Ronald C. Guillotte

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Ronald C. Guillotte, 51, of Mattapoisett died April 27, 2021 peacefully, surrounded by his loving family after a courageous two-year battle with pancreatic cancer. He was the husband of Mary C. (Cooper) Guillotte.

            Born in New Bedford, son of Ronald A. and Mary Lee (Edwards) Guillotte, he grew up in Fairhaven and lived in Mattapoisett most of his adult life. He was a self-employed plasterer who was a perfectionist and artist sought after for his craft. He was a sports enthusiast and avid outdoorsman who enjoyed hunting, fishing, gardening, cooking and sharing food with his family and friends. He enjoyed spending time with his family and friends. His quick wit and jokester personality will be missed by many.

            Survivors include his wife; his parents; 4 sons, Ronald C. Guillotte, Jr. of Rochester, Jesten Guillotte of Dartmouth, Jarred Guillotte of Fairhaven, and Tommy DeBortoli and his fiancée Julie Ingham of Mattapoisett; a sister, Kelly Zucco and her husband John of Mattapoisett; 4 brothers, Lee Guillotte and his wife Christyn and Kevin Guillotte and his wife Willow, all of Fairhaven, Shaun Guillotte and his wife Kristy of Acushnet, and Timothy Guillotte and his wife Rebecca of Rochester; 5 grandchildren, Aaliyah, Daniel, Emily, Ceri and Briann; and many aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins and friends.

            His Funeral Mass will be celebrated on Saturday, May 1st at 9:00 am in St. Anthony’s Church in Mattapoisett. Visiting hours will be held on Friday, April 30th from 3-8 pm in the Saunders-Dwyer Home for Funerals, 50 County Rd., Mattapoisett. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to help offset the cost of Ron’s funeral expenses, c/o Tim Guillotte.

            For directions and guestbook, visit www.saundersdwyer.com. Please be advised that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, there are strict guidelines that must be adhered to for the safety of everyone. You MUST wear a mask to be allowed entry to the services. Please practice social distancing and avoid any close contact. Guests will be permitted to pay their respects and depart to allow the next guests to enter. Capacity at the funeral home will be limited so there could be wait times outside the funeral home.

Marion Annual Town Meeting and Town Election Update

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We are asking anyone who is interested in attending the Annual Town Meeting on Monday, May 10, at 6:45 pm at Sippican School to contact Lissa Magauran in the Town Clerk’s office to make a reservation. Due to COVID-19 Safety Protocols, there is limited seating and we want to make sure we have the capacity to ensure everyone is comfortable with the seating arrangements. There will be 3-foot social distancing in the main auditorium and 6-foot social distancing in the Library, Cafeteria, and Band Room. Each room outside of the auditorium will have audio/visual capabilities as well as moderators to assist residents if they would like to ask questions at Town Meeting. You may make a reservation by emailing (lmagauran@marionma.gov) or calling 508-748-3502 and indicating in which room you would like to sit.

            Early Voting by Mail is now available to anyone who wishes to cast their ballot ahead of the Election. You may request a ballot by using the application on the Town Website (www.marionma.gov, select Town Clerk) or by a written request signed by you; either must be returned to the Town Clerk’s office prior to Monday, May 10, and the voted ballots returned to the Town Clerk by 7:00 pm on Friday, May 14.

            There is the possibility of In-Person Early Voting beginning on May 10 and ending on May 14; however, it must be voted upon the Board of Selectmen at their May 4 meeting, so stay tuned!

Rochester COA Candidate’s Night

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The Rochester Council on Aging invites Rochester town residents to attend its annual Candidate’s Night on Thursday, May 6, at 6:00 pm. Candidate’s Night will be held at the Rochester Senior Center, 67 Dexter Rd., Rochester and via webinar.

            The link for the meeting is: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/8576249633?pwd=Q3gwcDdYL3VDNVVaQXplZkN3Ym5WQT09

The meeting ID is 857 6242 9663.  The passcode is COA.

            Face coverings and social distancing guidelines will be adhered to at the Senior Center.

