964) give back to their communities in the state (36%). On average, Mainers 65 years and older contribute 96 hours of volunteer service annually which matches the
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national average. The most popular area of community service for older adults is in schools helping youngsters learn to read, write, and acquire other basic skills (almost three in ten do this – 29%). Almost 20% of older adults like to contribute their time and energy to either religious organizations (18.9%) or social service agencies (18.6%). Other elders serve in hospitals (8.8%), civic organizations (7.2%), sports and the arts (6.3%), and other settings (11.1%)—Corp. for National and Community Service, 2009 Years ago, the opportunities for volunteering your time may have been limited, but not anymore. The possibilities are endless and organizations have come to rely on volunteers more and more especially during times when budgets are lean and the availability of experienced staff is at a premium. Older adults, whether they come ready to volunteer their time or be compensated for their efforts, are especially sought after in today’s times because of their skill, their sense of responsibility and the knowledge they have from years working in the business world. Why do organizations want you? When asked, organizational representatives repeatedly emphasize that older adults bring a strong work ethic, a great deal of experience and a strong sense of civic duty and responsibility.
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On average, Mainers 65 years and
older contribute 96 hours of volunteer service annually which matches the national average.
Volunteering is not only good for the organizations and individuals you serve in the community, but personally good for you as well. Research has confirmed that maintaining personal relationships and helping others is good for you physically and emotionally. Volunteering is a win-win opportunity – good for the community and good for you. What are you waiting for? MSM This story originally ran in our October 2013 issue.
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 1 6
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
“Both my grandmother (Eleanor) and my mother influenced who I am today. As a child, I knew that my grandmother was very busy and important, but to me she was family. I remember the way she listened to me. She would lean in and ask questions about my life and what I was thinking. That stuck with me,” Roosevelt recalled. Roosevelt continued,“My mother grew up in Wisconsin, was a child of the depression, and knew what the FDR New Deal meant to this country. She taught me to respect that legacy and understand its importance and the impact that it had on people’s lives.” Anne held many interesting career positions over the years: Executive Director of Museums in the Park (nine museums) in Chicago; Director of Chicago Mayor’s Office of Program Development; Executive Director of The Brain Research Foundation at the University of Chicago; and Director of Community and Education Relations, Boeing Corporate Office, retiring from The Boeing Company as its Vice President for Global Corporate Citizenship.
Anne Eleanor Roosevelt with Senator King and his wife Mary Herman at Campobello 50th Anniversary
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Roosevelt Spreading Seeds of Goodwill BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
17 • MAINE SENIORS
S
he has been the President and CEO of Goodwill Industries of Northern New England since 2011 when she moved to Maine. Since then, she has become influential in many community activities throughout the state. Anne Roosevelt was raised in Pasadena, California. Her father, James Roosevelt, a WWII hero, was the eldest son of FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt. James married Romelle Theresa Schneider, a nurse, and they had two sons, James Roosevelt Jr., Michael Anthony Roosevelt and a daughter, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (Anne).
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PRIME MOVER Anne at Little Black Dress Event. Photo courtesy of MaineProPhoto.com
Her present affiliations include: Chair of the Roosevelt Institute in New York; Fellow at the Center for Corporate Citizenship at Boston College; Maine Community Foundation (MCF) board member; and board member of the Jim Browne Foundation in Skowhegan, Maine. In 2011, Anne was recruited to head Goodwill Industries of Northern New England. She related, “At Goodwill NNE, I came into an environment of people who have the most giving spirit. Smart, insightful, and capable people, who are just there for the right reasons. I felt like I was coming to the pinnacle of a career - trying to create good along with the people who became my team.” Goodwill NNE has almost 2,200 employees across three states, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine; the majority of whom are in Maine. Charlie Kennedy, long time board member of Goodwill sates that “There are not too many nonprofit executives in Maine who have her level of management skills, non-profit experience, national connections and on top of that, her prestigious family history. She has molded this good non-profit into a state of the 19 • MAINE SENIORS
art organization. She helped bring modern technology to the organization like web TV for corporate communications and proposed low office cubicles to spur communication between workers. When she is done with a project, it is like a work of art.” Anne Roosevelt thinks that Maine is a great place to live. She shares, “I feel fortunate that even though I had moved to Maine to retire, I was lucky enough to find this job. Right before I accepted the position, I told the recruiter that I would be interested but I was almost 64 years old—surely they’re not interested. The recruiter said to me, ‘We’re not afraid of seniors in Maine’. I really loved that statement and that attitude energizes me. “When I talk to people who are either my age or at the end of a career somewhere, I tell them to come to Maine, we’re not afraid of seniors in Maine!” MSM This story originally ran in our May 2016 issue.
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PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
Edward G.
Kaelber Inspirational Leader BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
E
dward Kaelber came to Maine to become the founding President of the College of the Atlantic (COA) in Bar Harbor and after that, he was the founding President of the Maine Community Foundation in 1982 – two influential Maine institutions that have changed many lives for the better.
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21 • MAINE SENIORS
He was born in Germantown, Pennsylvania on May 11, 1924 and was raised in Port Washington, Long Island, New York. He left home at 18 years old to attend college at Harvard. He admits the he has led a charmed life. Kaelber attended Harvard University for one semester in 1942. He said,“I got three D’s, a C and a B in my first term but before they had the opportunity to throw me out, I enlisted in the army as a buck private and went off to the war.” After the War he returned to Harvard in 1946 and he was much better able to handle the academic demands of the university and received an undergraduate degree in 1948. He attended Harvard Business College for one year and then left the school to start a lumber business. In 1957, he left that business even though he said it was successful and lucrative, because he found it to be boring. College of the Atlantic
By 1970 he had moved to Maine, and Ed stated “I was the first employee of the College of the Atlantic. When I was hired, the college had no real estate, staff, students and very
"I got three D’s, a C and a B in my first term but before they had the opportunity to throw me out, I enlisted in the army as a buck private and went off to the war." little money. I helped strengthen a great Board of Trustees. We all helped form the theme for the college that might excite potential students: Human Ecology, which focuses on biology and people. We hired a faculty who were recognized for their accomplishments in their fields of expertise. From the beginning, our students were to be treated as“customers” with a big say in their education. We formed committees, which included students, staff and trustees.” United States Congresswoman Chellie Pingree of the 1st District of Maine graduated from the College of the Atlantic in 1976. She was one of the first four-year graduates of the school and was a student during Ed Kaelber’s presidency at the college. She states,“COA is a really great asset to the State of Maine and Ed Kaelber was gutsy to become the founding president. I am so happy that the school has grown. Ed Kaelber was a strong leader who helped form the backbone of the school.” Nell Newman, founder of Newman’s Own Organics, is a 1987 graduate of College of the Atlantic. She recalls, “COA helped me expand my interests in ornithology and ecology at the same time. The school has a great student to teacher ratio and I received the attention that I needed to learn about my passions including Human ecology. I was interested in organic food. I saw how effective my father’s company was in raising money for charity through the sales of food products. I convinced my father, the actor Paul Newman, to let me follow in his footsteps by creating Newman’s Own Organics.” The Maine Community Foundation (MCF) began in July 1983 with Ed Kaelber at the helm as President and an initial donation of $10 from donor Bob Blum who started the first
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fund. Then Blum established the Dirigo Fund at the New York Community Trust, which allowed Kaelber, having retired as president of College of the Atlantic, to dedicate all his time and energy to establishing the Maine Community Foundation. If it were not for Ed, there would not be MCF; he was the inspiration for its success. It is a sophisticated investment program that is focused on helping Maine communities and non-profit organizations. The Foundation awards approximately 4,000 grants (totaling about 27 million dollars) per year. The smallest amount for a donor to start a fund is $10,000 and they get an immediate tax break. MCF owns the assets of the funds and manages them. Donors can make grant recommendations. The foundation has over 1500 funds and has given away well in excess of 200 million dollars since inception. Ed Kaelber said he was just lucky as a risk-taker. As a result of his efforts, all of us have benefitted from his contributions to society and are extremely grateful that he had chosen to live MSM in Maine. This story originally ran in our December 2015 issue.
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 2 2
Just Pondering
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Lobster
Loonies BY WALDO CLARK
Robert Frost wrote, “Forgive my nonsense, as I also forgive the nonsense of those that think they talk sense.”
I
207-725-8769
t’s summer and I didn’t feel like delving into deep thoughts. I preferred to push aside my ponderings and engage in brain easing. You see, I needed to embrace some old-fashion nonsense and I knew where to get it. One day late in June, I headed down Boothbay Harbor way to visit my friend Trap. Although he graduated from Colby College,he’d followed in his family’s tradition,lobstering.I found him in his workshop, settled into a rickety chair, and inhaled the fresh smell of saw dust. Two of Trap’s pals joined us, Crab and Seaweed. I never did figure out those two, but the word daft sure fit. I caught Trap winking at me. I waited.
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Crab downed the last of his coffee.“Ever watch a tourist eat a lobster? They wear those cute little bibs and look at the lobster like it was an alien.” Seaweed interrupted him. “Yeah, Ben Kingsley said, ‘All the ingenious men, and all the scientific men, and all the 23 • MAINE SENIORS
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Just Pondering imaginative men in the world could never invent, if all their wits were boiled into one, anything so curious and ridiculous as the lobster.’” Crab scowled. “You finished, Socrates? Anyway, they follow the directions on their place mats. First do this, then do that. Next comes the mess. Looks like a facial massacre, lobster innards on their eyebrows, hair, and hands. And, they squirt each other, gag on the broth, and spill the butter. Sure ain’t pretty, but it’s some fun to watch.” Seaweed rocked back in his chair.“If you’re such an expert how would you advise them?” Crab smiled. “Just eat it and stop making such a big deal of it. What say you, Trap?” Trap shook his head. “I’m way ahead of you two loonies. I tell the tourists to come over to my wharf. I boil and take the lobsters apart, give ‘em a corn on the cob, fish chowda', a roll, and a Moxie.”
August Is Here for a five piece goes over some big.” Trap eyeballed Crab. “Something bothering you, old boy?” Volume
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Trap glared at them. “You still selling your seagull stew to the tourists, Crab? You still selling your duck carvings to the tourists, Seaweed?” Let us worry about your The boys uttered a collective, “Nope.selling ” unwanted items, so you can ! “That’s what I your Summer Trap patted hisenjoy dog Schooner on the head. New issues of come out every Thursday thought. Nope, I don’t sell lobsters to the tourists either.” !
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“A Moxie,” said Crab,“that’s bitter stuff.” “It’s the official drink of Maine and it’s some good when you get used to it. Anyway, they get a deal. I charge ‘em five bucks less than the local restaurants. They like that. And they like eatin’ lobstah with a real live lobsterman.” “I don’t get it,” said Crab. “You go to all that trouble and only charge five bucks less?” Trap grinned.“There’s more. The tour.” “What tour?” “The wharf and lobster boat tour. They get to see my shed and gear and climb down the ladder to the boat. Then they climb back up; they love the climbing part.” Crab and Seaweed stared at him.“Yep, I charge them ten bucks for the tour. The tips aren’t too bad either.” “So you make up the five bucks and five more to boot,” said Seaweed.
