GREENFIELD — Sitting in the back of the new high school’s auditorium sat eight 1952 Greenfield High School alumni. Every month they would get together and have a mini-reunion, grab a meal together and maybe play cards.
They watched tributes from family members and from teachers and faculty and lastly they watched a chorus sing in honor of her and the school’s band play the old fight song.
On a Monday night in Greenfield, community members gathered at the high school to celebrate the life of Betty Nee, the longtime and beloved employee at Greenfield High School.
“It was a very nice gesture,” ’52 graduate Amy Proulx said. “She certainly worked for it.”
It was an evening where dozens came together in the auditorium to honor a highly respected figure in the community whom graduates remembered as an influential person in their lives.
Nee passed away at the age of 82 on Dec. 24, 2016. She had lived the three past winters in Florida. She initially retired from Greenfield High School in 1997, but then came back to assist with the school until 2012, after her longtime husband passed in 1999.
The 1995 senior class president Angel Mass emceed the event.
“Betty was definitely the definition of someone who is altruistic,” Mass said.
She first introduced a fellow classmate via a video recorded from San Francisco as he prepared for a play. He shared stories of his experience with “Mrs. Nee,” from asking for notes from the supply closet to first meeting her at the Xerox machine.
Her brother, John Spencer, spoke for a short moment.
He shared a story of going on a business trip in Switzerland. He was sitting around a table, speaking with others on the trip. They were talking about where they were all from. He said he was from Greenfield. Another person at the table then asked him, “Do you know Betty Nee?”
Nee’s son, John Nee, also spoke.
He shared his feelings with the others who spoke before him. They all spoke of not wanting to say the wrong thing to Nee but always noting her loving qualities and institutional memory for a community who was clearly influenced by her.
“It’s wonderful to be here and see that love reflected back at me,” John Nee said.
Current teacher Barry McColgan reflected on how Nee helped him get comfortable when he came to the high school.
“She was supportive, intelligent, wonderful, wonderful person,” McColgan said. “I will always keep in the beginning of my memory how important she was to my success at Greenfield high school.”
Before the evening’s ceremony concluded with a chorus dedicating two songs to Nee and the band playing the school’s fight song, Mass read a poem that Nee’s sister sent in for the remembrance. It was titled “Fill not your hearts.”
You can reach Joshua Solomon at:
jsolomon@recorder.com
413-772-0261, ext. 264