Nikki Tropeano joins the Pemi staff as Alumni Community Coordinator.

The Pemigewassett Board of Directors and the Fauver and Reed families are delighted to announce that Nicole Wilkinson Tropeano has joined the Pemi team as Alumni Community Coordinator, a newly created position aimed to serve and support a crucial constituency of our camp community.

Nikki grew up at the camp as the stepdaughter of Scott Withrow, the fabled Head of Music, and his wife Kay. Her formal roles at Pemi were many, beginning in the kitchen as a dishwasher and then a trip meal specialist, moving on to work in the office and then as an Assistant Counselor, Counselor, Head of Waterfront, Trip Leader, and then finally taking on the key positions of both Head of Staff and Head of Program. It’s hard to imagine anyone who wasn’t once “a boy” having a better handle on how Pemi operates. Nikki’s role as a member and recent President of the Rittner Fund Board has kept her closely involved in year-to-year operations and further consolidated her relationship with many alumni. Nikki’s Pemi credentials are striking, and along with her long and unquestioned love of camp, put her in a position to do a wonderful job.

Nikki’s training and experience in the professional world only add to our excitement in having hired her and our confidence that her impact will be immediate and profound. Nikki is a graduate of the College of Wooster, and earned a M.Ed. in Administration and Supervision at Antioch University New England. She was Director of the Middle School at Browne Academy in Alexandria, VA, before moving to Thayer Academy, in Braintree, MA where she served as Director of the Middle School. It’s our great good fortune that the recent birth of Nikki and husband Todd’s daughter, Brooklyn, has led Nikki to modify her career path, moving from secondary school administration to sign on with us.

Nikki will be in touch soon with her own vision for moving the alumni community forward. Most importantly, she will seek your vital input on such varied events and possibilities as:

• Pemi’s 105^th Reunion, slated for August 17-19, 2012
• Off-site gatherings that reflect Pemi’s instructional program of Sports, Nature, Music & Art, and Trips.
• The Pemi Blog: articles featuring alums or written by alums
• Bean Soup: digitalizing past editions
• Alumni networking: for college visits, in the workplace, and to support former campers who take the Pemi spirit and ethos into the world.

We couldn’t be more pleased to have added Nikki to the organization. If you know her already, you’ll be as thrilled as we are that she’s signed on as our Alumni Community Coordinator. If you’ve yet to meet her, we’re certain you’ll be quickly taken with her energy, dedication, charm, and hearty devotion to everything Pemigewassett. We look forward to working with her – and through her, with our Pemi alumni – for many years to come.

Ed Bemis, left, with fellow Pemi driver Butch Pease.

We recently received word of the death at age 88 of long-time Pemi employee, Ed Bemis. Given Ed’s many years of service – and well over a half century of neighborly friendship with us in the Town of Wentworth – it seems only fitting to say a few appreciative words about him here.

Ed first came to work as a driver when we were still transporting boys in the back of open trucks. For close to two decades, well after we relegated the big stake-body to moving laundry and switched over to van and bus transport, Ed was as safe and responsible in that position as anyone we have ever had. Far more than that, however, Ed was unfailingly cheerful and friendly with anyone from the youngest Junior camper to the oldest ex-director or alumnus. His sunny and out-going disposition in turn brought the warmth and good cheer out of others, who could never see him drive by without yelling “Bemis!” and giving their own version of his sanitized but plucky raised-arm “salute.”

I supervised Ed’s driving for most of the years he was with us. Ed was absolutely dependable. If you asked him to have a bus in the Junior Camp at 10:30 to take two cabins to Mt. Cube, Ed would be there with two packs filled with lunches.  If you told him to pick up a 2-day at Mt. Cardigan at 3 PM, he would be there. If, however, he knew he didn’t have any other responsibilities that afternoon other than getting the troops back for supper, the van wouldn’t roll in until 5:55 and then disgorge a crowd of happy boys right in front of the mess hall. “Where were you Ed?” “Well, you didn’t say what time to get them back, so I took them for a tour of the dowel factory in Plymouth.” What could you say?

Ed was a tireless but enthralling conversationalist, the Ancient Mariner of New Hampshire roads. He was, in fact, a Navy vet – a Seabee in the South Pacific – and he’d sometimes share his rich and often hilarious tales of service during WW II. More frequently though, as you’d ride with him, say, over the shoulder of Moosilauke to North Woodstock, he’d fill you in on every person in every house along the whole route – what they did, who they’d married, what kind of car they used to own, something funny that had once happened to them or to their kids. Ed knew everyone in the area – as everyone knew him – and he had an inimitable talent for talking about them in a way that might have brought a hint of a blush if they’d been listening but that was always filled with underlying affection and charity. If we’ve ever been “all in it together” with anyone, it was with Ed. To know him was to like him. For him to know you was to be liked by everyone with whom he spoke.

Part of Ed’s voluminous local knowledge came from his role in the off-season as the guy who hauled the mail from Warren and Wentworth to Plymouth. Part of it came from his running, for decades, the Texaco station at the junction of 25 and 25-A: everyone got their gas there, and kids flocked to the cooler for the chilly bottles of birch beer that you couldn’t find anywhere else. Part of it came from the fact that “Bemis Septic Service” pumped the tanks and cess-pools of virtually everyone in the area, and Ed clearly saw and learned a whole lot as he’d chat with clients while the infamous Poopa-Scoopa (aka “The Honey Wagon”) chugged away. Ed later turned this colorful business to minor additional profits when he came out with his famed “Bemis Septic Service” tee-shirt, with its storied motto blazoned beneath the image of a winning poker hand: “A Royal Flush Beats a Full House.” These are now treasured collectors’ items. Look for them soon on Antiques Road Show.