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PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
L. L. was an innovator and an entrepreneur. He expanded his outdoor product line, the store in Freeport, and continued to merchandise and market through the catalog. L. L. guaranteed and had personally tested all of his products in the outdoors. He set the standard for L.L.Bean business culture from the very start with his Golden Rule: “Sell good merchandise at a reasonable profit, treat your customers like human beings, and they’ll always come back for more.” In 1960, when Gorman was twenty-five years old, he was discharged from active duty in the Navy and he began to work with his grandfather at L.L.Bean. His father, Jack Gorman, who worked for L.L.Bean as a clothing buyer, had passed away the year before Gorman started with the company. Gorman was given his father’s old desk because it was the only one available in the back office.
Leon Gorman Photo courtesy of Lisa Gorman
At the time, Gorman’s only retail business experience was when he worked at Filene’s in Boston right before he joined the Navy. In his 2006 Harvard Press book, “ L.L.Bean, The
Making of an American Icon”, Gorman describes how he helped grow the family business from under 100 employees when he started to over 5,000 employees today. Gorman explained that his formal business education had been minimal. But, he was a studied man. He soon obtained marketing information from the traveling salesmen who came to the store, attended trade shows, read outdoor magazines and competitor’s catalogs, took business correspondence courses and read the Small Business Administration’s publications about all aspects of business. A few years later, he formally took business courses at the University of Southern Maine in Portland and took a Dale Carnegie public speaking seminar. In 1967, Gorman became president after the passing of his grandfather L.L. and his Uncle Carl in that same year. During his time as president of the company, from 1967 to 2001, he expanded the retail business, embraced new technology (such as a website presence and internet shopping), created world class “customer first” service, and made sure that call centers
L.L.Bean Board of Directors meeting 1962. From left to right: Tom Gorman, Leon Leonwood Bean (Founder), Warren Bean, Carl Bean, Leon Gorman Photo courtesy of L.L.Bean
Leon A. L Gorman
.L.Bean and lobsters are the first two images that come to mind when anyone thinks of Maine. Leon A. Gorman was the brilliant gentleman of few words who shaped L.L.Bean into the family-owned global giant that it is today.
A look at the life and legacy of a Maine legend BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
He did this by nurturing the principle-centered way of doing business that his grandfather Leon Leonwood (L. L.) Bean had begun in 1912. Gorman took charge in 1967 and grew the business from a 2.2 million-dollar company into the over a billion-dollar retail business that it is today. In doing so, he sold the romantically rugged outdoor image of Maine to the world. Birth of L.L.Bean
Leon Leonwood Bean started the family business with the invention and sale of his iconic rubber-soled hunting boot. 27 • MAINE SENIORS
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 2 8
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors Lisa and Leon at Lake Photo courtesy of Lisa Gorman
years. He knew Leon Gorman for over 30 years, but they became close when Maine Governor Baldacci asked Leon to join a task force in 2006 to help plan the future of Maine Community Colleges. Dr. Fitzsimmons said, “That was when Leon seemed to fall in love with the community college system, its mission and the people who it serves. He and his wife, Lisa, got involved with the creation of the first statewide Foundation for Maine’s Community Colleges. Lisa and Leon gave the first gift of a million dollars to kick it off, followed by another million-dollar gift to help purchase Kennebec Valley Community College’s new Alfond Campus.
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Mark Swann, Executive Director of Preble Street Resource Center, stated,“Leon was a humble and gracious man. Starting at 6 AM every Wednesday for twelve years, he helped serve breakfast at Preble Street Soup Kitchen in Portland and became our Grill Master. He almost never missed a day and would schedule his trips away so that he would be home on Tuesday night. No one there knew that he was chairman of
L.L.Bean. Direct service to his community in this way was meaningful to him. He was a brilliant man and a focused strategist who helped advise and grow our organization with his right to the point solutions. When he passed, the L.L.Bean family announced that donations could be given in Leon’s name to Preble Street. Hundreds of people donated in his name along with heartfelt notes. Leon and Lisa have been very generous financial donors to Preble Street for over 20 years.” His Legacy Lives On
When Leon Gorman died on September 3, 2015, he was one of the most respected and well-known men in Maine. He was a kind, generous man and was beloved by family, friends, employees, customers, and acquaintances alike. He left the State of Maine and his family a tremendous legacy and laid the foundation for the company’s enduring success. MSM This story originally ran in our Summer 2016 issue.
and Bean Boot manufacturing remained in Maine, all the while staying true to L.L.Bean’s Golden Rule.
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Community Relations Manager at L.L.Bean, Janet Wyper, has been with the company for over 28 years. She related, “Leon Gorman’s passion for Maine always showed through with his commitment to his Maine community. Leon believed in supporting community because he felt the company had a responsibility to do so. Leon and his wife Lisa have offered leadership, guidance and contributions to a number of organizations to help ensure access to the outdoors and protection of natural assets. Among those in our state are Maine Huts and Trails in Carrabassett Valley, the Nature Conservancy, the Maine Appalachian Trail Club and Natural Resources Council of Maine. Regionally and nationally, the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, Student Conservation Association and Trout Unlimited have been beneficiaries of their support.” Maine Community College System
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Dr. John Fitzsimmons recently retired after being the President of the Maine Community College System for 25
Leon - Grillmaster at Preble Street Photo Courtesy of Preble Street
BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 3 0
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
Elizabeth
McLellan Partners for World Healthcare BY DONNA HALVORSEN
I
n her travels around the world, Elizabeth McLellan saw people who were dying because doctors lacked the medical supplies to perform life-saving surgery, a scenario that most of us in the U.S. can’t even imagine. As a nurse administrator in Portland, McLellan saw firsthand that the very supplies needed in poor countries are being thrown out, even though they are sealed in their original packages. After years of working in Saudi Arabia, McLellan came home to Maine with a mission. It started small. As a nursing administrator at Maine Medical Center, she took the products left behind in patients’ rooms—from hand lotion to toothpaste—and brought them home. “It’s a bit overwhelming,” she says.“You start collecting 10 bags, and then you go back in a week, and you put 20 bags in your car, and you go back and put 30 bags in your car. And all of a sudden your cellar is full, and your kitchen is full, and your bathroom is full, and your laundry room is full, and the dining room is overflowing to the ceiling. I kept taking it because I knew that eventually I would find some place to put this stuff,” she says.“I just believed that it would happen. I’m a firm believer that you keep on walking down the road, and don’t look back, just keep on walking, and it will happen. And that’s how this started.”
McLellan is the founder and president of Partners for World Health, a nonprofit that operates in a nondescript building off Broadway in South Portland. She doesn’t bring supplies home anymore. Instead, with grace and gratitude, she presides over volunteers who show up regularly to get those supplies ready for shipping to countries that don’t have such basics as sterile bandages and gauze. It is a mission that hundreds of Maine volunteers have embraced as their own. McLellan’s can-do spirit infuses the headquarters. There’s always a way to do what needs to be done without spending money. When the office needed a table, a volunteer put a request on eBay, and they picked one up in Scarborough in a snowstorm two hours later. The symbol for the venture—and Partners’ challenge—is a ceiling-high mountain of plastic bags in headquarters that needs to be sorted, repackaged and labeled for shipment. Carol Smith, a restaurant owner and volunteer states “Without the volunteers, the stuff doesn’t move out of here. Without them, it doesn’t get to the Third World countries that need it.”
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Do you want more from your Medicare plan? Call me — I can help! Nicole Mackenzie Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield an authorized licensed insurance agent for Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Maine License number: PRR275115 1-207-303-4211 TTY: 711 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday days a week nicole.mackenzie@anthem.com We do not discriminate, exclude people, or treat them differently on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age or disability in our health programs and activities. ATTENTION: Si vous parlez français, des services d’aide linguistique vous sont proposés gratuitement. Appelez le 1-888211-9817 (ATS: 711). ATENCIÓN: Si habla español, tiene a su disposición servicios gratuitos de asistencia lingüística. Llame al 1-888-211-9817 (TTY: 711). Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is a Medicare Advantage Organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield depends on contract renewal. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of Anthem Health Plans of Maine, Inc. Independent licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. Anthem is a registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. This policy has exclusions, limitations, and terms under which the policy may be continued in force or discontinued. For costs and complete details of coverage, please contact your agent or the health plan. Y0114_19_35830_U_C_807 10/01/2018
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McLellan is a quiet presence in the warehouse-like facility. Although, when there she is hands-on when there’s work to be done. When Partners needed a truck with a lift to fill shipping containers, she went to a truck auction and bought one. When a 40-foot-long container destined for Rwanda needed to be filled, she was one of 10 people who filled it. She answers the phone in her spartan office and is as willing to talk to a volunteer as to a potential benefactor. Partners now collects supplies from over 40 medical facilities in Maine and New Hampshire. McLellean shares her thoughts about the supplies and equipment,“This is millions and millions of dollars worth of waste. We taxpayers are already paying for this in the foreign aid budget. I have all the medical supplies here.” She has a fierce resolve and states “I started this, I believe in this, I’m going to see it through.” MSM This story originally ran in our May 2014 issue. BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 3 2
FROM THE PORCH
A Place Called Camp BY HUNTER HOWE
Y
ou won’t see this place featured on The Travel Channel. There are no major airports nearby, no tourist attractions, no fancy hotels, no crowded restaurants, no taxis, no t-shirt shops, and no night life.
It’s a place found all over Maine, in the woods and the mountains, on lakes and along the coast. It’s an uncomplicated place where folks go to seek freedom, to feel alive and to enjoy the modest pleasures of life. It’s a place where folks embrace tradition, a sense of sameness and a lack of pretension, a sanctuary away from the strangling stress of today’s world. It’s a place Maine folks call CAMP. Many Mainers open their camps in April and May. However, May, with winter’s tenacious grip released, remains the more reliable month, tucked in between mud season and summer. It’s a month that promises good things to come. In Aroostook County where winters linger, many must wait until May to venture out to their camp. Here, owning a camp is a way of life. In particular, one envies those Fort Kent folks who travel 15 minutes south on Rt. 11 to their own version of paradise on Eagle Lake. Now that’s the right idea! For Maine folks, there are no better words than,“I’m headin’ to camp." There’s a comforting pace to each day. One rises early, brews the coffee, ambles down the path, Golden Retriever sprinting 33 • MAINE SENIORS
along, to the wharf and the sunrise.The mug of hot coffee warms the hands. Across the lake, a meadow reaches upward to a pine forest. A lone fisherman, huddled over and enveloped in the mist, motors by. He nods, no words needed. It feels good. It reminds one of the lyrics,“Easy like Sunday Morning.” A wood burning Franklin Stove anchors the combined living room and parlor. Wooden skis, straps unbuckled and torn, cross on a wall. A Waterbury Eight Day Mantle Clock requires winding. An oak bookcase contains a library of yesteryear. One shelf holds Look, Life and Saturday Evening Post magazines and books by Maine authors Caldwell, Gould, McDonald and Day. Another shelf holds the Horatio Alger series, The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew. Another holds Scrabble and Monopoly games along with a Cribbage board and deck of Bicycle playing cards.
