The story of Peter Bigelow Hersey — born December 4th, 1941 in Massachusetts, died October 30th, 2022 in Indiana — as remembered by “number one son”.
Some things just happen. Others we bring upon ourselves. Both suffer a uniquely human bent to justify our decisions at all costs →
→ Pete Hersey was the third child of Bigelow Thayer Hersey and Elizabeth Kelton Smith, both of Massachusetts. Bigelow was a railroad engineer and Elizabeth was the Executive Director of the American Red Cross, Melrose Chapter (Ell Pond). The Smiths and Herseys were well-established, college educated members of their Eastern New England suburban community. Elizabeth played cello in the Melrose Symphony Orchestra. Her sister, Miriam (one of Pete’s favorite aunts, alongside aunt Ruth and aunt Martha), played the viola. Pete played in the percussion section. Pete’s two older sisters, Jean and Joanne lived with their families in San Antonio, Texas and Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, respectively.
After several years spent in the public school system in the City of Melrose, Pete was enrolled at Thompson Academy, located on an island in Boston Harbor. He attended classes, played sports (he became an award-winning athlete who displayed considerable talent on the football field) and made new friends. Upon graduation, he moved back home to his mother.
In 1960, Elizabeth invited Liselotte Vera Malt, nee von Somogyi, a Yugoslavian refugee and citizen of Austria who had married a US Army soldier in Vienna in 1958, who soon after abandoned her and their two sons, to share a meal at her home at 160 Forest Street. Elizabeth had met the “nice German girl” at her place of work, when Lotte showed up at the doorstep of her Red Cross chapter, requesting financial assistance after having spent more than a year in Fitchburg and Leominster, near the Army base where her American husband, Alan Louis Malt of Melrose, Massachusetts, was stationed after completing a tour of duty in Frankfurt, Germany. Elizabeth introduced Lotte (30) to her son, Pete (19) that day and they soon started a relationship. In 1964, Lotte was finally allowed to file for a divorce from Alan. Then Pete and Lotte went to Reno, Nevada to be married in a local chapel. Their daughter, Hope Sabine, was born in Melrose that September.
In 1968, Pete signed papers to enable his wife’s boys from her first marriage to change their names to Hersey. The following year, in late August, Pete and Lotte adopted a five-day old boy and named him Mark Eric. Also in that same year, Lotte’s eldest son, born in 1956 near Frankfurt, Germany, Nikolay Peter von Somogyi (until 1958), then Nicky Malt (until 1969), now Nick Hersey, was enrolled in Thompson Academy, the same island boarding school in Boston Harbor Pete had attended in the late ’50s. The tuition for this private high school was covered mostly by “Grossvati”, Lotte’s aristocrat father, a retired Viennese lawyer who lived in Sweden in those days. Considering the divisive times in which we presently find ourselves, and especially considering the many tensions experienced across racial lines in the United States since its founding, it should be mentioned here that Thompson Academy had become a predominantly Black high school by the early 1970s. Nick would bring some of his new friends home to Melrose — a “lily-white” community back then — for an occasional weekend sleepover, and the Herseys attended many sporting events and other gatherings on Thompson Island from 1969–1973. To this day, his schoolmates love and respect Pete’s family for our unencumbered hospitality during their formative years as teenagers.
Lotte’s other son from her first marriage, born in Fitchburg, Massachusetts in 1960, Frederick (Fritz) Alan Malt, later Hersey, graduated from Melrose High School in 1978. Hope and Mark also completed their schooling in the Melrose public schools.
Pete worked for the Public Works Department in the City of Melrose, moving through the ranks from laborer to Chief of Operations. He found time to attend night school and earned his Associate Degree in Civil Highway Engineering from Boston’s Franklin Institute of Technology. I remember feeling so proud of him at the graduation ceremony. Pete interrupted his tenure at the Melrose DPW and was employed in the private sector for a short period, then returned to assume infrastructure responsibilities in the City of Melrose, where he suffered under the supervision of a politically ambitious mayor and his lackeys until his retirement in 2003.
By the mid ‘70s his wife’s two sons, both eligible to receive college tuition as children of a US Army veteran, left home for good. In 1974, Pete’s “number one son” flew home from Miami for an unplanned Summer vacation, was introduced by his mother to another Austrian in the same house where Pete had first met Lotte, and both teenagers were instantly smitten. In 1979, Nick married his teenage love, became a teacher after taking degrees in Cambridge, Massachusetts and, in 1984, started a family in Boston, then decided to move to Austria in 1986, where three of Pete’s and Lotte’s ten grandchildren— a daughter and two sons — are now grown and in relationships of their own. Their first granddaughter is with child :-)
Lotte’s second son, Fritz, completed his studies in Providence, Rhode Island in 1982 and worked as a hotel manager, then moved to Boston and went into banking. He was married in 1985 to an artist from Wisconsin and they had a daughter in 1990. Fritz passed away in 2005, after a long illness, at the tender age of 45 years. The whole family eventually gathered in Wiscassett, Maine to spread his ashes across the Sheepscot river, where as kids we would fish, swim and row on long Summer vacations. Fritz embodied the adage to ‘make sure your reach exceeds your grasp’, so he would certainly have been pleased with his only child and Pete’s second granddaughter, a Stanford and Harvard biologist, who grew up in Zurich, is recently married and lives in California and Boston.