Extolling Ed’s virtues would not be complete without mentioning what Ed did at camp between driving assignments. If he wasn’t pulling the gang-mower around camp on the old Ford tractor or spreading gravel in pot-holes on the road to the Junior Camp, Ed was always to be found on the porch of the Lodge, playing ping pong with anyone who cared to pick up a paddle. It was always “I play the winner” for Bemis wannabes, and as enthusiasts from the youngest denizen of Junior One to Tom Reed Sr. lined up to slap a ball around, Ed was only rarely knocked out of the competition and away from the table. That was fine by everyone, though, because the person they all really wanted to play with was Bemis. He was as steady as a brick wall and as cheerful and supportive as a Cub Scout den mother. He played just hard enough to beat whomever he was up against, and he was always – here and everywhere else – the vivid, knowledgeable, and hilarious color commentator on his own athletic performance.

Ed was an original. Anyone who ever knew him could tell you that as well as I. It was our distinct honor and privilege to have him as a friend and colleague for as long as we did. So here’s to Ed, and to everything he was and did for us.  Somewhere in another Valley, higher up in the Whites, he’s ready with a story and a grin. He’s freeing his arm for that sanitized salute.

“Hey! Bemis!”

– Tom Reed, Jr.

NOTE:

A memorial service for Ed will be held at 1 pm on May 15 beginning at the cemetery opposite his old garage station in Wentworth and followed by a reception at his daughter’s home at 650 Atwell Hill. All are welcome.

Ed’s children have established a scholarship fund in Ed Bemis’s name for a Wentworth high school graduate who hopes to continue on to higher education. Donations can be mailed to:

Please write “Ed Bemis Scholarship Fund” on the check.

]]> http://blog.camppemi.com/news/edmund-s-bemis-jr-nov-28-1922-march-29-2011/feed/ 9 http://blog.camppemi.com/news/thomas-lloyd-reed-sr-may-3-1916-july-21-2010/ http://blog.camppemi.com/news/thomas-lloyd-reed-sr-may-3-1916-july-21-2010/#comments Fri, 23 Jul 2010 17:00:35 +0000 camppemi http://blog.camppemi.com/?p=554 It is with a combination of sadness, appreciation, and - paradoxically - a quiet sense of rightness that we pass along word of the death of Tom Reed, Sr., long-time director and son of one of the founders of Pemigewassett. Tom died peacefully at his house on the Hill at Camp, surrounded by his family and by friends and colleagues of many years.]]> It is with a combination of sadness, appreciation, and – paradoxically – a quiet sense of rightness that we pass along word of the death of Tom Reed, Sr., long-time director and son of one of the founders of Pemigewassett. Tom died peacefully at his house on the Hill at Camp, surrounded by his family and by friends and colleagues of many years.

Tom had been challenged by failing health for a number of months, and it was remarkably gratifying for him to be able to make it back to Pemi in June. Once here, Tom was visibly buoyed by his return to the spot and to the community that he had given so very much to over the years. He attended the last meeting of pre-season staff training and gave his wonted inspirational speech about how something as routine as a distance swim can work true wonders in the life of a boy. He enjoyed the annual 4th of July Peerade, watched several baseball and soccer games from the sidelines, and, in a manner many of you will smile to remember, bellowed from his porch on one particularly sunny morning as sleepy boys stumbled out of their cabins, “Leap out of bed with a glad cry. Let’s do some jumping jacks and then into the lake!”

Tom was where he wanted to be, with the people he loved and who loved him. He saw the 103rd season begin with energy and purpose, and the contentment and solace which that brought him may have been what allowed him to slip away. The staff had been told several days ago that Tom was poised for his next big adventure, but word was delivered to the whole community this morning at breakfast by Charlie Malcolm in a very understated but powerful way, inflected by joy for a life well lived and a mission sustained.

More will be said about Tom in other settings, and to other audiences. Let me close, though, with the text of a wonderful tribute that was paid to Tom upon his retirement as managing director at the Final Banquet of the 1987 season. It accompanied a photo montage of that very successful season. Drafted by Fred Seebeck, Rob Grabill, Lance Latham, and Dean Ellerton, it does as good a job as could be done of summarizing the many blessings Tom brought to Pemi during the six decades he had already thrown into the running of camp. Two dozen additional years spent encouraging teams, leading songs, and imparting a long life’s worth wisdom to the many who looked to him for guidance have only solidified the incomparable legacy he leaves with us all.

Representing the members of the 1987 Pemigewassett family, I present to you this symbol of our affection for you and your lifetime of devotion to Camp. You have been our leader, our supporter, our advisor, our fan, our father, and our boss. This summer you have shared your yarns and anecdotes with us; you have graced us with your love of music, be it Beethoven on CD or The Junior Camp Song in the Messhall; you have encouraged us to be prompt, well-mannered, healthy, and clean; you have enjoined us to be intense and gracious sportsmen; and you have shown us, through your dedication to your job as Director and through your good humor, that one’s work can be a labor of love. Though you and Betsy will return to “the Hill” for many years to come (we hope), we shall sorely miss your prudent judgment, your warm words of encouragement, your meticulous organization, and your charming quips and jokes. More than any one person, Tom, you are Camp Pemi – and though camp will not cease to exist upon your retirement, it will change in subtle and meaningful ways. We therefore recognize tonight the end of an era, the changing of the guard. Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, for your unselfish and enduring love for Camp and for us all. And may God bless you and Betsy with good luck, long life, and joy.

For twenty-three years, Tom and Betsy continued to enjoy those blessings. They were the richly-deserved gifts that come to those who have themselves given so much. We will let you all know as plans evolve for remembering Tom and celebrating the great love he shared with his partner of seventy years.

“And when the battle’s over, he shall wear a crown in the New Jerusalem!”

–Tom Reed, Jr.
22 July 2010