50th Reunion

Kenneth M. Waldbridge
Amherst College has threaded its way through my life over these past 50 years. After graduation and a year working for the Standard Sanitary Company in Louisville I decided I wanted to go into secondary school teaching. I did graduate work in history at Harvard for a year and then began searching for a teaching position. After months of not finding an opening I took a summer job as a counselor at camp Agawam, which was run by George Mason 's brother, Ap, Amherst '33. In August I had a letter from Bill Avirett, Amherst '16, suggesting that I see Grace Bement at the Bement School in Deerfield. I was given a job teaching social studies and carpentry along with coaching soccer, skiing and baseball. At BementI met a fellow teacher, Jean Palmer, and the next June (1940), we were married. Since then my life has never been better!

I stayed at Bement one more year, then taught a year at Berkshire School, and when Mr. Boyden, Amherst '02, offered me a job at Deerfield Academy, we went there for six years.

Kenneth M. Waldbridge
We spent our summers on Monhegan Island in Maine and in 1947 we bought an old run-down haise with a great view and protected anchorage on Hodgdon Island in Boothbay, Maine. We bought the house from M.V. Malcolm and C.H. Andrews, both Amherst '07 and classmates of my father. When my brother Bob, Amherst'36, and his family spent Christmas of 1947 with us in the house, we all decided to see if we could find a business in Maine that would support us. Bob found a plumbing and heating business in Boothbay Harbor for sale that winter. We bought it, and hung out our shingle in June, 1948. Bob took care of the technical end while I did the office work, and the business expanded and prospered over the years. Our two daughters were born in Massachusetts and our son arrived in Maine in 1950.

For the next 20 years I was involved in the usual small town fairs - selectman, school committee member and district school committee. I served on the vestry of St. Philips Episcopal Church. I was treasurer of the Wawenock Power Squadron and commodore of the Boothbay Harbor Yacht Club.

We were reminded of Amherst on many occasions. We had one eccentric elderly customer who, when he called into the office, would burst into song with the first few lines of "Lord Jeffery Amherst!" One of our biennial fall events was the Amherst-Bowdoin game in Brunswick. For years we saw Eddy Switzer, Amherst ' 26 and John Hubbard, Amherst '07, and other Amherst friends.

We have had many different kinds of boats from outboards to cruisers both power and sail. We have explored the Maine coast for these past 30 years, and boating is very much a part of our lives.

In the late 1960s when we had the opportunity my brother and I sold the business, and Jean and I bought a condominium in Florida where we spent the winter months returning to Maine each summer. We were volunteer tutors at the Deerfield Beach elementary school. Much too late in life we took up golf, and we have been enjoying the game and its associations ever since.

After ten years at the apartment on the beach in Boca Paton we loved to a villa at Delray tuies golf club in Boynton Beach. We have enjoyed joining Joe Ewen's group for the Amherst-Williams alumni golf matches played the same day as the Amherst-Williams football game. Through Joe we heard about and went on the Amherst golf trip to Scotland in May, 1984. It was a memorable experience.