obits

Nancy Campbell Hammond of Lincoln died at her home on April 23, 2025 after two years of living with cancer. She was 87.

A native of Fremont, Neb., Nancy graduated from the University of Nebraska and moved to Pasadena, Calif. There, she embarked on a diverse career of work with children that ranged from researching childhood development, to teaching deaf children, to contributing to the nascent Head Start program to working as a children’s librarian.

She met and married John Hammond in California, and together they moved to the Boston area, purchasing a fixer-upper farmhouse in Lincoln that would be their home for the next half-century. While raising their two daughters, Sarah and Kate, Nancy completed a master’s degree in children’s literature at Simmons College. Later, Nancy reviewed children’s books for the Horn Book Magazine and worked as a children’s librarian at the Maynard and Cambridge Public Libraries, introducing countless kids to the joys of books.

Nancy’s curiosity about the birds at her backyard feeder developed into a lifelong interest in birding and the environment. She and John, often with Sarah and Kate and later their grandchildren, traveled the world to see birds, wildlife, and explore other cultures. Nancy worked tirelessly to remove exotic, invasive species from the family’s eight acre property. She was an avid supporter of Drumlin Farm, Mass Audubon, the Conservation Law Foundation, and the Boston Nature Center.

Nancy was a Boston and Nebraska sports fan, a reader, a naturalist, and a cultural explorer, always trying new restaurants, museums and music happenings in the Boston area with John and sharing her finds with friends. She was wonderfully dedicated to the causes she believed in, and to her family and friends. She was independent, stubborn, loyal, and warm-hearted.

Nancy was predeceased by her husband, John, and her brother, Kent Campbell. She is survived by her sister, Mary Pedersen, her daughters Sarah (Tim) and Kate (Geoff), and four grandchildren.

Services for Nancy will be private. Interment will be at Lincoln Cemetery. In lieu of flowers, please do something for the environment. Arrangements are entrusted to Dee Funeral Home & Cremation Service of Concord, which provided this obituary. To share a remembrance or offer a condolence on Nancy’s tribute page, click here.

(Editor’s note: This obituary was updated with corrections on April 25.)

Jeannie Mallary — beloved mother, wife, and friend — passed away peacefully on April 1, 2025, overlooking the Connecticut River, as it ran by the property of her late husband’s family farm. She was surrounded by her loving family. Even though her 89- year-old mind was still sharp as a tack and her interest in politics, art, and all manner of intellectual pursuits was as vibrant as ever, she knew her body was failing her rapidly. She courageously chose her own death with dignity, thanks to Act 39 — a bill she and her late husband worked hard to have passed here in Vermont.

Jeannie was the daughter of John and Mary Loud and raised in Lincoln, Mass., in a household filled with music. She was predeceased by her parents and brothers, John (Jock) and Rob. Not long after graduating from Radcliffe, she fell in love with and married Jonathan N. Brownell and they moved to Maple Corner in Calais, Vt., where they raised their three children. Jeannie was an active member of each community she lived in: volunteering, hosting, and generally being involved. She was the very first librarian at the brand-new Calais Elementary School, a role that brought her passion for stories and literature to that place, and inspired many young people’s curiosity thereby.

Music filled her life and she passed it on whenever she could. Jeannie most enjoyed directing and singing in numerous local choirs. It was the Old West Church in Calais that was closest to her musical heart. Another lifelong passion was her love of horses and horsemanship. In the second half of her life, Jeannie married her second great love, Richard Mallary, with whom she spent 32 wonderful years before his passing. Her professional life expanded. Among her many endeavors, Jeannie served as director of the Vermont Ethics Network, championing all manner of concerns ethical with a particular emphasis on end-of-life issues.

In her final years, she lived in Hanover, N.H., first among many friends at Willow Springs Circle and then at Kendal at Hanover, where she was warmly welcomed and cared for. She leaves behind her three loving children, eight grandchildren, two (soon four) great-grandchildren, and many, many beloved relatives and friends. We will all miss her very much. Goodbye, Mum. Goodbye, Didi. Goodbye, Jeannie. We love you!

A celebration of life was held on April 18, 2025 in the Gathering Room at Kendal at Hanover. Memorial contributions may be made to the Old West Church in Calais and the Big Life Foundation. Arrangements are under the direction of Day Funeral Home in Randolph, Vt. To leave a message for the family or to send flowers or plant a tree in remembrance, click here.

David once wrote, “My career has had a consistent inner theme and purpose — a calling, perhaps — that has been with me while being a university chaplain, an urban planner, and a county attorney Fairfax, Va.”

After his theological degrees at Yale Divinity School, where he was heavily involved in urban poverty issues in neighborhoods, and after becoming ordained in the UCC, he became a university chaplain at Drew and Vanderbilt universities. While fighting the racial divides in our country by organizing students and participating himself with them in marches in Selma and Montgomery, including “Bloody Sunday” in 1965, he heard Dr. King calling all Americans to look beyond the moment and solve the structural problems which perpetuate poverty and racism through urban zoning, housing, and development. He then left university chaplaincy to acquire the additional skills he needed with a master of city planning degree at the University of Pennsylvania.

In the next decade he worked as an urban planner, primarily in obtaining financing for affordable housing with national law firms in Washington, D.C. In 1973 he began working for the long-range Comprehensive Planning Department of Fairfax County, and later for the Environment and Policy Division of that office.

In 1982 he acquired a J.D. degree from. Georgetown University Law School to manage the legal cases surrounding affordable housing and land use and was a county attorney for the Redevelopment and Housing Authority of Fairfax County.

