Richard Fardy
PO Box 429
Billerica MA 01821
Hi Fellow Members of MHS Class of 1961,
I can’t believe how fast the years have flown by and yet some of the remembrances I have from those years at MHS are as vivid as if they happened just yesterday and I am sure many (if not all) share the same sentiment.
I still maintain my Maynard connections inasmuch as I am the euphoniumist and assistant conductor of the Maynard Community Band. I joined the band after meeting Judy DeGrappo’s uncles, Alex and Charlie, one day at Tutto’s Bowling Alley (remember— 6 whole alleys for candlepin bowling). That was in 1957, and I am still there! Alex was almost like a second father to me and taught me a great deal about music and I will always be indebted to him. I am also the assistant bandmaster of the Aleppo Shriners Brass Band located in Wilmington.
I am still a teacher at Wilmington High School and the 2011-2012 school year will be my 47th there. I currently teach AP Biology as well as anatomy and physiology to 11th and 12th grade students. I have some great kids and hope I can keep going until I at least reach the 50-year mark. Remember the Paul Newman film, “Cool Hand Luke?” In one scene in the movie a character bets that Luke can’t eat 50 hard-boiled eggs in an hour’s time (“Nobody can eat 50 eggs…)! Well, I once thought nobody (especially me) could teach for 50 years, but I am getting close to that benchmark! I also serve on the Assessment Development Committee in Biology for the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, am a past director of the Wilmington Summer School and the K-12 Science and Health Program for the Wilmington School System.
I married my sweetheart, Lydia Jewell, of Cambridge in 1971 and this summer we will celebrate our 40th anniversary. For many years she worked as early childhood education specialist and ran a very successful family child care business from which she is now enjoying a well-deserved retirement.
Our oldest son, Jim, works for O’Connor Hardware in Billerica after serving a stint in the U.S. Army. Our daughter, Lisa, is an assistant clinical professor at Regis College in Weston after having earned master’s degrees in nursing and public health at Case Western Reserve University and Dartmouth College and working in epidemiology and newborn intensive care at hospitals in Cleveland and Cincinnati. Our youngest son, Jonathan, is currently a Ph. D. candidate in Theory and Criticism at the University of Western Ontario in Canada after having earned a master’s degree at Bowling Green University in Ohio. None of our children are married so we have no grandchildren but one my students once asked me if I could be her “grandfather” since she didn’t have a living grandfather. Besides our primary house in Billerica, we have a vacation home on Great Diamond Island in Casco Bay, Portland, Maine which we enjoy during the summer and fall seasons along with our children when they can get some time off from their own busy schedules, and we have a calico cat named Sarah who is a lot of company whenever our grown children aren’t able to be with us.
I am so looking forward to seeing friends from MHS again and until then, wish everybody good health and happiness!
Rick Fardy (back in MHS days, a lot of kids called me “Dutchie”)