Saturday, November 3, 2012

Gov. John H Reed (1921-2012)

John H. Reed, governor of Maine in the early and mid 1960s, died Wednesday in Washington, DC at age 91.

I didn't know much about Gov. Reed until late yesterday morning, when I started work on this obituary profile which ran in today's Portland Press Herald. Grandson of one of Fort Fairfield's most successful men -- a seed potato grower -- and a farm manager himself, Reed was thrust into the governor's mansion at 38 after the sudden death of his predecessor. A Republican who became friends with LBJ, he would later serve - twice - as our ambassador in Sri Lanka.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. It's all in the piece....

(A side note. By odd coincidence, yesterday I wound up speaking to both name partners at the law firm Curtis Thaxter back to back for entirely different and unrelated stories. (Kenneth Curtis defeated Reed to become governor of Maine in 1966.))

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