"Where Are They Now" Series...

CATCHING UP: Early DDT opponent continues to 'stir the pot'
Dick Anderson's work with salmon made headlines in the '60s, and he's been a leading conservationist ever since.
By JOHN RICHARDSON
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

First of a nine part series

Richard "Dick" Anderson was a young fisheries biologist in the early 1960s when something was causing the decline of Sebago Lake's famed salmon population.

Anderson and a colleague in the state's fish and game department wanted to find out if the decline had anything to do with an insecticide sprayed for years around the lake to kill mosquitoes. That insecticide was DDT, the same chemical that was the focus of a controversial new book by Rachel Carson called "Silent Spring."

"We had some (fish) analyzed and it was pretty astounding. Nobody would believe the numbers today," Anderson said during a recent interview.

Anderson put the word out, generating local and national headlines about DDT in Sebago's salmon that got Anderson in a little hot water with superiors. The news brought an end to DDT spraying around the lake and effectively launched the career of a bold and enduring voice for conservation in Maine.

"I was a kid. I just happened into it," Anderson said. "It made me aware that if somebody is willing to disagree with the status quo, and if you do it with facts, you can change things."

While not making headlines as much as he did earlier in his career, Anderson is still asking questions, generating ideas and mobilizing people. At 73 years old, the Freeport resident's most public project these days is the International Appalachian Trail, which continues to grow both in Maine and in Canada's eastern provinces and is now even stirring interest on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

SEBAGO SALMON DECLINE REVERSED

Anderson, who grew up in Brockton, Mass., graduated from the University of Maine in 1957 and got a biologist's job with what was then the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Game. He became the director of the state's salmon project right at the time when Sebago's salmon were decreasing in size and number.

When Anderson got the word out in 1963 about the DDT test results on salmon, the story made front-page headlines in Maine, as well as national television news and Sports Illustrated magazine.

"It was pretty much my first experience with the press. I got all kinds of (grief) because I was just a lowly fisheries biologist," he said. The head of the department wanted to know what he was up to.

"They wanted to see me in the office. I was only a kid." But, he asked, "Who was going to fire me for just using facts?"

The state and private-property owners soon stopped the spraying. "People had a fit and a half," he said.

Sebago's salmon started rebounding a few years later.

Anderson continued his work and helped start a group of state biologists who spoke out on conservation issues around the state.

In the early 1970s, as executive director of the Maine Audubon Society, Anderson helped to pass the state's landmark bottle bill and drew attention to the discharge of sewage and industrial waste into the Presumpscot and other rivers.

In the late '70s, he ran a private recycling business and hosted "UpCountry," a television program about Maine's outdoors.

Democratic Gov. Joseph Brennan appointed him commissioner of the Department of Conservation in 1981, and Anderson held the job until 1988. He promoted land conservation, river cleanups, wood-fired power plants and the creation of the St. Croix International Waterway.

As commissioner and then a citizen, Anderson was a leader in the effort to reintroduce caribou to Maine.

"We raised $600,000, and it didn't work. But we learned a lot for the next time somebody does it – and they will do it," he said.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=207545&ac=PHnws

Family grows with love, hope
A Wells couple continues to open their home to children from around the world.
By KELLEY BOUCHARD
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Second in a nine part series

WELLS — Christine Tomaszewski anticipated being vastly outnumbered by boys when her youngest daughters, Johanna and Joelisa, graduated from high school and went off to college in 2004.

The mother of 12 figured she would be the only "girl" left at home, with seven younger sons and her husband, John.

But life has been full of surprises for the Tomaszewskis, who have adopted 11 children from around the world, most of them with physical, mental or emotional disabilities.

We last reported on the Tomaszewskis in 2001, when 5-year-old Nikolai came from a Russian orphanage to have surgery on his clubbed left foot and be fitted for a prosthetic right leg. The operation was successful, and they adopted Nikolai soon afterward.

In 2004, fate tossed the Tomaszewskis another curve. That March, they got a call about an 18-day-old baby girl from Texas whose adoption here in Maine hadn't worked out.

They took her in. They named her Lily. They knew nothing about her birth parents or health concerns. She cried almost constantly for the first six months.

"I remember holding her when she first came to us and thinking, 'She has no say in what's happening to her now, but she will some day,' " Christine Tomaszewski recalled.

