COURTESY
CHARLESTOWN — Anne F. MacArthur, 90, died Friday evening, June 29, 2018 after a period of declining health. She was born the fourth of six children to Avery M. and Arline Fides and was their last surviving child. She was raised in Bowdinham, Maine, Attended Fryburg Academy for H.S. (’46) and went to Farmington State College (’50) for her teaching degree.
In August 1950 she married Rodney MacArthur at her parents’ summer home on Orr’s Island. They moved to Walpole and her first teaching assignment was at the Sarah Porter School in Langdon. The next year she went to the Holden School in Charlestown to teach second grade. She later went to Memphis, Tennessee to teach for a year while her husband continued his education.
After moving back to the Walpole-Charlestown area and while raising two daughters she was asked one January to “just fill in until the end of the year” at the Farwell School — a multi grade class. It would be more than 25 years of teaching first grade before she retired. First she taught at the “Stucco” building, then at the “new” Charlestown Primary School. As the Charlestown Primary was being built, she and Rodney were building a house right behind it on East Street – no more traveling from Walpole every day for her!
In retirement she and her husband moved to their retirement home in Jackman, Maine where her husband was born and brought up. While living in Jackman she enjoyed her flower gardens, going down-river shopping, taking her book and going bird hunting and fishing with Rodney and the dog. She looked forward to her Friday lunches out with the “old ladies”.
After her husband died in 2001, she moved back to Charlestown to be closer to family and old friends. She got to enjoy family gatherings with her grandchildren and great-grandchildren as they came along.
Anne was predeceased by her parents and her husband, and by her sisters Georgie F. Mathieson and Mary Jane F. Leavitt and her brothers Avery Fides, Jr., Forest Fides, and Peter J. Fides.
She is survived by her daughters Peggy (Kevin) Blaine of Charlestown, and Pam (Stephen) Ferrari of Simpsonville, South Carolina, as well as her grandchildren Rachel (Dale) Wilson, Bridget Blaine (Jason Sawyer), Kevin Blaine, Jr., Justin Blaine, Duncan (Megan) Blaine, Meganne Blaine-Dupont and Christina Ferrari, and her great-grandchildren Raymond, Cole, Olivia, Mia, Amelia, Chloe-Anne, Kasey, Duncan and Giles.
Per her request, there will be no services. Arrangements are with Stringer Funeral Homes and Crematorium, 146 Broad Street, Claremont, NH 03743. To view an online memorial or send a private message of condolence, visit www.stringerfh.com
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