By Rachel Andrews Damon
Special to The News
Chris Lewey of Fryeburg is running for Maine’s House District 82, representing Brownfield, Fryeburg, Hiram, Lovell and Porter. Here’s where he came from and where he’s going.
Chris was born in 1953 in Chelsea, Mass. at the hospital where his mother, Marilyn (Gardella) Lewey, would later work as an LPN. His father, Paul, was an attorney. The Lewey family lived in Revere, Mass. Chris, the fourth of the Lewey children, joining brother, Paul Jr., and sisters, Sharon and Jane. In the decades to come, all of them would eventually migrate north to the Conway, Stow and Chatham areas.
“My mother was an amazingly kind and loved woman by her children. My father was a brilliant man. We had an exceptional upbringing and very lucky to have a close family,” Chris says.
The Leweys had a camp in Effingham, where they spent weekends and summers. Chris says, “It was heaven. We had a brook behind our camp and that was the beginning of nature for me.”
The eldest of the Lewey kids, Paul, was the first to move north. Chris says, “He moved to Conway and lived with our aunt and uncle, Helen and Fred Gardella. Uncle Fred was a radio announcer in North Conway. Paul was brilliant like my dad. He read constantly and knew a lot about everything. He had the gift of intellect and his youngest son, Josh, also got that same gift. The kind of smart that comes easy.”
Chris and his mother moved here permanently when he was in eighth grade, and his father came up after work on weekends. Marilyn Lewey worked at Memorial Hospital. Chris went on to attend Kennett High School.
“As it often goes with the youngest children, since I was the fourth child, I could do whatever I wanted,” Chris chuckles. “But if I had stayed in Revere, I would have become a hoodlum. It was a rough place for kids. I can very much say the Mt. Washington Valley saved me.”
At Kennett, Chris played baseball, but says he couldn’t hit. “My big claim to fame is that I was struck out at a game in Littleton by Rich Gale. He went on to play for the Kansas City Royals and later the Red Sox.”
“I came to realize that around here, kids are hatched out with skis on. I ended up loving skiing too and then became a competitive jumper at Kennett.”
Chris says his four best friends from Kennett remained close even after high school — Justin Howe, Charlie Altenbern, Doug Nichols and Doug Garland.
Chris and Judson Howe attended UNH after graduating from Kennett in 1971. They both dropped out at the end of the first semester.
“I just wasn’t ready. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. Judson, Doug Nichols, and I ended up hitchhiking around the country. It was a great experience. I left home with $90 in my pocket. We’d be broke and cold on the side of the road, and then someone would pick us up. We met great, generous people on the road.”
During his brief stint at UNH, Chris attended a transcendental meditation lecture about getting better grades and more clarity of mind.
“I was really taken by it. It’s simple but really powerful. I had to ask my dad for $35 to learn TM. It’s a simple mental technique taught by people who have learned from Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The roots of TM are ancient. Judson started it too. It just captured me. In 1974, I went to France to learn how to become a TM teacher with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. I then taught my own programs here. I’d do programs all over this area — Laconia, Plymouth, Berlin and at the Red Jacket in North Conway. I did that for several years and worked at Carroll Reed selling skis at the same time.”
Chris’s first foray into politics started around 1979. “It was a discouraging time politically. Jimmy Carter was president. Ronald Reagan was going to run on the Republican side, and it was evident that Carter couldn’t win. My father had moved up here by then. He was a very strong Democrat. I can remember him saying that if Ted Kennedy ran for president, he’d work for him. NH was the first primary state and Kennedy stepped up to run in the primary against Carter. I decided I’d work for him too. I ended up with a paid position running the top third of NH, a whole congressional district, and eventually went on to work the advance team in NY for the Kennedy campaign. I traveled with him often providing local intel. He was wonderful but obviously he had too much baggage. I lost 20 pounds working for Ted Kennedy!”
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