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VASCULAR DR. MICHAEL RICCI
LUNG CANCER SCREENING KEVIN QUIGLEY, PA
DIABETIC NUTRITION GWEN SCOTT, DT
After supper, light conversation, playful dickering and laughter commence. As dusk turns to dark, conversation ebbs and camp folks settle back in the soft cushions of their favorite chair with a Stephen King novel. The dog slumbers on the threadbare braided rug. A cup of King Cole tea and a plate of Nissen chocolate donuts lie on the lamp table. It’s a Norman Rockwell scene. Camp roots run deep, families passing them on from one generation to the next. There’s something spot on about all this. Simply put, it’s a good way of living, a tradition like none other. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could all find a place called Camp in MSM the land of Maine? This story originally ran in our October 2013 issue.
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“It served me very well, and I got to know a lot of people and made a little money,” he said. “That helped a lot, financially, when I was growing up.”
Peter
Vigue
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Vigue was not a great student, but said,“I’ve had more mentors than I can count: Doctor Stein, Doctor Woodcock, the Cianchette brothers. One of the very first was a Portuguese immigrant, Albert Motto, who never went to school one day in his life. Albert Motto taught me so much – how to construct a box cut on a roadway, for example. He was one person that had so much wisdom and so much knowledge to share that it was unbelievable.” “The Cianchette brothers were newspaper customers of mine,” said Vigue.“They gave me an opportunity to learn. And the thing about the Cianchette brothers is – each one of them is unique, and I learned something unique from each one of them. Carl taught me to stand tall in difficult situations and not to back down in the presence of people who intimidate. With Kenneth, the lesson was – think before you act. Take
A
lifelong love of both learning and teaching has catapulted Pete Vigue, and construction giant Cianbro, to great success. Vigue is soft-spoken when talking about himself, but outspoken when speaking about doing what is right and appropriate. Cianbro has expanded into 40 states and grown to more than 4,000 employees working on a mindboggling variety of construction projects, from landmark bridges, state-of-theart corporate headquarters, milestone solar farms and natural gas pump stations to massive refineries and sophisticated high voltage transmission systems. “Sure, I’m involved,” the chairman of the board and former CEO says of his company. “I should be. That’s my job. But when it comes to making it all happen and executing projects and doing that safely, Cianbro’s team members do it.” By age 8, Vigue was mowing lawns, shoveling snow, and distributing The Pittsfield Advertiser on Thursday afternoons. Over time, he took on delivery of two additional newspapers.
Alton E. (Chuck) Cianchette, Kenneth L. (Ken) Cianchette and Ival R. (Bud) Cianchette with Pete Vigue. BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 3 6
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The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) presented Cianbro with the VPP Star Participant Flag and a plaque for workplace safety.
perfection. And Chuck was a people person, and he taught me how to listen and how to treat people appropriately, and to understand that people are the most valuable asset in any company.”
Vigue was named CEO in 2000. Two responsibilities are incumbent upon a CEO, he said. One is the year-to-year success of the company, and the other is preparing the company for the next generation. Rather than risk the company being acquired and consolidated or dismantled, Vigue revived an effort to make Cianbro employee-owned, and then led the charge. “We were able to finalize the purchase of the stock from the Cianchette brothers in 2003,” said Vigue. “It’s not about any one person. It’s about everyone who works in this company. They are the ones that did that. I did not do that. It’s all about people. It’s that simple. I am very proud of what our people have accomplished and what they have done over a period of time, and they are now the beneficiaries.” Another point of pride is Cianbro’s safety record. “In 2004, we were named the healthiest and safest company in America,” said Vigue. The company’s safety and wellness programs have received awards from the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, the Wellness
Council of America, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Steel Structures Painting Council, Associated Builders and Contractors, and the American Institute of Steel Construction. “There are personal circumstances that led us to that point,” said Vigue somberly.“In December of 1987, we were repairing an old bridge out of state. A 24-year construction veteran was working under the bridge, 90 feet in the air. He had a life preserver on, he had a tool belt on, and he also had a safety belt, tied off to a cable on his right. He had to reposition himself, and in the process of doing this, released the lanyard and fell 90 feet into the river. We had a boat in the water and retrieved him, and called an ambulance, but on the way to the hospital, he died. “OSHA came on site and evaluated our training, our policies, all of those things, and gave us a clean bill of health. I went to his funeral, and after the funeral, I was in his home with his
“There are times when it’s very easy to say ‘can’t.’ You won’t see that from my vocabulary—probably one of the most important lessons of my life,” Vigue said. “I’ve had my share of challenges and I’ve never given up. I pass that on to young people today.” Vigue seized every opportunity to learn from his coworkers.“I really enjoyed the people, and what I was doing. But most of all the exposure, the learning, was unbelievable, and the people I learned from, in many cases, were people that had very limited formal education, but so much experience and knowledge, and a willingness to share it,” he said.“It’s been a great opportunity. One thing I’ve learned is that opportunities are, in many cases, disguised as something that is not convenient, not popular. I learned that there’s only one way to approach these sorts of disguised opportunities. Instead of saying, ‘No, I’m sorry I can’t,’ say ‘Yes, I can and I will.’ Never once have I said,‘I can’t.’” the time to think, and you’ll make fewer mistakes. Bud was a perfectionist with extremely high standards in terms of image, the way people present themselves, the way the company is presented – Bud taught by example about excellence and 37 • MAINE SENIORS
“Looking back at things, I’m very blessed, very fortunate,” he said.“My wife and children sacrificed, and I sacrificed, but I’d say that there were significant benefits that came from that, both for the company and for us as a family.”
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Do you hit the skip button?
"It boils down to moral responsibility, and if you are in a position of leadership, then you’ve got to look at the well-being of the people you are responsible for.That’s my personal feeling. That’s who I am."
Pete during module voyage.
family, talking to his wife, and his 9-year-old daughter came up to me in tears and pulled on my coat sleeve and asked me why I killed her Daddy. That was one of the worst days of my entire life.
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“I didn’t run the company at that time. I was responsible for operations. The Cianchette brothers were away, if memory serves. I shut down our projects, gathered a small group of trusted people in a conference room and said, ‘We are not going to do this anymore. This isn’t going to happen again. What’s it going to take to see that this never happens again?’ Within a short period of time, we decided we needed a system whereby our people in an elevated situation would be tied off 100 percent of the time. It was brought up that if people fall in a waist belt any distance, it typically would do abdomen or back damage. What came out of that discussion was ‘Why can’t we have two lanyards on the waist belt be tied off at two locations, so that our people can be tied off 100 percent of the time?’ But what good was that, if they received back or abdomen damage? “One of our people, a former military guy, said, ‘I’ve jumped out of airplanes at 200 mph, and I never had any back or abdominal issues from a parachute ever, and I’ve done many jumps.’ So we went down to a local airport and got a parachute, and we cut all the strings and hung it from the ceiling in the conference room and asked ourselves‘What is different about this harness than a waist belt?’” That led to the idea of a body harness.“A day later, we were in an out-of-state manufacturing facility asking them to manufacture body harnesses for us, modified to have two lanyards and accommodate our needs,” said Vigue. The manufacturer wanted to patent, but “we said absolutely not. We are going to make this free to the industry.
In 20 days, we had enough to outfit our company.” The kicker, said Vigue, is that despite OSHA support, it took another 10 years, and many trips to D.C., to pass a law making a full body harness and 100-percent tie off the industry standard. “Earlier, I made reference to the fact that every problem is an opportunity,” said Vigue. “Today, this company has worked approximately 100 million work hours without a single serious injury from an elevated fall.” “When you are in a position of responsibility over the lives and well-being of people in an organization, what does that really mean? I’ve observed someone dying because of an environment that was acceptable, where there was no such thing as a body harness, there was no mandate by OSHA,” said Vigue. “So where does the buck stop? It boils down to moral responsibility, and if you are in a position of leadership, then you’ve got to look at the well-being of the people you are responsible for. That’s my personal feeling. That’s who I am. I couldn’t live with myself if I just turned my head and looked MSM the other way.” This story originally ran in our October 2018 issue. BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 4 0
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors his time in the Army, Mitchell received his law degree from Georgetown University Law Center. After his graduation from law school, Mitchell began his career in public service. He was hired in September 1960 as a trial attorney in Washington, D.C. at the Department of Justice in the Anti-Trust Division while Robert Kennedy was Attorney General. Then in 1962, he began working for Senator Edmund Muskie of Maine in the position of executive assistant for three years. In 1965, Mitchell moved back to Maine and worked as a private practice lawyer. Realizing that he was very interested in politics, he accepted the position of chairman of the Maine Democratic Party for two years and served on the Democratic National Committee for eight years. In 1968 he took a leave of absence from the law firm to be Deputy Campaign Manager for Edmund Muskie who was running for VP as Senator Hubert Humphrey’s running mate.
Heather, Andrew, Claire, and George Mitchell in front of Northern Ireland Assembly building, March 2012.
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George J.
Mitchell
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
A
s a Senator, statesman and philanthropist, George J. Mitchell has travelled the globe. He believes,“Maine is the greatest place on the earth.” Mitchell says that he keeps returning to Maine because most people like him have a warm feeling about the place where they grew up. He loves Maine and loves being here. He has a large close-knit family and all his siblings live in Waterville. He and his wife and children return every year (when school is out) to their home on Mt. Desert Island and to visit their relatives. They go there for all the holidays as well. In his latest book, The Negotiator: A Memoir, he vividly describes his childhood while growing up in the 41 • MAINE SENIORS
Maine’s Own “Negotiator”
Lebanese-American community in Waterville. His father was an orphan of Irish descent who was adopted by a Lebanese couple from Waterville. His mother immigrated to America from a small town in Lebanon to live with her sister’s family in this community when she was eighteen. His parents were not given the opportunity to receive a higher education. They both worked hard to raise their family and although sports were encouraged, they stressed the importance of scholastic achievement to their children. George Mitchell and his four siblings all graduated college.
Senator Mitchell and Senator Cohen review bill. Courtesy George J. Mitchell Papers, Bowdoin College Library.