            For additional information, please call the Rochester Senior Center at 508-763-8723, visit the Facebook page, or view the newsletter online at ourseniorcenter.com.

Mary Lou (Goulart) Goyette

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Mary Lou (Goulart) Goyette, 80, of Mattapoisett died Saturday, April 17, 2021 unexpectedly at St. Luke’s Hospital.  She was the wife of Rene A. Goyette.

            Born in Fairhaven, daughter of the late Manuel and Emily (Andrade) Goulart, she lived in Mattapoisett for most of her life.

            She was employed as a secretary at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company for 25 years until her retirement.

            Mary Lou enjoyed going on yearly vacations with friends and cycling. She and Rene also enjoyed touring on their Harley, often traveling thousands of miles per year.

            A private burial was held at St. John’s Cemetery in New Bedford. For online guestbook, visit www.saundersdwyer.com.

Francis E (Ted) Carey

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Francis E (Ted) Carey, 76, of Rochester, (formerly of Plymouth) passed away peacefully April 21st. He is survived by his wife of 52 years Carol (Ustaszewski) ; his sons: Francis E (Ted) Carey of Arlington and Christopher Scott Carey and his wife, Andrea, of Carver. He adored his grandchildren, Colby Scott Carey, Allyson Jewel Carey and Tiffany DaSilveira and her husband, Joshua, of Taunton. He cherished great grandchildren Aaliyah, Cayden and Cole. He is also survived by his brother, James Carey and his wife, Sarah, of Williamsburg, VA, his nieces: Meghan Nels and her husband, Travis, of Arlington, VA, Elizabeth Rowe and her husband, Nathanael of Vacaville, CA and Nephew; Timothy Carey of Brooklyn, NY. He is predeceased by his sister, Loretta Carey and his parents, Francis and Margaret Carey.

            Ted always had a smile on his face. He loved his family and country. He served in the US Army stationed in Gelnhausen, Germany where he started his family. After his service, he and his family moved to Plymouth, MA, where he was active in Plymouth Youth Soccer and Boy Scouts Troop 1620. He loved being near the water and happy to bring family and friends to the beach. Ted was an avid skier, carving turns at Waterville Valley with his family following in his tracks. His love of snow and mountains was so great, he moved to Campton NH. It served as home base as he and wife, Carol, travelled across the country and back to Europe. As the grandchildren grew older, he needed to be closer to them. He moved to the next town over. Ted found great joy watching them especially on the soccer field. He loved to cheer them on and help referees with their calls.

            Born in Cambridge in 1944, Ted grew up in Malden and graduated from Malden Catholic High School. He attended Norwich University, receiving his MBA from Southeastern Massachusetts University now UMass- Dartmouth. Ted went on to start a number of businesses including Stone-Leigh Ltd which brought him to hospitals throughout New York and New England.

            Visiting Hours will be held Sunday, April 25 from 4:00 to 6:00 pm at Bartlett Funeral home on 338 Court Street, Plymouth. A Funeral Mass will be celebrated at Monday, April 26, at 10:00 am St. Mary’s Church, 313 Court St, Plymouth. Burial will follow at Massachusetts National Cemetery in Bourne.

            Ted was diagnosed with liver cancer and was grateful for the extraordinary care he received from the Mass General Hospital Cancer Center. In lieu of flowers donations in is name can may be made to https://giving.massgeneral.org/cancer/donate/

            His family will remember Ted on the slopes, on the water and on the sidelines of a soccer field – always smiling.

Gerald (Jerry) F. Wolfe

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Gerald (Jerry) F. Wolfe of Marion, MA and Englewood, FL passed away on April 22,2021 at the age of 77. Jerry was born in Lynn, MA the son of the late Katharine J. (Fisher) Wolfe and Frederick W. Wolfe.

            Jerry was raised and educated in Saugus, MA, where he excelled in both baseball and hockey, eventually being inducted into the Saugus High School Hall of Fame.

            Jerry enjoyed music and even performed as the lead singer in the band “Jerry and the Empires” in the early 60’s.