Pete and Lotte’s daughter, Hope Perkins, a successful entrepreneur, was married and had four sons. She later re-married her Melrose High School sweetheart. Her dear husband and then her eldest son passed out of our lives much too soon. She lives next door to Lotte in Middlebury, Indiana. Her three sons are married and all live locally and Hope’s youngest — the couple have a four year old girl — just welcomed Pete’s second great grandchild, a healthy boy, into the world on October 28th.
Pete’s youngest, Mark Hersey, attended colleges in Massachusetts and Washington, DC, was married and has two sons. He lives in Virginia and enjoys a stellar career with the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments.
On December 4th, Peter B. Hersey would have celebrated his 81st birthday. His family and extended family, along with his many friends, will celebrate his life on that day. Can I get a P? B? H?
I am especially grateful to Dad for having saved my life — literally from nearly drowning in cold Boston Harbor in 1968, figuratively in his role as my Dad on a daily basis for twelve years and later as an understanding friend. He was a careful thinker and had developed a thoughtful, compelling writing style, corresponding with me across the “pond” many times over the years. He was mindful of my scepticism toward his and mom’s “church” affiliations and we both tip-toed around that topic, preserving our valued father-son relationship to the end.
Fortunately, his daughter, my precious Sis, inherited his unique combination of pragmatic and emotional intelligence, so I can look forward to many more years of clear communication with someone I trust who also left New England in younger years to settle down in the legendary Midwest.
Brother Mark was very close to our Dad, having spent more time at home in Melrose than any of us. Pete was a gentler, more patient father for his adopted son, and Mark can channel many of Dad’s familiar mannerisms, humorous twists and perspectives on the human condition — a constant delight for me. As a 13 year old, I had the privilege of holding baby Mark in my arms when we picked him up from a New Hampshire care facility. That was the moment I decided I wanted to be a dad myself someday. I also remember noticing our age difference was practically the same as that between me and my unforgettable Dad.
rest in peace.
- Nick
→ On October 28th, 2022, at around 3:30 p.m. local time near Bristol, Indiana, Dad, returning home to Middlebury from a visit to a medical clinic, was driving his 2008 Chevy Tahoe along County Road 131 when his heart monitor chip, implanted by his good doctor a few weeks ago, issued one of its regular electrical impulses, causing him to swerve across the center lane into oncoming traffic, where he took out two unsuspecting drivers, a 26 year old and a 47 year old, sending all three of them to the hospital. Five days later, Dad died from injuries sustained in the “accident”, leaving a mourning family more than 20 strong plus many friends who loved and cared for a Father and Grandfather and Great Grandfather who had dedicated his life to his and his wife’s children and to their children, to his employers and co-workers, his fellow church-goers and everyone else he came in contact with. Dad was a giver, a worker, a protector, a rock, and now he has laid down his sword and shield and moved on. His wife of nearly 60 years — my Mom — has lost her main squeeze and the only guy who could protect her from herself. (This means all hands on deck, starting now!)
→ So: please keep your eyes on the road, your hands on the wheel and your mind on driving. And if you have medical issues — especially if you are wearing implanted chips that induce an electric current or are under the influence of meds or alcohol or controlled substances, just stay tf away from your car altogether. It’s not always just about you.
→You might also consider communicating with local politicians, physicians and the DMV in your area about establishing a “Fit to Drive” protocol that at least tries to keep unsafe drivers off the roads. Connected directly to this is an urgent need to expand EASILY AFFORDABLE public transportation services to every corner of your State and County, so that young an old always have reasonable mobility alternatives in their neighborhoods. Your local car dealers and national and international automobile manufacturers will fight such progress tooth and claw, but you may just find a private sector ally in the insurance business…just saying.
→ If you’re in Middlebury, I hope you’ll consider helping establish a local (electric) bus route with a stop called “Pete Hersey” somewhere in the vicinity of the Middlebury KOA. Then you could take a short stroll and visit his final resting place in Mom’s backyard. She might be around the house or yard with her pets, weeding her vegetable patch, maybe sipping a cup of tea or coffee — for the next 30 years…according to her good doctor.