Philip MacLean

BRIDGTON — Philip Eugene MacLean died peacefully at home on the morning of Thursday, March 7, 2013, following a five-year battle with melanoma and prostate cancer.

Mr. MacLean was born in Lynn, Mass. on April 27, 1921, the eldest child of Ethelreda (Saunders) MacLean and Arthur Flagg MacLean. He grew up in Swampscott, Mass., surviving a serious hernia and an episode of scarlet fever that caused him to lose a year of school. He graduated from Swampscott High School in 1940 and began his undergraduate university studies at the Lowell Textile Institute, now the University of Massachusetts, Lowell. He was a sophomore at Lowell on Pearl Harbor Day and the following day his entire fraternity descended upon the U.S. Armed Forces Recruiting Office hoping to serve. Although the recruiters were not prepared to process the large number of volunteers on that day, Mr. MacLean delayed his university studies to enter the U.S. Navy’s V-12 Officer Program, during which time he trained at Columbia University and studied diesel engineering at North Carolina State University. Upon commissioning as a naval officer, he served in the Pacific Theater of World War II aboard Landing Craft Infantry (LCI) #797 from 1942 to 1945.Following the war, Mr. MacLean married and returned to Lowell and earned his B.S. in textile chemistry in 1946. He had two lovely daughters from this first marriage and the family enjoyed postwar prosperity. Mr. MacLean worked for the Onyx Oil & Chemical Company as a technical salesperson, a role that required him to travel extensively throughout the Northeastern and mid-Atlantic states. Although he enjoyed the work and excelled at sales, he yearned for a chance to be self-employed.

Mr. MacLean was married to Barbara Ann Bishop of Short Hills, N.J. on April 23, 1960, and they had two sons.

In 1961, Mr. MacLean pursued that dream of self-employment and moved with Barbara from Bergen County, N.J. to Cape Elizabeth, Maine. He became a principal in a research and development firm serving Maine’s robust paper industry called Gorham Research and Development Corporation (later Gorham International) in Gorham, Maine, where his particular expertise was fine paper coatings. In 1974, Mr. MacLean assumed responsibility for a new venture of Gorham International called the Institute for Graphic Communication (IGC), a business that specialized in educational programs on cutting-edge communications technology in the early days of the personal computer age. During this part of his career, he and Barbara were fortunate to travel throughout this country, Europe, and Asia and these were adventures they enjoyed very much. He retired as President of Gorham International and IGC in 1987.

As with many men of his generation, Mr. MacLean’s life was heavily influenced by his experience as a child of the Great Depression and as a young man coming of age during World War II. His work ethic was the central element of his character and he worked very hard to provide a good living for his family. Beyond his career, he enjoyed watching his sons grow up swimming, water-skiing, and boating on Moose Pond and Long Lake in the summers, and skiing with his family at Pleasant Mountain/Shawnee Peak in the winters. He also made a point of attending every Lake Region High School football game during the years his sons were playing. Mr. MacLean was an avid baseball fan, first of the Boston Braves and later of the Red Sox. He often recounted Boston baseball lore and stories of his trips to Nickerson Field and Fenway Park as a boy. He knew the careers of and could cite statistics of many Red Sox players over the years. He also was very proud of his Scottish heritage and spent time researching his genealogy and participating in the activities of the St. Andrew’s Society of Maine.

Mr. MacLean is survived by his wife of 53 years, Barbara Ann (Bishop) MacLean of Bridgton and Portland; daughter Heather M. Styckiewicz and her husband Joseph of Tolland, Conn., daughter Holly M. Thomson and husband David Wilson of Greensboro, N.C., son Andrew Bishop MacLean and his wife Michele of Gardiner, Maine, and son Scott Saunders MacLean and his wife Katherine Tsung-Yen Tuan-MacLean of Winchester, Mass. He is also survived by grandchildren, Caitlin Elizabeth Dunlap, Jonathan Calder Dunlap and his wife Carrie, Hannah Ryan Fossett, Abigail Chuan-Ling MacLean, Joelle Chuan-Kai MacLean, Collin Chuan-Ren MacLean, and Cameron Burr MacLean; great-grandchildren, Nathan Joseph Dunlap, Charles James Dunlap, and Theodore Calder Dunlap, as well as several nieces and nephews. Mr. MacLean was predeceased by his parents, his sister, Lois M. Thoumine, and his niece, Rosalyn Smith Merrifield.

Mr. MacLean’s burial ceremony with military honors was held in the chapel at the New Maine Veterans Memorial Cemetery, 163 Mount Vernon Rd., Augusta on Wednesday, March 13. Arrangements are under the care of A.T. Hutchins, LLC Funeral and Cremation Services, 660 Brighton Ave., Portland. To offer words of condolence and share memories with the family, please go to www.athutchins.com. In lieu of flowers, donations in Mr. MacLean’s memory may be made to the American Cancer Society, Inc., 30 Speen Street, Framingham, MA 01701.