Mitchell graduated from Waterville High School and received his undergraduate degree from Bowdoin College. He then served in Berlin, Germany as an officer in the U.S. Army Counter-Intelligence Corps from 1954 to 1956. Following BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 4 2
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CHLOE'S CORNER
In 1977, George Mitchell was appointed U.S. Attorney for Maine by President Jimmy Carter and in 1979 was confirmed U.S. District Court Judge for Maine.
The choice is
As a result of Senator Muskie’s resignation from the Senate in 1980, Judge Mitchell was appointed to the Senate by Governor Brennan to finish Muskie’s remaining two-year term. In 1982, Mitchell was elected for a full six-year term, winning 61% of the votes. In 1988, he was re-elected for his second full term with an astounding 81% vote. He became Senate Majority Leader from 1989 until 1995, when he left the Senate. Since leaving the Senate, Mitchell has served as the chairman and the director of various corporate boards, companies and commissions and served for ten years as Chancellor of Queen’s University of Northern Ireland. His most gratifying post-Senate accomplishment was when he served as the Independent Chairman of the Northern Ireland Peace Talks during the Clinton administration. Mitchell helped form the Good Friday Agreement that put an end to the sectarian strife, which had gone on for so long in Northern Ireland. Through this major achievement, Northern Ireland citizens now have a democratic means of settling conflicts. Later, Mitchell took the initiative to give a graduating address at every high school in Maine – all 140 of them! This led to the establishment of the Mitchell Scholarship Fund with the goal of helping all kids in Maine to graduate college, even if their parents were poor. Mitchell feels that establishing the Mitchell Scholarship Fund is his most significant achievement other than his family. He devotes a good amount of his time to fundraising for his scholarships. Maine Seniors can find out more information about the Mitchell Scholarship Fund and how to donate by going to the website www.mitchellinstitute. org or by calling (207) 773-7700. Mitchell says that the people who have most influenced him in his life’s journey are his mother, his father, his high school English teacher Elvira Whitten and Senator Edmund Muskie. Kudos to them for helping to shape this altruistic statesman! MSM This story originally ran in our Summer 2015 issue. 43 • MAINE SENIORS
yours!
BY CHLOE JONPAUL
How Do You Plan To Spend Your Retirement?
Mitchell Scholar Nathan Kinney and Senator Mitchell. Photo © Tim Byrne 2014
Based on a U.S government publication
that combined 2003/2004 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, interesting data turned up showing how people between the ages of 65-74 spent their time on an average day.
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Where to Celebrate with Friends?
A
nother study, the American Time Use Survey analyzed more specifically how different age groups spent their day and their results for persons 65 + were somewhat disheartening. So... let’s take a look and see. The studies showed that people 65+:
• • • • •
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Spend 0 hours a day on educational activities. Watch too much TV – nearly 4 hours daily compared to 2 - 1/2 hours for the rest of the population. Spend about 38 minutes a day turning pages while those 75+ read a book for nearly an hour. Exercise roughly 19 minutes for those 65-74 and 13 minutes for those 75+. Spend about 30 minutes daily interacting with friends and neighbors.
Take a look at some popular retirement ambitions. Here is what many retirees hope to do: • •
Spend more time with family and friends. Read.
• • • • •
Travel. Experience another culture. Commemorate their retirement with an expensive gift. Take on a home improvement plan or garden project. Write a book (said by 12%).
Now let’s take a look at what you can/should do for a happy retirement: • Learn something new. • Volunteer. • Exercise regularly. • Travel. • Improve your personal care. • Have specific plans for each day. Plan to retire to something, not from something. Can you dream BIG? What is your vision for the rest of your life?
MSM
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Jamie
Wyeth
Photo © Peter Ralston
A Living Art Legend
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
J
amie Wyeth is a cherished painter of many iconic images of American people, animals and landscapes —especially on the coast of Maine.
He is a gracious and charming third generation American artist. When he is in Maine, he lives on his own private lighthouse island—Southern Island, which is located at the mouth of Tenants Harbor—and he occasionally stays at his home on Monhegan Island. Jamie’s parents are the famous American painter, Andrew Wyeth, who died in 2009, and Betsy (James) Wyeth, who is 95 years old. When she is in Maine, Betsy is an island person too; she lives on an island near Jamie’s. Jamie has an older brother named Nicholas. Their grandfather was N.C. Wyeth, who was famous for illustrating children’s books. Jamie says,“My mentors were certainly my family and certainly my father by example. Our house was his studio—his work was right there. My grandfather died a year before I was born, but his presence was felt by me. Physically, my grandfather had an enormous studio, which was up the hill from our house in Chadd’s Ford. It was full of costumes, guns, swords, and cutlasses all from his illustrations of Treasure Island, Kidnapped, Robin Hood and all those books.” “For me it was much more exciting at my grandfather’s studio; it had a profound influence on me.” Jamie continues,“As a child, I would wander up to this enormous studio—at that time a lot of his illustrations were still stacked up. I would pore through those—it was magical.” 45 • MAINE SENIORS
While Jamie is a realistic painter, he says that he tends to shy away from things that seem attractive and things that people will want to look at. Jamie says, “Painting is a highly personal thing. Of all the disciplines, I think it’s probably the most individual in that it requires no editors, no musicians, no printers, no cameramen or light person. I have no preconceived sort of goals. I find that if I start doing that, it freezes me in my work. I think it is better to keep working and record my world and life as best I can, rather than theorizing: which way I’m going or is this better, or more successful.” Congresswoman Chellie Pingree says, “I’ve always loved the work of Jamie Wyeth who, like his father before him, has a gift for taking the ordinary aspects of life and elevating them to the extraordinary. Through his paintings, we see the world around us with a deeper and different lens.” “But he is more than just a great artist.” Congresswoman Pingree continues, “I applaud Jamie and his wife, Phyllis, for carrying on the Wyeth family’s longtime commitment to the people of Maine and gracious support of many of our state’s critical organizations.” Jamie Wyeth is a living art legend. We are proud to call him a Maine Senior and are grateful that he chose to honor the people of Maine and its landscapes with his beautiful art. MSM
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Donato
Tramuto Changing Lives for the Good
Retirement On The Horizon? Be Ready.
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ou would never know Donato Tramuto’s difficult past from looking at him – a trim, successful CEO and philanthropist who is both thoroughly engaging and deeply compassionate.
Donato came from a large and loving Italian family – his grandparents having immigrated from Potenza and Sicily, Italy to Dunkirk, New York. Theirs was a bustling household Portland (207) 774-7000
Lewiston (207) 777-5200
Donato at 5 years old
47 • MAINE SENIORS
indeed – Donato had four brothers and a sister. His father had a small children’s clothing shop which, for a time, supported the family. But, things changed. Big shopping malls overtook the ‘Mom and Pop” family businesses – his dad was forced to close the shop and return to a grueling job at the local steel mill in their hometown.
traumatic events,” Donato wrote in his popular memoir, Life’s Bulldozer Moments: How Adversity Can Lead to Success in Life and Business. “I had been a very good student but suddenly my grades nosedived… My speech became garbled… once it was obvious, my parents took me to doctors and sought out specialists. It was too late.
At the same time, Donato developed a nagging and painful earache, but the family was struggling and distraught that their patriarch, grandfather Joseph, had been shot and nearly killed by a robber and the family business had closed down due to shopping malls entering the area. It was also a tumultuous time for our country—President John Kennedy, beloved by Donato and his family, had been assassinated. “At first, they dismissed my change in behavior as a natural reaction to the
My hearing loss was profound and permanent.” Donato became withdrawn and depressed. As he wrote in his book, “I was a sad, bullied, lonely little kid.” He references a bulldozer in the title of his memoir because those awful moments in life, when you have no power to resist terrible events, are lifealtering, similar to when a bulldozer knocks down and destroys one house, only to smooth the ground for a better home to be built. His childhood was filled with those moments: loss BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 4 8
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
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of the family business, his loss of hearing, then the loss of a beloved brother and sister-in-law. Donato made the conscious decision to rise up after those crushing losses and carry on while he was still a child. When he was only 11, he wrote an encouraging note to his parents and carefully placed it on the pillow of their bed: “The sun is going to shine again… we are going to be OK.” This important life decision guided him as he grew. He would not give up, nor would he lose track of his desire to make the world a better place. Robert F. Kennedy became his personal hero; he studied him, read everything he could find that Kennedy wrote and aspired to be a person of change like his hero was. Much later, Donato created a new company with some partners, Protocare, in Los Angeles. He found himself flying all over the country and once again, experienced a crushing “bulldozer moment”. It took place on that infamous day, September 11, 2001. This is what happened:“My two friends and their three-year old son were staying with us in Maine, and were flying back to Los Angeles,” he said. “I had been on
49 • MAINE SENIORS
second plane hit the South Tower,” he paused, the memory still fresh after all these years.“So, I think for me it was another bulldozer moment that knocked me down, but I wasn’t going to get angry and I wasn’t going to have hatred in my heart.”
Donato and Ethel Kennedy
that flight every single week for about seven years. But, I had a toothache and went to the dentist the night before. Because of that, I changed my flight not to go out on September 11 but to go out on September 10. My friends and their little son did not change their flight and lost their lives when the
With the understanding that life can be so fleeting and wanting to honor his friends’ memory, Donato formed the Tramuto Foundation to help individuals and organizations like the Good Shepherd Food Bank achieve their educational and healthcare goals. In the past 17 years, the Foundation has distributed more than $1 million in grants to organizations working to make the world more just and fair and also to provide annual scholarships for graduating high school seniors. Three years later, in 2011, he was struck by a startling statistic: in our lifetime one billion people will die having never
had access to a health care worker. To address this issue and expand his mission on a global scale, he launched Health eVillages, a non-profit partnership with Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, which provides state-of the-art mobile health technology in the most challenging clinical environments, including Africa, Haiti and the United States. Currently, as CEO of Tivity Health, Donato oversees Silver Sneakers®, the nation’s leading community fitness program for older adults. "I’ve been very fortunate professionally in terms of my success, but I don’t measure my life by that… I measure my life by the ability to make the world a better place and that MSM has brought me more happiness than anything else.” This story originally ran in our Summer 2018 issue.
Donato with babies
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
Morrill Worcester with his wife Karen.
That occurred in the early 1960s. Fast forward to 1992. Worcester had become a successful entrepreneur, involved in several ventures including the well-known Worcester Wreath Company in Harrington, Maine. That year, however, Worcester faced a major dilemma. Due to a communication “glitch”, he found that the company had an excess of 5,000 wreaths. It was the second week in December and the retail season was just about ending. What could he do with these wreaths?
Never at a loss for ideas, Worcester contacted Senator Olympia Snowe and, with her assistance, obtained permission to transport the wreaths to Arlington National Cemetery where they would be placed on the graves of fallen soldiers. Leaving his wife, Karen, to run the business, Worcester, the rest of the family, and the wreaths headed to Arlington. “It was going to be a one-time thing”, says Worcester. “but it was so well-received that when I came back, I told Karen that we were going to do it again.” And they did.