            Following high school Jerry attended UMASS Amherst and was a member of the fraternity Theta Chi, before becoming a decorated veteran of the United States Navy.

            While stationed in Kenitra, Morocco Jerry married his beloved wife, Carol of over 50 years, before her passing in 2018.

            Jerry found a career with Kemper Insurance, eventually rising to the position of branch claims manager in 1977 until his retirement in 1998. Jerry was an avid fisherman and boater throughout his life. He was active late into his life. He enjoyed playing tennis and golf, but found great joy playing in the Englewood Softball league, both in the 60 and 70 and over leagues. He cherished the camaraderie and friendship of his teammates, both on and off the field.

            Jerry was the husband of the late Carol A. (Guttadauro) Wolfe and beloved father of the late Jeffrey Wolfe. He is survived by his daughter Cathi Possick of Bridgewater and her husband Mitch and his grandchildren Evan, Leah and Dana. Jerry also leaves his brother Bruce Wolfe, his sisters Bonnie Boyington and the late Brenda Walden, along with several nieces and nephews.

            Due to the ongoing Covid pandemic, services for Jerry will be private.

            In lieu of flowers donations in honor of Gerald may be made to: Autumn Hospice 54 Washington Street Norwell, MA 02061

Mattapoisett Tree Committee Observes Arbor Day

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Join the Tree Warden and the Tree Committee on Friday, April 30, at 10:00 am as we raise the Arbor Day flag at Mattapoisett Town Hall. The Town of Mattapoisett does an annual observance of Arbor Day to qualify for Tree City USA recognition. In addition, we sponsor a public service or educational event each year. This year we will be planting a tree at the Police Station as a memorial tree to recognize our town’s first responders: The Police, Fire, and EMTs. The tree and its accompanying plaque will be planted later this year due to the Fire Station construction. The public will be invited for this important event as well as the flag raising. The Town of Mattapoisett is celebrating its 13th year in the Tree City USA program.

Mattapoisett Woman’s Club Tag Sale

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The Mattapoisett Woman’s Club will hold a Tag Sale on May 1, from 10:00 am – 2:00 pm, at the old Bowlmor parking lot next to Ying Dynasty. The rain date is May 8.

            Also available for purchase at the Tag Sale are the specially designed MWC notecards and postcards of local scenes and flowers, and the Pathway to Planting Passport. This $10 passport will provide purchasers with special discounts for local florists and greenhouses. Most shops included will discount only on May 21, 22, 23. The exception with special dates are Village Gardens (May 17-23) and TomCat Daylily Farm (the month of July).

            If you need a wonderful gift idea for Mother’s Day, the Mattapoisett Woman’s Club Tag Sale is a terrific place to start. All proceeds from the sale support scholarships that are awarded to local students annually.

Towns Still Prefers Sewer over Septic

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            Although the Town of Marion amended a bylaw in 2020 to require all new construction septic upgrades to exceed Title 5 compliance and include approved denitrification technology, a tie-in to town sewer, when possible, is much preferred, according to Conservation Commission Chairman Shaun Walsh.

            In its April 14 meeting, the commission heard a continued case involving a Notice of Intent filed by J. Thomas Bowler Jr. and Ellen Bowler to demolish a single-family house built in 1986 and replace it with a new house at 17 Moorings Road.

            “We would much prefer a sewer line even to a denitrification system,” Walsh told project representative Dave Davignon, who had submitted a second revision on April 7.

            Davignon explained that the Board of Health would not grant the project a variance on its requirement that a denitrification feature be included in the planned septic system upgrade. The Bowlers’ intention has been to hook up to town sewer and, only if that cannot be accomplished, use a septic system instead. Davignon said the potential installation of a 2,000-gallon denitrification system will not result in any additional land disturbance.

            Walsh said it is highly unlikely the denitrification system will be needed, as he expects the Bowlers will be able to connect to town sewer.

            With that, the commission voted to issue the Bowlers an Order of Conditions including storm damage and flood control stipulations for land subject to coastal storm flowage at 15,000 square feet.