After a bumpy start, Lily has grown into a rambunctious, inquisitive 4-year-old who enjoys rough-housing with her brothers and plaguing the family cat, Jimmy.

Christine Tomaszweski, 53, is the family's driving force, getting up at dawn to do laundry when electric rates are lower and managing a food budget that can top $300 a week.

John Tomaszewski, 47, is the family's quiet strength, maintaining the sprawling light blue Cape he renovated and expanded on Nottingham Drive and making sure each child's needs are met.

He recently retired from the Coast Guard but continues to work for the federal agency in Boston as a government employee. The change means he has a more regular work schedule and is home more often than he was in the past.

As the children grow, the couple are seeing their unusual commitment and patience bear fruit. The four oldest, all girls, are in college or have started careers. "But they still call us for advice," John Tomaszewski said proudly.

Lauren, 33, Christine's birth daughter from a previous relationship, is a licensed practical nurse who works at a doctor's office in Wells.

Minelli, 23, and Joelisa, 22, were adopted from the Dominican Republic, where they were abandoned and spent their first few years on the streets of Santiago, the capital city.

Minelli graduated from Mount Ida College in Newton, Mass., with a bachelor's degree in early childhood development. She works at the Italian Home for Children in Jamaica Plain, Mass., a residential facility for emotionally and behaviorally challenged children.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=207666&ac=PHnws






Photos By Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

Catching Up: After right-to-die fight, a life rebuilt
'Tish' Tanski starts to feel joy again, eight years after her spouse's push for a Maine Death with Dignity Act.
By MEREDITH GOAD
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Third in a nine part series

Eight years after her husband died from stomach cancer, Patricia "Tish" Tanski still can't bring herself to watch any videos of him. John Speh was the love of her life, and the pain of that loss lingers.

But she occasionally re-reads all the newspaper articles that were written about Speh near the end of his life, when he became a right-to-die activist fighting for passage of the Maine Death with Dignity Act. The proposed law, which Mainers narrowly rejected in November 2000, would have allowed physicians to help terminally ill patients die by prescribing a lethal overdose of pills.

Years after her family's private battle with cancer was played out in public, Tanski, 57, says she is starting to find some joy in her life again. She still feels her late husband around her all the time. When faced with a problem to solve or a decision to make, she thinks "How would John do this? What would John say?"

"It sounds kind of corny, but in many important ways, John didn't leave me," Tanski said.

John Speh (pronounced "Spay") was a quiet and introspective man – the least likely person to open up his life, and the details of his impending death, to the public. When the end finally came, he fiercely fought it. But he always believed that it was his right to choose death, should the suffering become too great. So, in the last weeks of his life, he went on TV newscasts and agreed to talk to newspapers, including a Maine Sunday Telegram reporter who visited him weekly at his home in Bar Harbor.

Speh died at age 56 in Massachusetts General Hospital, just a month after Mainers voted down the referendum. His ashes were scattered in Bar Harbor and on an island in midcoast Maine where he spent a lot of time as a child.

In the months immediately following Speh's death, his wife focused on helping their children – Caroline, who was 13 at the time; Kate, who was 18; and Renee, who was 32.

Tanski took on all the legal paperwork required to turn two lives back into one. She noticed that some good friends fell away, while others who were just casual acquaintances drew closer. A few years ago, she took part in a clinical trial at Massachusetts General that was studying grief as a physical condition.

By then, Tanski had become an expert on grief. Her mother-in-law died 10 months after John, her own mother two years later.

"I tried to keep my life the same, but now I can see my life shattered," she said. "It took me a while to see how thoroughly things had changed."

At the time of Speh's death, Tanski was working at Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor. She left that job and started a period of self-exploration, working as a consultant for everyone from the Maine Science and Technology Foundation to Acadia National Park. She became heavily involved in health care from the patient's perspective, including working with the Governor's Office to make sure the public had a voice in the development of the state health plan.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=207881&ac=PHnws


Doug Jones/Staff Photographer

2000 Press Herald File

Catching Up: New state, new daughter, no controversy for Maine tribes advocate
Tom Tureen, who led a failed pro-casino effort in 2003, is now a financial consultant in California.
By TUX TURKEL
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Fourth of nine parts

Voters will consider a proposal this fall to build a casino in Maine – this time in Oxford County – but Tom Tureen won't be paying much attention.