Top: There were long lines of people eager to distribute wreaths at Arlington Cemetary. Bottom: Over 143,000 wreaths were placed on graves within one hour..
Wreaths Across
America The Worcester Family's Commitment BY ELLEN L. SPOONER
51 • MAINE SENIORS
I
t’s all about freedom. In this country, the harder you work, the better you do. That’s true, even today. It’s a great opportunity that was given to us by the veterans.” —Morrill Worcester
"
Over fifty years ago, in a small town in Washington County, Maine, an enterprising young newspaper carrier became a prize winner by obtaining the highest number of new subscriptions for the newspaper. The town was Cherryfield, the young man in question was 12-year old Morrill Worcester, and the prize, a trip to Washington, D.C. Worcester toured all the famous landmarks in Washington but was particularly impressed by Arlington National Cemetery. He was overwhelmed by the number of crosses representing men and women who had given their lives to defend our country; to preserve our freedom. It was an experience that Worcester would remember throughout his life.
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
Inspired by 5,000 wreaths that Morrill Worcester “didn’t want to waste”, Wreaths Across America has become a global tribute to all veterans; a way for us to say“thank you”; a means by which we “Remember, Honor, Teach". Worcester says, "We've been gifted with this 'Wreaths Across America' thing. The good Lord gave it to us. I don't know how long it will last. This year could be the last year, but I don't think so. "It's not just Arlington National Cemetery. This year it's over a thousand cemeteries in all 50 states and 24 cemeteries
overseas that have American veterans buried there. So it's come from that one cemetery to over 1,000. In 1992 there were 12 volunteers; today, there are between 600,000 to 800,000 volunteers around the world. We're very proud that we started it, but it's not just us. It's a lot of people involved." Morrill Worcester’s ultimate goal is “to lay a wreath on the grave of every veteran in the United States”. Ambitious? Yes. MSM But with Worcester at the helm, it could happen. This story originally ran in our December 2014 issue.
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The Worcester family traveled to Arlington each of the ensuing years to decorate the graves in remembrance of those men who have given so willingly to ensure our freedom. Morrill Worcester’s efforts did not go unnoticed. The seeds had been planted and would blossom into Wreaths Across America (WAA). In 2007, Wreaths Across America was formed as a nonprofit organization with the mission: Remember, Honor, Teach. As this suggests, in addition to remembering and honoring our veterans, WAA works with the younger generation to heighten their awareness of and appreciation for our veterans who have fought so bravely to protect our freedom.
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PHOTOS & ARTWORK • The Best of Maine Seniors
PHOTOS & ARTWORK
Best Photo: The Hawkes of Cundy Harbor by Victor Oboyski
Best Photos & Artwork A picture is worth a thousand words; these are some of our favorites. Best Black and White Sketch:
Best Cartoon: Waldo Clark by Michael LaRiccia
Springer Spaniel by Brad Eden
Best Color Sketch: Southwest Airline Sketch by Mark O’Donnell
55 • MAINE SENIORS
Best Watercolor: Winter Magic by Casey Johnson
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As Paul of the trio “Peter, Paul and Mary”,
Noel wrote and sang music that shaped many of us who came of age in the 60s. He's long been a gifted songwriter and singer.
1963 “March on Washington”, and I've been a mesmerized fan since then. Now as I sit across a table from him, I have a chance to know the person behind the songs, and that is a gift. Noel Stookey moved to Michigan when he was 12, and there he met Betty, whom he married 54 years ago. As a child, Betty spent summers in Kennebunk and in 1974, when success seemed to cloud their lives, Noel and Betty sought a refuge where they could find privacy for their own family of three young daughters, as well as a simpler way of living. They asked Maine singer-songwriter and friend Gordon Bok for advice
Stookey Noel Paul The Music Maker
BY BARBARA KENT LAWRENCE
57 • MAINE SENIORS
and at his suggestion made two trips to Maine, searching along the coast until they arrived in the Blue Hill area and knew they had come home. The first property the Stookeys bought in Blue Hill was an empty four-story chicken barn set on about thirty acres across from the ocean. Because they rented a house from a family named Coope, many people thought they had actually moved into the Henhouse. Instead, within a year, skilled local contractors turned the former shelter for chickens into the new home of Neworld Studios. Peter Clapp of Blue Hill Garage used his tow truck to hoist a piano to the second floor. There Noel wrote, recorded his own music, and produced recordings of talented friends like comedian Tim Sample, singer-songwriter David Mallet, and the spoken words of neighbor E.B. White. Eventually, Noel and Betty moved to a house, conveniently located across the street, that they bought from Ann and Clarence Conroy. The Conroys had predicated the sale on the agreement that
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oel Paul Stookey speaks to us in songs and invites us to listen with our hearts.“Music melts the heart,” he says,“so the brain can comprehend what it might often resist.” Known to his family, friends, and neighbors as Noel, he has reached into the conscience of his listeners for over fifty-five years. As Paul of the trio “Peter, Paul and Mary”, Noel wrote and sang music that shaped many of us who came of age in the 60s. He's long been a gifted songwriter and singer, and at eighty, he’s still at it. A tall handsome man on whom the few pounds of maturity drape well, he reaches out a hand strengthened by years of playing guitar. I heard him sing with Peter and Mary at the
A Retirement Community in Coastal Blue Hill, Maine Call TODAY to Schedule a Tour 207-374-2306 | 63 Parker Ridge Lane, Blue Hill | www.ParkerRidge.com | Follow us on BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 5 8
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
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natives to accept people ‘from away,’ ” which is a respite from the superficial adulation that follows him elsewhere. Mainers offer “the invitation to prove yourself,” Noel reflects.“People here accept you because of your character, not press releases,” he adds. Having a long life is a gift, and imagination helps Noel find new meaning and enjoyment as he gets older. Noel believes every one of us employs his or her imagination, but in different ways. How to foster imagination? “Volunteer, mentor, don't assume you can’t help,” he suggests. “Technology opens up avenues. There are lots of ways for older people to stay active in their minds. People who make their living by using their imaginations, including song writers, writers, painters, and craftspeople, may benefit most, but for all of us, imagination is a key to aging well,” which is precisely what this Music Maker is doing. This extremely gifted artist may be best known for his 1971 hit“The Wedding Song—There is Love” (see the lyrics below) This song poured out of Noel as a divine inspiration and it definitely has been divine for so many millions who have known and felt the grace of this piece of music.
Liz, Noel, Betty, Anna and Kate
the Stookeys would continue operation of Fairwinds, their greenhouse and flower shop. Betty had a talent for floral design and the endeavor proved to be such a success that she eventually moved it into Blue Hill, where it continues to operate today. In 1980, people in Blue Hill wanted to create a community radio station. They appreciated NPR, but there were so many musicians and artists living nearby, that the idea of a station utilizing and celebrating local talent was compelling. In 1969 Peter Yarrow had asked Noel to “bless his wedding with a song.” Noel is a deeply spiritual man, and as “The Wedding Song” came from prayer, he believed that the profits should be returned in much the same way. In 1971, he had created the Public Domain Foundation to use the considerable profits from this song to support the public good. The Foundation funded many such ideas from people around the world, and creating what became WERU offered a welcome opportunity to help locally. What drew the Stookeys to Maine, and keeps them here? Surprisingly, Noel appreciates the “reticence of Maine 59 • MAINE SENIORS
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Do you want more from your Medicare plan? Call me — I can help! Nicole Mackenzie Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield an authorized licensed insurance agent for Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Maine License number: PRR275115 1-207-303-4211 TTY: 711 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday days a week nicole.mackenzie@anthem.com We do not discriminate, exclude people, or treat them differently on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age or disability in our health programs and activities. ATTENTION: Si vous parlez français, des services d’aide linguistique vous sont proposés gratuitement. Appelez le 1-888211-9817 (ATS: 711). ATENCIÓN: Si habla español, tiene a su disposición servicios gratuitos de asistencia lingüística. Llame al 1-888-211-9817 (TTY: 711). Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is a Medicare Advantage Organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield depends on contract renewal. Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of Anthem Health Plans of Maine, Inc. Independent licensee of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association. Anthem is a registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. This policy has exclusions, limitations, and terms under which the policy may be continued in force or discontinued. For costs and complete details of coverage, please contact your agent or the health plan. Y0114_19_35830_U_C_807 10/01/2018
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He is now to be among you at the calling of your hearts Rest assured this troubadour is acting on His part. The union of your spirits, here, has caused Him to remain For whenever two or more of you are gathered in His name There is Love. There is Love. A man shall leave his mother and a woman leave her home And they shall travel on to where the two shall be as one. As it was in the beginning is now and until the end Woman draws her life from man and gives it back again. And there is Love. There is Love. Well then what's to be the reason for becoming man and wife? Is it Love that brings you here or Love that brings you life? And if loving is the answer, then who's the giving for? Do you believe in something that you've never seen before? Oh there's Love, oh there’s Love. Yes the marriage of your spirits here has caused Him to remain For whenever two or more of you are gathered in His name There is Love. There is Love. —Noel Paul Stookey
MSM
Noel and Betty Photo by Lancia Smith
This story originally ran in our June 2017 issue. BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 6 0
A LOOK BACK
A LOOK BACK
End of the Innocence
Become a CASA Guardian ad Litem and …
Summer 1963 BY BARBARA BEARDSLEY
Over the last six weeks, I have had a series of illnesses that kept me inside, mostly reclining, and thinking a lot.
I
t occurred to me that the last really great summer of my childhood was that of 1963. I spent most of that summer with my family at a rented cottage on Unity Pond in Central Maine. Our rental was part of a little compound of cottages in a cove near the golf course. The families who owned the other cottages were friends and acquaintances of my parents, and all the kids were schoolmates of mine. Now, the reason that this particular summer was so great, was that we were, as a country, still a bit naïve. We knew about war and chaos, and many of the adults in our summer place were WWII veterans. We knew about the dangers of nuclear war, and had even been to the brink in the October 1962 Missile Crisis. But, in other ways, we were still a country of relative innocents. We listened to Lesley Gore’s teenage angst in “It’s My Party”, and we marveled at the harmonica virtuosity in a song called
61 • MAINE SENIORS
“Fingertips” by a young lad named Little Stevie Wonder. I was twelve, so I yearned for the ultimate sophistication of becoming a teenager, which was still months away for me. My girlfriends and I dreamed of dancing with boys when we listened to Bobby Vinton croon “Blue Velvet”, and we weren’t quite certain what to make of the bad boy the Angels described in“My Boyfriend’s Back”. In our little cove we got up early, put on our bathing suits, and spent the days swimming and boating. On rainy days, we stayed inside and played Monopoly. Our parents had cocktails in the late afternoons on the screened porches of the camps, and the moms created a flotilla on plastic rafts during the day to gossip and catch some rays. We had canoes and rowboats and motor boats. We swam to the “float” and pretended we were mermaids, or Lloyd Bridges in“Sea Hunt”. We used our goggles underwater and made up bazillions of games that kept us in the lake all day. When it was time to eat, my friend Dean’s father would cook hot dogs and burgers on the grill. My mom would make quick and easy meals like spaghetti and salad and cupcakes. The parents would combine forces and have potluck on the picnic tables. At night you were so tired from
Interested in speaking up for a child? If so, we hope you can join us for our August 13th-16th volunteer training. Please contact us at casa@courts.maine.gov or 207213-2865 for more information.