            Two other continued public hearings were revisited with positive outcomes.

            ConCom voted to issue John and Judith Wyman an Order of Conditions for their Notice of Intent to construct a 160-square-foot addition to their garage and a 296-square-foot carport requiring that several large trees be removed, a 120-square-foot expansion of their driveway that will be paved over 2,400 square feet at 12 Bell Guzzle Lane.

            Representing the Wymans, Rick Charron reiterated their need to shelter their vehicles in the winter and pave their driveway so they can spend more time at what had been a seasonal residence. He described the land as a heavily wooded site, so the project would remain low impact despite the removal of several trees.

            Representing Christopher Klapinsky in a continued NOI filing, Chris Gilbert detailed his revised plan, addressing some of ConCom’s March 24 comments regarding Klapinsky’s application to construct a patio, retaining wall, planting bed, and reconstruct a deck at 41 East Avenue.

            After Gilbert provided a detail of the retaining wall, including elevations at the top and bottom, and explained that the homeowner hopes to add a stone swale there to help drain the area to the east, the hearing was closed, and ConCom voted to issue an Order of Conditions including stipulations for storm damage prevention and flood control.

            Four new Requests for Determination of Applicability and two new NOI filings were heard for the first time and, per town rule during remote access public hearings, were continued to Wednesday, April 28, at 7:00 pm.

            William Jr. and Elizabeth Weber filed an NOI to replace an existing float and its bottom-anchored chain system with a pile-held, two-float system at 21 East Avenue. Davignon presented on behalf of the Webers. Walsh questioned the design and asked Davignon if he considered copying a float to the east considering the water was less than 2 feet deep.

            “There really isn’t all that much water as you go that far out at low tide so … we didn’t see a whole lot of benefit in terms of how we could use the structure…. The goal here is the existing float that we have is so small that it’s really just not usable for any purpose whatsoever. We’re just trying to grab some square footage,” said applicant William Weber Jr. “We would like at some point maybe in the future to build something more, but that’s a lot more investment. Since we just built the house, we weren’t prepared to start planning something of that size, so this is what we were looking to do in the interim.”

            Davignon said the applicant would have to build out another 30 to 40 more feet in order to gain 3 or 4 more inches of depth.

            ConCom member Jeff Doubrava then questioned extending a 20-foot float to 48 feet to achieve a 1-foot, 7-inch depth. Doubrava said his concern is the egress.

            “The ramp right now takes up maybe 8 feet of the existing float. We can’t put more than one lounge chair out there just to sit on a sunny day, so we were looking to pick up square footage to actually use it,” explained Weber Jr. “We do have a young family, so at high tide we like to jump off and swim. Paddleboards, kayaks we can leave out there, things of that nature. Things that we just can’t currently do right now.”

            Anne Bramhall filed a, NOI to remove non-invasive vegetation and trees within the buffer zone to bordering vegetated wetlands at 260 Converse Road. Her representative, Brad Holmes, described a “number of hazard trees and overhanging vines,” saying that the work would take place on the western portion of the property, staying between the 25 and 100-foot buffer zone.

            Several ConCom members walked the site on April 10. “It’s a thicket back there,” acknowledged Walsh. “It looks like it could really use some management.”

            Sippican Lands Trust filed three RDAs, one for the placement of boards atop existing rocks allowing passage over a stream for visitors to White Eagle Parcel at Old Indian Trail Road, one to reroute the Osprey Marsh Trail to avoid encroachment of private property at 354 Point Road, and another to repair a stone wall and remove and cutback invasive vegetation across from 173 Front Street.

            The encroachment case met with the most substantial discussion because it is not clear whether or not the Osprey Marsh Trail crosses over the property line onto the lot at 354 Point Road.

            “Before the SLT goes forward – it’s absolutely wetlands in this area where the trail would go – so before we act on this RDA, it would be a good idea to definitively determine where this trail is. Once markers are placed … if it is on the adjacent property, we’ll know exactly where we need to cut off that trail and reroute it,” suggested Walsh. Another ConCom member said it would be very difficult to reroute the trail through that area, being the most wet.