In 2003, Tureen was the chief architect of a failed ballot measure to allow Maine's largest Indian tribes to run a casino in southern Maine. Come November, Tureen will be busy with his work as a financial consultant from his home in San Francisco.

He'll also have his hands full helping to raise his daughter, who was born this summer to Erin Lehane, the former spokeswoman for the pro-casino campaign.

Tureen and Lehane dropped out of public view immediately after voters defeated the measure by a 2-1 ratio. They left Maine for San Francisco in 2005 and got married in 2006.

Mainers with long memories know Tureen as the Portland lawyer who engineered the historic $81 million land claims settlement between the tribes and the state in 1980. Many also recognize his complex legacy in Maine: a man who became wealthy in a high-profile career meant to lift the tribes out of poverty.

Now 64, Tureen offered a few thoughts about the upcoming gambling referendum in Maine. But mostly, he seems excited and energized about his second family and his fresh living environment.

"We've really got a whole new life out here," he said.

Tureen said he's structuring investment deals for New York-based private-equity firms, which he declined to identify. Some of the enterprises involve western Indian tribes.

Lehane, who is 37, has been working as a political consultant, most recently for former NBA basketball player Kevin Johnson, who won a June primary in the mayoral race in Sacramento and will face the incumbent in November. Lehane's brother, Chris, an adviser to Democrats who was involved with the Bill Clinton and Al Gore presidential campaigns, lives nearby.

From their home in Pacific Heights, Tureen and Lehane can see the Golden Gate Bridge and the downtown skyline. Aside from caring for their new daughter, Rose, named for Tureen's mother, they enjoy their Great Pyrenees dog, Boo Radley, and their 35-foot sailboat, docked in San Francisco Bay.

"We feel very fortunate," Tureen said.

Tureen's work for the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes became a springboard for him to build an investment company representing American Indians. He gained a national reputation in the early 1980s by helping an obscure Connecticut tribe win sovereignty. That led to the creation of the lucrative Foxwoods Resort casino, a model for today's tribal gambling resorts.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=208018&ac=PHnws


Photo by Jodi Gibney

Catching Up: Maine's first 'Survivor' still traveling
The Monhegan Island native credits her 2002 appearance with encouraging a long-held desire to see the world.
By RAY ROUTHIER
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Fifth of nine parts

Back in 2002, the CBS reality show "Survivor" was the hottest thing on TV.

Millions tuned in every week to see ordinary people from all over the country struggle to battle the elements, and each other, in an effort to survive in some desolate, isolated locale.

Then Maine's first "Survivor" contestant burst onto the small screen. And she wasn't just any Mainer. She was a female lobster boat captain who had spent most of her life on Monhegan Island and wasn't afraid of a little hard work.

After a few episodes, all of Maine was talking about Zoe Zanidakis, dubbed "The Lobster Lady." She had to win, right? She can fish with just sticks. She's not afraid of weather. She was raised on an island, for crying out loud.

But this being reality TV, "Survivor" was really more about sniping and back-stabbing among the 16 contestants. Zanidakis proved to be more of a woman of sharp action, not sharp words. On the ninth episode, she was voted off the show by the remaining contestants. The vote was 7-1.

Zanidakis, then 35, had never watched "Survivor." She had been a lobster boat skipper for about 14 years and was a Monhegan native. But she had longed to be involved with film or television when she was a child. So when she heard that "Survivor" was looking for contestants, she thought she was up for the challenge, and she hoped the experience might lead her into show business.

"I thought being on the show might be a step into the industry, that I might see what it was like," said Zanidakis, now 42, speaking from Tenants Harbor last week.

Zanidakis spent her time on the show on the Marquesas Islands, in the South Pacific.

"I certainly liked the exotic locations. I would have liked to be one of the camera people; it was interesting watching them," said Zanidakis.

Since "Survivor," Zanidakis has worked in entertainment, as a production person in Los Angeles for a company that makes commercials, and in Australia, helping to set up entertainment and events at a local museum.

But she hasn't really made a career out of film or TV. That might be because her experience on "Survivor" also brought out her longtime desire to travel and see the world. So that's what she's been doing.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=208194&ac=PHnws




Courtesy photos

He's content giving 'good advice'
Dan Wathen stands by his decision to resign as Maine's chief justice and seek the governorship.
By TREVOR MAXWELL
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Sixth of nine parts

AUGUSTA - No, he doesn't regret it.