November, and we changed as individuals, too. This was the beginning of suspicion and mistrust of the institutions many of us had regarded as above reproach before. This was the beginning of a lot more divisiveness and discord. This was the beginning of an era that saw us plunge more deeply into a very unpopular war, recoil from the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, and protest violently against all the injustices that were to come. It was no longer possible to feel those“Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer” that Nat King Cole sang about. We were too frightened to go“Up on the Roof” with the Drifters, as we had before. And we searched for something that would transport us to a happy place in our minds, as the Beach Boys had done with their singularly American images in “Surfin’ U.S.A.”. As the summer of 1963 faded into autumn, we were not prepared for the enormity of the changes that we would soon face. We were unworldly, ingenuous, and trusting. I guess that’s what I miss the most about the summer of 1963. MSM
Coastal Apartments & Cottages
playing hard all day, that you slept soundly with the lapping of waves on the beach as a lullaby. The sun seemed to shine most of the time that Summer. The parents were enjoying their vacations and laughing a lot. A few of the older kids pushed the limits, but most of us behaved pretty well and got along with each other. The Country was in a pretty good place with a remarkably intelligent young family in the White House. We were unaware of major events that would change our happy world, and that is why it was, in retrospect, such a lovely time. That fall, I turned 13 on November 21st. On November 22nd, the charismatic, 46-year-old President Kennedy was killed. Everything changed. Really, everything. No longer were we a nation of innocents; now we all knew that really bad things can and do happen when you least suspect that they will. I wish we had never learned that. We changed as a country on that long, horrible weekend in
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
PRIME MOVER President Bush at Walkers Point with Zach & Sully the Dog
After the war, Bush graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Yale in 2½ years with a degree in economics and a minor in sociology. He and his wife, Barbara, moved to Texas and Bush became an oil field supply salesman and later co-founded an oil development company, a petroleum corporation while pioneering in experimental offshore drilling equipment. The future President began his public service when he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives for Texas’ 7th District serving from 1966 to 1970. In 1971, he became U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and in 1973, became Chairman of the Republican National Committee and served as Chief of the U.S. Liaison Office in China. He was appointed Director of the Central Intelligence Agency in 1976. From 1981 to 1988, he served two terms as Vice President to President Ronald Reagan.
George HW Bush, Naval Aviator Cadet
In 1989, he was elected as the 41st President of the United States.
A Tribute to President
Former President George H.W. Bush (41) is truly an American hero and a man who has lived his life dedicated to his family and has served his country in many extraordinary ways. Thank you for your service, Mr. President and God Bless your family. MSM President Bush, Mrs. Bush, and Millie the Dog leave Marine One
George Herbert Walker Bush
This story originally ran in our Winter 2019 issue.
BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
P
resident George H.W. Bush was born on June 12, 1924 in Milton, Massachusetts to Dorothy Walker Bush and Prescott Bush (Republican Senator of Connecticut 1952-1962). He married the love of his life, Barbara Pierce of Rye, New York during wartime on January 6, 1945. (She recently passed away on April 17, 2018.) Their five children are President George W. Bush (43), former Florida Governor John (Jeb) Bush, Neil, Marvin, Dorothy Bush Koch. A sixth child, Robin, died of leukemia in 1953. He has 17 grandchildren and 7 great-grandchildren. On June 12, 1942, President Bush enlisted in the Navy during World War II on his 18th birthday—the same day that he 63 • MAINE SENIORS
graduated from Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts. He became the youngest pilot in the Navy at that time, when he was commissioned as an ensign. He served aboard the USS San Jacinto, flying Grumman Avenger torpedo bombers with the 3rd and 5th Fleets. During his time in the war, Bush flew 58 missions, making 126 carrier landings, and recording 1,228 hours of flight time. He was decorated with gold wings, the Distinguished Flying Cross, an Air Medal with Gold Stars, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with Three Battle Stars, the World War II Victory Medal, the American Campaign Medal and the Selective Service Medal. He was discharged from active duty on Tuesday, September 18, 1945. Bush Family at Walker's Point, 2000 BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 6 4
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
PRIME MOVER
Philanthropist Elizabeth Noyce pledged to donate $3 million to the hospital if Mrs. Bush permitted them to use her name. Mrs. Bush said yes and noted that,“It was the nicest form of blackmail." Mr. Wells, who is currently the Vice Chairman of the Libra Foundation, added, “Barbara Bush personified the grandmother of children in America. This hospital has been a great tribute to her. It is one of the twenty-five leading children’s hospitals in the United States."
Barbara Bush at Barbara Bush Children's Hospital
Mrs. Bush’s daughter-in-law, Margaret Bush said, “If you looked up volunteerism in the dictionary there would be a picture of my mother-in-law. She was truly the definition of volunteerism. She has been extremely inspiring her entire adult life... I have observed so many selfless efforts on her part to give her support to the local community. She spent all of her birthdays for years visiting the children at the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital and reading to them. She would bring one of her small dogs with her, which of course brought great joy to these very sick children—and that’s how she spent her own birthday.”
A Tribute to
Barbara
Bush BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI & SHELAGH TALBOT
B
arbara Pierce Bush had the ability to touch and inspire everyone she met. She was the wife of the 41st President of the United States, George Herbert Walker Bush and the mother of the 43rd President, George Walker Bush. She served as First Lady of the United States from 1989 to 1993 and was the matriarch and muse for her large family of altruistic high-achievers. Every summer for the past 72 years, she and her family lived on their compound on Walker’s Point, Kennebunkport, Maine. Mrs. Bush told Maine Seniors magazine that what she liked about Kennebunkport were the people. Betsy Hemingway, her close friend for over 45 years recalled, “Barbara had an extraordinary sense of humor. She was very self-deprecating and fun to be with. She was extremely sensible and down to earth and remained that way through the White House years.” 65 • MAINE SENIORS
The former First Lady loved dogs and flowers. “She wrote a letter of support in order to get people in town to allow dogs on the beach,” said Mrs. Hemingway. Barbara also had a beautiful garden at Walker’s Point. “It was her pride and joy and she knew where every flower was,” Mrs. Hemingway added. Mrs. Bush’s daughter, Dorothy“Doro” Walker Bush Koch said,“My mother was a great example of a ‘doer’. She was talented and creative, and she loved her garden in Kennebunkport. Her mission was to leave Walker’s Point more beautiful than when she found it. She planted things for the future.” There is also a garden in Kennebunkport dedicated to her called,“Ganny’s Garden”. It is surrounded by stone walls engraved with all the initials of her grandchildren. Officially named in 1995, Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital is a hospital within Portland’s Maine Medical Center. During its start, Owen Wells was Vice Chairman of Maine Medical Center.
Due to her inspiration, the Barbara Bush Children’s Hospital is the cornerstone of the Raising Readers program. Mr. Wells noted, “Every child born in Maine receives books funded by the Libra Foundation’s Raising Readers program. Every hospital, pediatrician and well-baby clinic in Maine has books
Barbara with President Bush at Walker's Point
that they give to their children patients. Maine is the only state in the United States where all of the children receive books until age five.” Thank you, Mrs. Bush, for helping to enrich our State of Maine by choosing to live here for so many years along with your husband, President George H. W. Bush and your very lovely family. You have made this state and our country a much better place because you were a very lovable, thoughtful and inspiring woman. We are all proud that you chose to always come home to Maine. You will be sorely missed. May you rest in peace. MSM This story originally ran in our June 2018 issue.
A Memorial for Barbara Bush in Kennebunkport Photo by Beth Simpson Robie
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
GORDON ANDERSON // OCEAN PARK, ME
HIS HANDIWORK COMES FROM THE HEART. WE MADE IT STRONGER THAN EVER.
Bill
Haggett BY KITTY WHEELER
B
ill Haggett hails from the Bath area. He is a hometown boy who graduated from Morse High School in 1952 and Colby College four years later.
When Gordon began acting incoherently while resting in his home, his wife immediately called 911 and he was taken to Maine Medical Center. Working closely with his local cardiologist at Southern Maine Health Care, Gordon’s medical team found he was an ideal candidate for a revolutionary miniaturized pacemaker. With peace of mind, and pace of heart, Gordon happily returned to the simpler things in life. Compassionate care. Coordinated care. Through MaineHealth, you are connected to better.
Grass has never grown under his feet. Today, Haggett is Chair of the Board and CEO of Pineland Farms Natural Meats, Inc. and Pineland Farms Naturally Potatoes. The Creamery, a recent Pineland Farm cheese business, has folded into the potato company. Libra Foundation, the largest owner of these for-profit companies, supports sustainable businesses for the state of Maine to enhance its economy. Long before he embraced cattle, potatoes and cheeses, Haggett worked at Bath Iron Works, and by the time he left in 1992, he had become president of the company.After another stint as head of five different Irving shipyards in St. Johns, New Brunswick, Haggett retired in 1997. However, he was not ready to fade away. Community activities whisked him and his wife, Sally, into action. A major capital campaign was underway in Bath for the
Imagine a network of hospitals, health care providers, and specialists, built with your needs at the very center. We did – that’s MaineHealth.
Champion for Maine Businesses & Community Affairs
new Family YMCA. The Haggetts dove right in as campaign chairs in 1998 and helped raise $7 million. A thriving Family Y continues to draw new members today. Then Governor John Baldacci tapped Haggett to lead the newly formed Hospitals in Maine Commission. Its recommendations rang hollow to the medical institutions, and therefore, nothing happened. Undaunted, Bill turned to a committee formed in late 2005 to look into consolidation of the school districts in the Bath area. He felt strongly that the existing schools needed to be regionalized to improve the quality of education and to operate more efficiently. Local voters approved the consolidation two years later, to the great satisfaction of Haggett. Hometown Bath boy, Bill Haggett, has generously shared his talents in the work place and community service for close to 60 years. He is truly a Prime Mover, and his efforts benefit Maine in many ways. Maine is a far richer state with Bill Haggett in it. MSM This story originally ran in our January 2014 issue.