            In the case of 173 Front Street, Walsh said, “I appreciate the Sippican Lands Trust managing overgrown areas without the use of chemicals. I commend your efforts, and it is a lot of effort to manage invasives in this way.”

            Represented by Davignon, Todd Zell filed an RDA for a two-lot subdivision including construction of a roadway, underground utilities, and a stormwater management system adjacent to 525 County Road.

            Marion is interested in pursuing grants for coastal resiliency projects (aka hazard mitigation plan), and Walsh told ConCom members that Town Planner Gil Hilario has asked for their participation in a hazard mitigation plan development committee. It is expected that Walsh and one other commission member will join the committee.

            Under action items, ConCom voted to issue Jonathan Tracy a full Certificate of Compliance at 14 Ridgewood Lane. ConCom considered a request for comments from the Zoning Board of Appeals regarding an application for special permit or variance at 8 Kabeyun Road to be outside of the commission’s jurisdiction.

            The next meeting of the Marion Conservation Commission is scheduled for Wednesday, April 28, at 7:00 pm.

Marion Conservation Commission

By Mick Colageo

From the Files of the Rochester Historical Society

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            The Air Raid Warden’s armband seen here belonged to Andrew MacGregor, a farmer who lived and whose family still lives on Vaughan Hill Road. He was just one of several Rochester men who “kept an eye to the sky” during World War II. Called the “Ground Observer Corps,” these men took turns stationed at a watchtower/post, one of many along the eastern and western coasts, keeping a lookout for an attack by German and Japanese fighter planes. At its height, these civilian observers numbered 1.5 million with 14,000 coastal observation posts. Rochester had one set on Vaughan Hill Road. Fairhaven’s tower still stands on West Island. It was part of an anti-submarine fire control system. Thankfully, the threat never came to our towns. 

            For those too young to know, the fear of attack was high on everyone’s mind. Towns organized groups of men who volunteered to be part of a Home Guard. The United States Civil Defense gave out printed handbooks to every volunteer. Duties listed in this booklet included going around town to ensure all residents were following guidelines set up by the government; for example, at night, all windows had to be blackened out so that no light showed through that could be used by “the enemy” to find their targets. Heavy dark draperies and roofing paper were two of the items used to do this. Car headlights were painted halfway down with special blackout paint so that the little light that could be seen did not point skyward and was just enough to see to drive. Many homes kept buckets of sand to use to put out fires that would be ignited by a bomb hitting the roof.

            In writing for the Rochester Journal published by the Plumb Library, Barbara Besse, who grew up in town, remembered Mr. Rounseville driving down the road tooting his car horn three times at each home. That was the signal for the home’s occupants to put out the lights and pull down all shades. In this same journal, Virginia (Fuller) Decker noted that an observation post was located in one of her father’s brooder houses on Neck Road. If a plane was seen, the “spotter” would call a central number to describe the aircraft and tell which direction it was headed.

            The Ground Observer Corps was disbanded in 1944 and revived in the early 1950s due to the Cold War. It was ended in 1958 with the advance of automated radar.

            Rochester resident Art Benner remembers as a teenager in the 1950s manning the Vaughan Hill lookout with a friend. Their job was to spot planes flying overhead and reporting what they saw to a “filter center.” He remembers the lookout as being about 5-by-6 feet with big windows and having a couple of chairs. There were pictures of planes to help with identification. By this time, Rochester’s corps was headed by Hoyle Demoranville. Art remembers he would come to the station at night to check and make sure that they were on duty and not sleeping. He says, luckily, they were always awake. During this time, nationwide, there were 750,000 volunteers aged 7 – 86 with 16,000 lookout posts.

            Thank you to all the Rochester volunteers for helping keep our town safe.

            If you know of someone who was a member of the Ground Observers Corp during WWII or in the 1950s, please let the Society know by emailing Connie at sash48@comcast.net. We would like to have a list of the names of as many town volunteers as we can find.

By Susan LaFleur, Secretary/Librarian