Dan Wathen doesn't stay up at night thinking he should have kept his job as chief justice of Maine's Supreme Judicial Court, instead of stepping down in the fall of 2001 to run for governor as a Republican. He doesn't harbor resentment against the politicians and pundits who harassed him.

And he's glad he made the enduring decision to leave politics behind, only seven weeks after he stunned the establishment by becoming a candidate.

"At least in the election process, division is the key. It's about partisanship," Wathen said during an interview last month at his law office.

"I just assumed I could put up with it for however long it would take," he said. "It quickly became apparent that partisanship was completely alien to my character. I just didn't like it."

Wathen, 68, was comfortable with that choice on Nov. 26, 2001, when he ended his campaign. Seven years later, he's still comfortable with it. Wathen said he admires politicians, but learned he was better suited to settle disputes between parties, rather than fighting on one side.

At the time, few people knew that Wathen was ready to leave the supreme court bench, regardless of what happened with his bid for public office.

"At that stage, I had been a judge for 25 years. I had been chief justice for 10 years. I was thinking of doing something different," Wathen said.

John Baldacci moved into the Blaine House after his victory in 2002, and Wathen went back into private practice as a lawyer for Pierce Atwood. He has developed a specialty in arbitration and mediation for business disputes, and cases have taken him to dozens of states and recently, Puerto Rico.

Wathen also has remained involved in public service, serving on boards for several organizations, including the Maine Community College System, Jobs for Maine's Graduates, and the Holocaust Human Rights Center of Maine.

Since 2003 he has been a special court master, assigned by the Maine Superior Court to make sure that the state makes good on its legal obligation to improve the system of care for mentally ill adults.

"I always had trouble defining what a good retirement is," Wathen said. "I came to the conclusion that a good retirement is doing only the things you want to do."

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=208389&ac=PHnws


John Ewing/Staff Photographer

From being good in sports to leader in sporting goods
Josh McKeown, a top football player in the 1980s, uses lessons from sports to succeed in life.
By PAUL BETIT
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Seventh of nine parts

When John McKeown went to work driving a delivery truck for Olympia Sports 15 years ago, it was supposed to be a temporary gig.

"Something to fill in in between jobs," McKeown said. Instead, it turned into career.

As lead driver for Olympia Sports, it's his responsibility to make sure the goods are delivered on time to the sporting goods chain's 178 outlets.

It's a much different career than the one McKeown envisioned while growing up in Biddeford. Back then, it was all about playing sports.

During the 1980s, McKeown developed into a talented catcher in baseball and one of Maine's top football players.

After playing three seasons for legendary football coach Mike Landry at Biddeford High School, he became an All-American linebacker at the University of Massachusetts. Then he coached and played two seasons of professional football in Italy.

In the early 1990s, McKeown returned to Maine to marry his high school sweetheart and start a family. But he's never forgotten the lessons he learned while playing football.

"Football teaches a lot of life skills, and John is the epitome of someone who took what he learned about in football and applied them to his life, his family, his work life, his career," said Joe Cullen, one of McKeown's teammates at UMass. Cullen is in his third season as defensive line coach for the NFL's Detroit Lions.

"He was a tireless worker in terms of preparation for opponents," Cullen recalled. "He was the guy you would watch film with on Thursday nights, and he would show you the next opponent's tendencies. He taught me how to recognize an opponent's tendencies."

McKeown said he learned about scouting opponents from Landry, who won six Class A state championships in his 17 years at Biddeford.

"When I went to college, all of the things he gave us, like scouting reports, came back to me," McKeown said. "I went to college as a fullback and they converted me into a linebacker, so I thought like an offensive player. (Landry) definitely helped me there. I immensely respected him as a coach. He knew what he was talking about."

Landry died in 2006 at age 58 after a two-year battle with skin cancer.

The ability to anticipate what offensive play was coming next enabled McKeown to become one of the top defensive football players in UMass history.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=208605&ac=PHnws


Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

1981 Press Herald file

CATCHING UP: Injured veteran has new life, says he'd 'do it all over again'
Ex-Marine Eric McCue is still dealing with injuries suffered when he stepped on a mine, but says he has no regrets.
By EDWARD D. MURPHY
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Eighth of nine parts

Eric McCue has lost two of his toes, endured multiple surgeries and even had his employer pull up stakes from Maine. But he has no regrets.