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HEALTHLess TREASURES A Trail Traveled
A Trail Less Traveled we could afford were remote and rustic ones available on paper company leased lots. The ambiguity of owning a building but not the land took some getting used to, but for many families, like ours, it was the only option. In essence we bought the structure but had no firm hold on the rocky slope it was built upon. We spent seven summers at Loon Call Camp. Our two young daughters were drawn to the water and swam like otters while the dogs paddled in worried circles around them. Both kids caught their first ever fish off the rickety dock, and learned to paddle a canoe and a kayak under our watchful eyes. We built a fire pit along the water’s edge, and cooked hot dogs on sticks, and toasted marshmallows and made s’mores. We played marathon scrabble and card games under hissing Coleman lanterns, and scribbled the scores on paper plates, and pinned them on the rafters. There were no TV’s, video games, iPods, tablets or smart phones; just an old radio playing hushed music or a Red Sox game in the background. We would read books by flashlight in the loft and laugh and talk and fall asleep to the lapping of the water and the call of the loons.
Summers at Loon Call Camp We all should have the opportunity to experience owning a camp on the water, and it doesn’t have to be expensive or fancy.
I
owned a rustic camp on a Maine trout pond back in the early 90’s. The camp was just over an hour drive from home. It had one main room, a second floor loft, and a small screened in porch I built on the front. It was just a stone’s toss from the water’s edge. There was no electricity or indoor plumbing. We drew water from the pond with an old hand pump for washing dishes and carried in drinking water. The outhouse doubled as a storage shed and depending on wind 69 • MAINE SENIORS
STORY AND PHOTOMONTAGE
BY BRAD EDEN
direction proved to be placed a tad too close to the camp. It had a wood stove, a propane range, and an ancient Servel gas refrigerator that I never really trusted. Once you navigated the half-mile stretch of camp road, which was basically impassable during winter and spring mud season, you parked above the camp and poked your way down a steep path strewn with rocks and roots. The blue of the pond would begin to filter through the trees and soon the red stained siding would come into view and you knew you had made it to Loon Call Camp. I had always dreamed of owning my own hunting and fishing camp, and a place for my young family to spend time together outdoors. But, it soon became apparent that the only camps
Like everything in life, things change and the kids grew older and less interested in going “upta” camp. My wife and I would spend weekends at camp but it wasn’t the same without the pitter-patter of little human feet. I continued to hunt and fish there, and snow shoed in every winter to shovel snow off the roof and slide in fresh propane tanks over the frozen pond. I’m not sure if the Maine tradition of owning affordable camps on leased lots is popular or even feasible these days. Back then, the paper companies that owned the land surrounding the myriad of ponds and lakes throughout much of northern Maine tossed the properties between themselves like a hot potato, until finally selling much of it to Boston investment firms. Some camp owners were offered the land for sale. We weren’t one of those lucky ones and decided it was time to sell. Looking back now, I don’t remember as much the brook trout I caught or the partridge I bagged, but I think of my children when they were young, and we were all together at camp. Loon Call Camp paid dividends not found in a bank account. It was much more than just a small, ramshackle building perched on a hardscrabble hillside overlooking a pond. It was family. MSM BEST OF ISSUE 2019 • 7 0
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
PRIME MOVER Bob Crowley and his daughter Page
Crowley Bob
A True Survivor BY LARRY GRARD
B
ob Crowley is a perfect role model for Maine’s senior power.A decade ago, at age 57, he became the oldest winner of the CBS reality show “Survivor” and the $1 million that went with it. Bob also won an additional $100,000 as the “player of the season”. “Before (Survivor), after and now, we’ve always been on the same page,” Bob’s wife, Peggy said.“It’s not like one was against the other. We’ve always believed (the Survivor money) was a gift for both of us, not just for Bob.” “We realized how fortunate we were,” Bob remembered telling his wife back in 2012. He had suggested back then that they should pinpoint something for Maine people with the winnings.
Crowley and his family – wife Peggy, daughter Page, and son David – remain committed to charitable giving and have raised money for veterans, Special Olympians, people associated with the Center for Grieving Children of South Portland and others to stay free of charge at the Maine Forest Yurts in Durham. Although the Survivor Challenge is no longer held on their property, Bob Crowley and his family will continue to raise money for free stays at Maine Forest Yurts by helping with fund-raisers at AMVETS in Harpswell and other events in the area. Recently, in exchange for some expertise Bob lent L.L Bean in setting up a yurt, he secured a $1,000 donation to his Durham Warriors Project. “My mother and father were both veterans,” Bob explained. “They brought me up to show gratitude for what veterans have done. I just wanted to say ‘thank you.’ I’ve been a lucky MSM person all my life.” This story originally ran in our March 2018 issue.
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The Crowley family poses during a Durham Warriors Survival Challenge. From left are daughter Page, son David, wife Peggy, Bob Crowley, and John Vataha
The couple had owned the property around Runaround Pond, site of the challenge, for years. Then they bought the big farm across the road in 2013, and moved there from South Portland. They built a number of cozy yet rustic yurts - The Maine Forest Yurts - scattered on the property for deserving veterans to stay in and de-stress. “We wanted a winter campground, and we wanted to do something for nonprofits in Maine, such as veterans,” Bob recalled. That was also the beginning of the Durham Warriors Challenge, a 501(c) 3 nonprofit. This challenge, a remarkable imitation of the “Survivor,” show, made its fifth and final run at the Crowley’s expansive property in Durham in 2017. 71 • MAINE SENIORS
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
PRIME MOVER
Leavitt patsy
level of wellness for themselves. This does not mean that we can cure every disease they may have, though if we can, we do. It also means that we help people live with chronic disease, chronic pain, chronic sorrow and other realities of life the best that they can.”
Caring for the Least of These
Leavitt’s Mill Free Health Care is available at no cost for anyone who does not have insurance (i.e. Mainecare, Medicare, private insurance) and there are no income guidelines.
BY CATHY GENTHNER
If you are interested in volunteering or donating, or are in need of healthcare services, please, visit www.leavittsmill.org. MSM
T
he founder of the Leavitt’s Mill Free Health Center in Buxton believes health care is a human right. Nurse Practitioner Patsy Thompson Leavitt, 62, of Buxton, grew up learning and seeing that people deserve health care, regardless of their ability to pay.
Leavitt learned by example from her father, Dr. William Thompson, whose residencies included Maine Medical in Portland. Thompson served as a surgeon in the Korean War, where he treated U.S. soldiers as well as poor Korean villagers. It was in Korea where he served alongside fellow Dr. Richard Hornberger, the author of the MASH novel. Thompson encouraged Hornberger to get his book published, which turned out to be a very successful career move. Throughout his career, Thompson worked as a general surgeon but was known as a “generous surgeon,” reaching out to poor families in need in rural Maine, the homeless on Cape Cod as well as Native Americans on Montana reservations. He not only advocated for universal healthcare as a right, but put his convictions into practice by providing medical care for free and supplementing his income by taking up odd jobs to support his wife and six children. “When I was a young girl, we lived in Pittsfield, Maine where dad served as the town doctor. This was before the advent of Medicaid and Medicare and so many people were poor there,” said Leavitt. “Dad was always willing to give them a helping
73 • MAINE SENIORS
This story originally ran in our September 2018 issue.
hand and he never forced anyone to pay, if they couldn’t. Many people would pay with potatoes or apples. In order to pay the mortgage and buy food for us, my dad worked for our neighbor digging ditches to make ends meet. For this reason, my dad has always been an advocate for ‘socialized medicine’ or what we would call ‘universal healthcare.’ I grew up understanding that this was the way things should be and that reaching out to help others was part of adult life.” Leavitt’s commitment to healthcare as a right for all continues to drive her to make it more available to more people. Since the clinic started in 2003, it has served over 1900 people and has a patient roster of 250 people, mostly from York and Cumberland Counties. Leavitt believes the key to a healthy life is for people to become involved and responsible for their health. “As important as health care itself is, helping people to realize their own health potential is even more fundamental. As a nurse and a nurse practitioner, I am educated to help people achieve the highest
Patriots Chairman and CEO Robert Kraft and Patriots and Pro Football Hall of Famer Andre Tippett congratulate Patricia Thompson Leavitt from the Leavitt’s Mill Free Health Center for being selected as the 2018 Myra Kraft Community MVP Award grand prize winner. During the June 12 luncheon, the Kraft family and the New England Patriots Foundation awarded $275,000 in grants to 26 New England nonprofits. The Leavitt’s Mill Free Health Center received a $25,000 grant in honor of Leavitt’s volunteer efforts. (photo courtesy of Eric J. Adler/New England Patriots)
Successful Aging Expos Do you need information to help your loved ones (or yourself) age well?
Come to our FREE fall expos, 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Southern Maine Successful Aging Expo and Forum October 3, 2019 Hilton Garden Inn, Park Street, Freeport Seacoast Successful Aging Expo October 16, 2019 Kittery Community Center, Roger’s Road, Kittery Thanks to our media partner: Sponsored by: Salvation Army
Maine Seniors magazine MidCoast/Parkview Health
FMI: DMcLean@MaineSeniorGuide.com
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Recreation - Wildlife - History - Culture
BUCKET LIST
Visit the Gems of
Route
Maine State Building From Gray to South Paris
Up, Up & Away!
26
Locals and visitors from every corner of the world are encouraged to experience these rare and unique places. All less than an hour from each other on picturesque Route 26 in Western Maine.
BY LOIS N. NEALLEY
W
hen I was young I was intrigued with trains, planes and cruise ships. I didn’t know where they were going, but like Bing Crosby, I knew they were going to “Far Away Places” and they were, "calling me”.
I was such a dreamer! In fact, a teacher once told my mother and me that if “Day-Dreaming” were a subject on my report card I would most certainly get an A+. (I’m not sure she thought that was a good thing…I know my mother didn’t.) However, reality nudges us every once in a while, so when it did, my day-dreaming about traveling took a backseat to my “real” life. My “real” life kept me busy for many years …then all of a sudden, I was a retired grandmother, So what next? Well, with the help of a little serendipity and a few dear friends, I reached into the backseat for all those travel dreams…and was able to make many of them come true. When one does travel fairly extensively over a twenty-year period, one quite often covers “Bucket List” items by being in the right place at the right time. In fact, I can check off a long list right now. I was so fortunate.
gentle rap on the door and greeted with coffee and biscuits. Then it was off to climb into our safari vehicles. On one of these morning I saw a “Bucket List” item I will never forget. On the plains, the guide slowly stopped and pointed off in the distance. The sun was just barely coming up and we weren’t sure what we were looking at. Two or three large dark “blobs” blocked out part of our light as they moved slowly across the everbrightening horizon As the sun touched these strange shapes that were moving slowly upward, beautiful colors appeared…then we knew. We were looking at hot air balloons. We probably had all seen hot air balloons before, but never like this! The sun, the wide plains, the scraggly scrub trees, the silhouettes of zebras, impalas, and other grazers moving about slowly in the distance…and above it all these beautiful rainbow-colored observers moving ever so silently…it was a sight I will never forget.
