A lifelong resident of Mobile, Alabama, John M. Reed, 62, died away in the comfort of his own home on Thursday, March 14, 2024. He was surrounded by his devoted wife and children at the time of his passing. Although John was born in Ferndale, Michigan on May 16, 1961, he spent his childhood in Theodore, Alabama, as well as on the Gulf Coast region. On Friday, December 1, 2023, John Stewart Reed, who was 88 years old at the time, passed away unexpectedly at his house in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
He was in the process of packing to move to Boothbay Harbor, Maine. Norwood, Massachusetts was the location of his birth on January 25, 1935. His parents were Gordon Reed and Cynthia Jane (Lepper) Reed. In the early years of his life, his father passed away, and he spent his childhood on a farm in Walpole, Massachusetts, alongside his mother and his sister, Cynthia. During his earlier years, he worked at the Goudy & Stevens Shipyard in East Boothbay, Maine, and spent many summers in Southport, Maine, with his Aunt Ruth Lepper Gardner.
During this time, he also spent time with his extended family. Because of these summers, he developed a lifelong affection for Southport, where he was a member of the Southport Yacht Club for a significant amount of time. When he was in Boothbay during one of these summers, he was arranged to go on a blind date with Sue Welsh, whose family spent the summers at the farm where they had been raised for generations. Their wedding took place on Valentine’s Day in the year 1959.
John received his education in Walpole, and he graduated from Harvard College in 1956 and the Harvard Graduate School of Design in 1958. Both of these institutions are located in Harvard. He never missed a Harvard-Yale game if he could help it, and he had a lifelong fondness for the Harvard men’s basketball team. He later became an economist and consultant with Arthur D. Little and Cambridge Systematics, where he worked for a number of reasons. As a result of his work as a consultant for a number of governments, both local and international, he developed a passion for traveling and seeing new things during this time period.
He was overjoyed to spend a significant amount of time in England, and he had a deep affection for both London and Stilton Cheese. There is a story that has been passed down through the generations about him flying to Boston from London during the holiday season with a full Stilton hidden under his seat. There was a lack of affection for him among the other passengers. The consulting work he did also required him to go to Saudi Arabia, Buffalo, New York, and a great number of other locations that were in between.
John was an enthusiastic student of history, and he valued the opportunity he had to educate himself by traveling to different parts of the world. John Reed was a man who possessed a wide range of skills and interests. Genealogy and studying family history were two of his favorite hobbies, whether it was his own family, the family of his wife, or his come-by-late-in-laws. He was a true storyteller, and he really enjoyed a good party, whether he was the one who attended or the one who planned it.
Some of the most memorable parties he hosted were in honor of Sue’s publication of exhibition catalogs for the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. These included “Printmaking in the Age of the Musketeers” at the Higgins Armory, a celebration of the Magna Carta, and a celebration of the Carrie Winslow, a clipper ship that was owned and sailed by his great-grandfather-in-law. The Carrie Winslow was visited by the Maine Maritime Museum in 2004. During the time that he died away, he was in the process of organizing a celebration to honor family members who had traveled on the Mayflower as Pilgrims.
John had a fondness for the ocean and a passion for sailing, in addition to his many other accomplishments. He had the ability to navigate any kind of boat in any kind of weather, and he was always aware of his precise location, even when the fog was as thick as pea soup. In addition to being a stunning figure skater and dancer, he had been a member of the Cambridge Skating Club for a considerable amount of time. Also, he had a passion for fine woodworking. John is survived by his wife of nearly 65 years, Sue Welsh Reed, who resides in St.
Andrews Village in Boothbay Harbor, Maine. Sue Welsh Reed is a retired curator of prints and drawings at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts. She will miss John terribly. In addition, she is survived by her twin daughters, Elizabeth Reed and Beatrice Reed, who reside in Raleigh, North Carolina and E. Windsor, Connecticut, respectively; her grandsons, Nick Reed and James Emmerling, who both reside in New Hampshire; her sister-in-law Martha Welsh Goldstone, who resides in Washington, District of Columbia; and her brother-in-law John H.
Welsh and his wife, Rebecca, who reside in Boothbay, Maine. Additionally, the nephews Gordon Workman (Stefanie), George Workman, and John Charles Workman (Sharon) are still alive and continuing to live.