"If I had to picture a perfect life after what happened, this is about as good as it gets," McCue said. "I'd do it all over again."

McCue, now 27, was the first Maine casualty in the Iraq war to come home alive, wounded after stepping on a land mine on April 1, 2003. Just days before, on March 20, Marine Maj. Jay Thomas Aubin, a 36-year-old Skowhegan native, had become the first casualty of the war from Maine when he died in a helicopter crash.

McCue, a Marine corporal who grew up in South Portland, was injured while working with a detail that was handling surrendering Iraqi soldiers.

He said that when he stepped on the mine, he didn't realize he had been injured. But the blast blew off the big toe on his left foot and seriously injured the two toes next to it. He also had multiple shrapnel pieces in his right foot.

The second toe had to be removed, and the middle toe on the left foot is permanently curled, he said.

The doctors have left the shrapnel in the right foot, he said, because the pieces are very small and there's a dormant infection that could become active if surgery was performed.

McCue ultimately retired from the Marines because of his injuries and came back to Maine, unsure of what to do.

His friends were all at an age when they were out of college. He took classes at the University of Southern Maine but felt out of place with younger students.

His mother, Betsy Maxwell, feels her son and all the other veterans returning from the war would be better served with more counseling to help them adjust to civilian life.

"Anybody that's exposed to that kind of action and results, they need some extra help," Maxwell said, adding that she feels her son is doing well. "I'm a firm believer that these kids who come back from Iraq need counseling for at least six months."

McCue took advantage of an offer from a foundation that helps returning veterans to go to Orlando, Fla., for some rest and assistance. Representatives of major companies came in and helped the vets prepare resumes and gave them tips on what to say and do in a job interview.

That preparation helped McCue land a job with Citigroup, which had a Portland operation that provided customer service for investors in mutual funds. He bought a condo and enjoyed the work.

Citigroup decided it would close its Portland operation March 31, so on April 1, five years after McCue stepped on a land mine, he switched to Atlantic Fund Administration in Portland, which does the same type of work.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=208763&ac=PHnws


John Patriquin/Staff Photographer

Still waiting to see gun waiting period
Catherine Crowley, whose son killed himself with a shotgun he bought at age 18, continues her efforts to change the law.
By DENNIS HOEY
Staff Writer Portland Press Herald

Last of nine parts

LEWISTON — Catherine Crowley's life took a sudden turn four years ago after she found her son's lifeless body lying next to a shotgun he had bought at Wal-Mart for $80.

Laurier "Larry" J. Belanger Jr. was just 18 years old when he committed suicide in his apartment in Lewiston during the early morning hours of May 23, 2004.

Today, his 44-year-old mother has become a political activist, in addition to being a full-time nurse's aide. She travels across Maine and the rest of New England, speaking to high school and college students about ways to prevent teen suicides.

She also appears at screenings of "There Ought To Be A Law" – a film that chronicles her efforts to get a law passed to require anyone younger than 22 to wait 10 days after filling out an application form before purchasing a rifle or shotgun.

"I just know that if Larry had to wait, he would never have done this," Crowley said.

Long after her son died, Crowley has not given up her campaign to institute a waiting period. She plans to propose another bill in 2009.

Crowley, a mother of four, believes that young people act impulsively at times and need a period in which they can settle their emotions.

"Cathy never gives up," said George Smith, executive director of the Sportsman's Alliance of Maine. "It's because I think she would like to see her son's death make a difference, and who can argue with that?"

However, Smith said a new state law that requires anyone younger than 18 to have parental consent before they can buy a gun is more than sufficient.

"The new law goes beyond federal law. We feel it's a good law," Smith said.

Meanwhile, friends say Crowley has become a dynamic activist since her son's death.

"When I first met her, she just couldn't believe that an 18-year-old could walk into a store and buy a gun and ammunition," said Margaret Craven, a Democratic state representative from Lewiston. "Catherine was very naive. She was just a mom trying to raise her kids."

In 2005, Craven sponsored a bill that would have imposed the 10-day waiting period that Crowley sought, but the legislation died in committee and was never debated on the House floor.

"I knew at the time it would be difficult, but I didn't realize just how difficult it would be," Craven said of the opposition she faced.

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/story.php?id=209093&ac=PHnws


Doug Jones/Staff Photographer

Courtesy photo