April 25, 2006
Section: Amherst
Bloggers pay tribute
to college professor
DEAN SHALHOUP
Telegraph Staff
NASHUA - They spent the
weekend mourning his passing, many by posting heartfelt tributes to an
online blog created in his honor.
And this morning at 11,
faculty members and students, past and present, who knew popular Daniel
Webster College professor Donald D. Fagan will jam Immaculate
Conception Church in Lowell, Mass., to bid the longtime educator
farewell and celebrate the life of a unique, widely respected man.
Don Fagan, a 31-year assistant professor of business management
at Daniel Webster, died at his Lowell home Friday after a brief illness.
He was 67.
"There was truly no one like him," Annette Kurman, DWC public
relations director, said Monday. "This is a great loss to us, both
professionally and personally."
Fagan also taught at Nashua's Rivier College, Franklin Pierce
College in Concord and Middlesex Community College in Bedford, Mass.
Despite declining health, he continued teaching at DWC and Middlesex
until two weeks before his death, Kurman said.
"He came in one day looking very tired; it was obvious he didn't feel
well . . . I think he napped most of the day," Kurman said. "But Don
loved teaching and truly enjoyed coming in each day. He enjoyed the
company of everyone he worked with."
Fagan's fiery, passionate delivery was legendary among his
economics, investment and personal finance students, who good-naturedly
dubbed his brand of teaching "Faganomics," Kurman wrote in a tribute
that was released Monday.
"Professor Fagan taught not just in terms of curricular goals
and outcomes, but in terms of how to live life to the fullest, leading
by his own example," she wrote. "He was a very practical teacher . . .
Don had an interesting story to support every theory he presented."
Personal tributes to Fagan and condolences (www.dwc.edu/news/Fagan/Fagan.shtml)
over the weekend and into Monday.
"I always remember Don Fagan's view of people from California,
wrote Dennis G. Rouleau, a 1983 DWC grad. "He used to say that the
United States was tilted toward the Pacific and that all the nuts and
screwballs rolled down into California.
"He was a great man, and I certainly appreciate what he did for me."
A lifelong Red Sox fanatic who loved attending home games and even
traveled to Florida for spring training, Fagan habitually
listened to games on his office radio, Kurman wrote. "His passion for
baseball and other sports arose from his youth, when he boxed in the
amateur Golden Gloves . . . he often told us stories of growing up in
Lowell."
A 1963 graduate of Northeastern University with a bachelor's degree in
business administration, Fagan later attended Rivier College and
got his master's in business in 1978.
Before becoming a teacher, Kurman wrote, Fagan dabbled in the
fast-food industry, becoming a management executive for Burger King and
Dunkin' Donuts. There he met a young Nashua police officer, Bob
Ravenelle, who years later became DWC's director of campus safety and
served for 25 years.
Early in his teaching career, Fagan taught junior high and high
school in the Lowell area, Kurman wrote. He was named chairman of DWC's
business department in 1982, and received the college's "Teacher of
Excellence" award in 2002.
A lifelong private pilot who loved world travel, lasagna, practical
jokes and sports, Fagan was known to quietly reach into his own
pocket to assist those in need. "One time he learned of a student who
didn't have the money to pay for her last semester at DWC," Kurman's
tribute states. "Don loaned her the thousands of dollars she needed to
complete her studies . . . she later repaid the loan that allowed her to
graduate."
Keith Moon, a DWC business professor from 1982-95 who met Fagan
when the two taught at Franklin Pierce, remembered a perennially
positive man with a terrific sense of humor. He was quoted in Kurman's
tribute.
"Whenever I was looking for Don on campus, he was easy to locate,"
said Moon. "All I had to do was wander around until I heard laughter,
and there would be Don.
"He had a way to make the world seem bright, even when his world was
not."
Professor Neil Parmenter, Fagan's "officemate" for the past
several years, who Kurman described as one of Fagan's closest
friends on campus, was also quoted in her tribute.
"There (wasn't) a morning that went by that Don, with his coffee and the
sports sections of several newspapers and magazines, didn't sit down
with me and others to discuss how we can solve the world's problems,"
said Parmenter.
Another among the scores of bloggers honoring Fagan was 1993
graduate Darlene (Meely) Hutchinson.
She wrote, in part, "Mr. Fagan was the heart and soul of DWC. He
was always there with a laugh and a smile, but he was also always
available to assist with any academic questions or needs. He was not
just a professor. He took a sincere interest in each person . . .
"DWC has lost an incredible person," Hutchinson wrote.
"Anyone who knew Don Fagan will forever have his handprint on
their heart."
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