Probably one of the highlights of my globetrotting adventures was a trip to Kenya for a safari into the Maasai Mara Game Reserve. We were very comfortably housed in Camp Kia Ora.
Our trip ended before there was time for a balloon ride in Kenya, but years later, early one morning on my way to work, I spied a hot air balloon floating silently over the Penobscot River in Bangor. I thought about how beautiful it must be from up there, or for that matter from almost anywhere in Maine. Maybe one doesn’t have to go very far from home to activate that ‘Bucket List’!
In the morning (5:30 or 6:00 AM) we were awakened to a
"Up, Up and Away…”
75 • MAINE SENIORS
MSM
Sabbathday Lake Shaker Village
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• Poland Spring Resort and Golf Course • All Souls Chapel (1912)
• Maine State Building (1893) Poland Spring Bottling Museum
• Poland Spring Bottling Musuem (1907)
• McLaughlin Garden and Homestead (1936) beautiful gardens, a historic home, gift shop.
All are truly the “Gems of 26” A family can spend a day or several days visiting these important and interesting destinations. Poland Spring Resort
For more information visit www.gemsof26.com.
PRIME MOVER
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
S
tephen and Tabitha King met and fell in love in their college library. They have been successfully married for over forty-five years. Their mutual admiration and love for each other is unmistakable. As seniors, they remain active in their careers and in the Maine community. Both agree that they choose to reside in Maine because they could not imagine living anywhere else. They are dedicated to the people and institutions of their home state. Stephen King says,“Do unto others, but don’t make a big deal about it. And give a bunch away. No one’s going to bury you with a loaded billfold.” And most notably, he says, “Maine is a great place to be a senior!”
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Stephen was born September 21, 1947 in Portland, Maine.
Stephen & Tabitha
KING BY PAULETTE OBOYSKI
Stephen and Tabitha
For this story, both were asked,“What would you like Maine Seniors readers to know about you?” Stephen responded, “That I’m basically just a regular Maine guy—born here, went to school here, live here, expect to die here…but hopefully not this week.” Stephen keeps fit by walking at least three miles a day, doing sit-ups and playing tennis. Tabitha says,“I have wrinkles, wear any damn rag that comes to hand so long as it covers my naughty bits, and find toast and tea a gourmet supper.” She gardens extensively, growing a wide variety of hybrid daylilies. She also enjoys kayaking and foraging for mushrooms. Stephen and Tabitha met in college at the University of Maine at Orono in the Raymond Fogler Library where they were work-study students. Stephen recalls,“The whole crew usually ate lunch al fresco on the lawn outside the Bear’s Den. We also both frequented the Coffee House, near the (now defunct) University Cabins, and attended a poetry seminar together. I was very impressed with her poetry, which was rational as well as beautiful. Eventually we became a couple. We were friends before we were lovers, which is—just my opinion—the best basis for a long-lasting relationship.” Tabitha gave reasons why their marriage has been such a success: “We had some things going for us. Books to be sure. We’ve both been four-eyes since childhood. We understand
Photo by Cheryl McKeary 77 • MAINE SENIORS
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PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors in the Room, which was a short story about Stephen’s mother. He was nominated for an academy award for this movie. Through his close association with Stephen, he later went on to direct, write screenplays and/or produce movies such as Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist. Stephen says, “People deserve a hand up.” It seems that everything that the Kings do leads to opportunities for others. The Kings also own a few radio stations in Maine. WKIT is their rock and roll station located in Bangor. It is manned 24/7 by“rock jocks” and it is the number one rock station in the state.
On September 10, 2015, President Barack Obama awarded Stephen King the National Medal of Arts. The National Medal of Arts website states that he was endowed with this honor, “for his contributions as an author. One of the most popular and prolific writers of our time, Mr. King combines his remarkable storytelling with his sharp analysis of human nature. For decades, his works of horror, suspense, science fiction, and fantasy have terrified and delighted audiences around the world. The National Medal of the Arts is the highest award given to artists and arts patrons by the federal government.”
Our very own Maine Seniors got its start as a radio show on Stephen King’s radio stations before it became a magazine. It was aired on The Zone on AM and The Pulse on FM. The show was on the air long enough to secure solid categories of content and then publisher, David Nealley, decided to create the magazine as it exists today. David is just one of many Mainers who are grateful for the generosity of the Kings. When interviewed about the Kings, former Maine Governor King's radio station. Photo by Sam Rapaport
each other enough to know we don’t understand each other fully. We have much in common, and much not in common, and much uncommon in common. We accept that change is constant in life and that paradox is to be expected and possibly entertaining. Neither of us has ever stopped learning and wanting to learn. We find most of the same things funny.” Dollar Babies
The Kings have given many people a start in their careers. One example of this is Stephen’s Dollar Babies Program. It gives film students the opportunity to produce a movie from a list of Stephen King stories. All they have to do is pay a dollar for the rights and they can make a movie. They must sign a contract, which states that they will not make any profit and must provide Stephen King with a DVD of the finished product. Notably, Hollywood’s Frank Darabont got his start in filmmaking as a Dollar Baby. As a young man, Darabont entered the Dollar Babies Program and produced, A Woman 79 • MAINE SENIORS
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John Baldacci said, “Stephen and Tabitha King are two compassionate people who are dedicated to helping the people and institutions of Maine. They encourage reading and through their foundation, they support libraries because many libraries may not be able to get money for things that are not book specific. The Kings are very nice people. The people of Maine could not find better friends than Stephen and Tabitha King. With all that they have, they are very well grounded – their feet are firmly planted in Maine. “One time, they helped Maine troops arriving from Iran and Afghanistan get home in a timely manner. Stephen and Tabitha provided the transportation home from their dropoff point in New York. They also donate books to the troops.” Stephen says that he and his wife established the Stephen and Tabitha King (STK) Foundation “in the late eighties when it became clear to us that we should be sharing our own good
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Stephen King and Former Governor John Baldacci
Dedication of Tabitha Spruce King Wing in Old Town Public Library, 1991. From left to right: Valerie Osborne speaking, Maine State Librarian Gary Nichols, and Stephen & Tabitha King.
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fortune.“ Since that time they have given millions of dollars to Maine non-profits. Part of their mission was to focus on libraries, but they also wanted to give aid to education, health care facilities, public safety departments, land conservation and some artistic endeavors as well. Tabitha’s sister, Stephanie Spruce Leonard, is the administrator for the STK Foundation. Although she does much of the work for the Foundation, she will not take any credit for it. She praises her sister, Tabitha and brother-in-law, Stephen for their humble generosity. The Foundation gives upwards of 3.5 to 5 million dollars annually to Maine non-profits. She does admit that this Foundation’s work has been a geography and a civics lesson for her. She says, “Through my work with the STK Foundation I have learned about the State of Maine towns, their locations, their needs and their visions for the future. Every day we receive thank you letters from people who have benefitted from the grants. This foundation is a The King's red house in Bangor.
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
source for non-profits when Federal and State funds are not available. We receive over 1,000 applications a year.” Stephen and Tabitha King have been reluctant to talk about their generosity to the Maine community. The STK Foundation awards approximately 125 to 130 grants per year. Recently, they were told that it is a good idea to talk about their altruism because it might inspire others who have the monetary means to do the same—give it away for a good cause. Tabitha King says,“As kids who grew up poor, we want others to have the educational opportunities that we had. The most rewarding aspect of our foundation is giving back. We were nurtured by our communities as kids and know it is the right thing to do.” There are 260+ libraries in Maine; most have received grants from the Kings and quite often, more than once. Stephanie Leonard, STK Foundation administrator, said, “It would be easier to name the few libraries in Maine that have not received grants in the past. If they have not gotten a grant, most likely they have never applied for one.”
Kings of Bangor
Bangor may very well be the luckiest city in Maine. The Kings have resided here for a number of years. They have generously helped improve the community in many ways. The Mayor of Bangor, Nelson Durgin, confirms, “Stephen and Tabitha King have been very generous to the Bangor community. For example, they gave the funding to build Mansfield Stadium, which is an up-to-date baseball and sports field. They have supported many area non-profits, which help the elderly and the needy. Both have recognized their roots in Maine and as a result of their talents they have been able to give back to the community where they now live. They have also helped boost tourism in Bangor. The first question that tourists ask when they arrive in Bangor is: ‘Where is Stephen King’s home?’” The King residence in Bangor includes a couple of Victorian mansions—one is red and one is white—and they are surrounded by beautiful, well-tended gardens. The property is located right near the center of the city. This large acreage is enclosed with a black wrought iron fence with the most
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Stephen and Tabitha Photo by Cheryl McKeary
PRIME MOVER • The Best of Maine Seniors
intricately designed gate and posts, decorated with bats, spiders and gargoyles. The estate has replaced Paul Bunyan’s statue as the number one tourist attraction of Bangor—and unlike Paul Bunyan, the Kings are not mythical—they are real. Some of Stephen King’s horror movies have been filmed in and around Bangor. As a result, the Internet website Trip Advisor says that Bangor has been dubbed, Transylmainia.
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It is obvious to most of us that Stephen and Tabitha King could just ride off into the sunset and live a life of leisure. Yet, they have stayed very active in both professional pursuits and in their benevolence with a wide variety of organizations. Due to their involvement and generosity, they have made Maine a better place for all of us. In doing so, they are an inspiration MSM for us to give back to our communities.
AUG 7 - 24
This story originally ran in our October 2015 issue.
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memories
Mist
in the
A
s we grow older, our minds often wander back in time—. It’s an addiction, in that we require a nostalgic fix, a memory journey into the past, perhaps to a simpler place in time. Like old vines, their roots deep in the soil, still producing top notch wine, certain memories invigorate our soul giving us sustenance—I call it nostalgic nourishment. Seasons seep away. Hair fades to gray. Gray matter fogs our Maine memories. I remember vacationing in Jonesport. Even as a kid, I knew I was somewhere different, an authentic piece of Down East Maine where hard-working people barely managed a living. My grandparents lived on a tranquil lane that dead-ended at Sawyer Cove. I remember the silver doorbell on the seldom used front door—it had a shrill ring. On the porch, I’d lie in a worn gray 87 • MAINE SENIORS
BY HUNTER HOWE
navy hammock reading the adventures of the Hardy Boys. Best of all, I’d steal my grandfather’s BB gun, swipe empty milk bottles from a neighbor’s doorstep, and pop ‘em on the rocks below. I remember the cheerleader’s megaphone abandoned in the rafters high above the workshop, the Aunt Jemima cookie jar chock full of treats, and the cistern that supplied backup water for the house. I remember the penny candy store in a timeworn shack up the road, Danny Hall’s general store where I purchased rubber balls to toss against the back of the barn, and the tiny post office where individual wooden boxes held the mail. In melancholy moments, when I need nostalgic nourishment, I think back to the joy in Jonesport. I sure miss it. It’s a good place MSM to make memories in, our Maine.
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