He was preceded in death by his parents Walter Stroh and Betty Sampson Stroh, but his parting is deeply mourned by a large family: his brother Stephen F. Stroh and Susan Hoffman Stroh, and his sister Deborah Stroh Tezich and Greg Tezich and their families. He was married to Carol Vines Moss and they had two daughters, Sarah Stroh Jeppesen and Christine Stroh Reddy. His grandchildren are Dylan and Asa Franchak, and Alexandra, Ravi and Vikram Reddy.

After divorce he was married to Susan Mockenhaupt, who died in 2009. He was married again in 2013 to Jane Chowning von Maltzahn. His stepchildren through her are Philip von Maltzahn and Stephanie Slates, Geoffrey von Maltzahn and Maxine Sharkey Giammo, and Julia von Maltzahn. His step-grandchildren are Felix and Norris von Maltzahn; Eva Orion, Leo, Wolf and Zelda von Maltzahn; and Valentina and Carlos Rangel.

David was born in Boulder, Colo., spent most of his career in Fairfax County, Va., and lived in Lincoln the last year of his life, dying in hospice in Wayland. He spent a year at Exeter University in England and enjoyed a lifetime of holidays in Devon.

The family give thanks to the communities of St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church in Lincoln and Christ Church Episcopal in Andover where he was treasurer, and to our neighbors and friends in Virginia, Maryland, and Massachusetts. Special thanks to our priest the Rev. Garrett Yates and Dr. Philip Saylor and his cancer team at Mass. General Brigham in Boston for their expert care for ten years during his bout with cancer. David volunteered for a year of experimental treatment to benefit others.

Family and friends will gather to honor and remember David for his memorial service on Saturday, May 10, 2025 at 11:00am at St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church in Lincoln.

Keep us all, O Lord, so awake in our calling,
So deep in service to you in the world,
So aware of our neighbors’ sufferings
That at the last day we may sleep in thy peace
and wake into thy glory, majesty and love,
Where time has vanished,
and joy shall shine in the dawn of your new day. Amen.

Donations in his name may be made to: St. Anne’s-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church, 147 Concord Rd., P.O. Box 6, Lincoln, MA 01773; Doctors Without Borders, P.O. Box 5030, Hagerstown, MD 21741-5030; or ACLU, 125 Broad St., 18th floor, New York, NY 10004; or to a civil rights or environmental cause of your choosing. Arrangements are under the care of Concord Funeral Home, which provided this obituary. Click here to write in his online guest book.

Lester Ira “Les” Gordon, of Lincoln passed away on Wednesday, March 26, 2025.

For 52 years, he was the beloved husband of Dafna Krouk-Gordon. Loving father of Ilana Gordon Brown and son-in-law Craig, and Alexis Vichniac and son-in-law Avi. Adored grandfather of Tyler, Lily, Nate, Ella, Jeremy, and Zach.

Services at the Levine Chapels (470 Harvard St., Brookline) on Sunday, March 30 at 12:30pm with livestream viewing available using the following link: www.levinelive.com/lestergordon. Burial will follow at the Shara Tfilo Cemetery, 776 Baker St., West Roxbury. Shiva at his late residence following the burial through 7:00pm and continuing Monday, March 31 from 5:00-8:00pm.

In lieu of flowers, remembrances may be made to TILL, Inc., 20 Eastbrook Rd., Dedham MA 02026, www.tillinc.org

Dudley Shepard died peacefully in his sleep at 93 years old on January 14, 2025. He was surrounded by his close family and friends during his final days.

Dudley was born on January 2, 1932, in Exeter, N.H., to Henry B. Shepard Sr. and Frances Dudley Shepard, and grew up in West Newton, Mass. He attended Yale University, graduating in 1954. After two years in the Navy, he studied at MIT, receiving his doctorate in mechanical engineering in 1962. In 1965, Dudley and his wife Mary-Macy settled in Lincoln, where they raised their young family. Over his career he worked at the Draper Laboratory in Cambridge and was a professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department at the University of Lowell.

Dudley had many passions in his life, beginning with his professional work, where he was involved from the very beginning in NASA’s Apollo space program. Working in uncharted territory, he and his colleagues contemplated, brainstormed, and helped design solutions to provide astronauts safe passage to the moon and back. Dudley always mentioned how grateful he was to have been in the “right place at the right time” to be a part of this trailblazing project.

In his personal life, Dudley was known for his lifelong love of sailing. From his childhood days spent with his uncle Fritz in Marblehead, where he learned to sail and developed a formidable talent for competition in regattas, to the annual cruises he took down the coast of Maine and beyond even into his late 1980s, the ocean was central to who he was.

Additionally, there was his love of music. This took many forms over his life, including singing in church choirs and choral societies. A particularly memorable experience was when Dudley and his wife Becky travelled with the Manchester Choral Society, where they were invited to sing in several cathedrals across Europe including in Spain, Italy, France, Germany, and England. Of special significance was his clarinet, an instrument he took up in his 60s. Dudley loved playing with the band at the town bandstand and in quartet recitals with fellow music students. In his final years as he struggled with the limitations of his age, his clarinet playing remained intact, allowing him to experience the joy and happiness that music brought to his life right up to his final days.

Dudley was preceded in death by his first wife Mary-Macy Shepard, his sister Perry Shepard, his brother Henry B. Shepard Jr, and his sister Anne S. Bullis. He is survived by his wife Becky Shepard; his son Allen Shepard and wife Helena; his son Daniel Shepard and wife Linda; his daughter Nanette Fleming and husband Scott; his grandson Connor Fleming; his granddaughter Leah Fleming and her husband Viraj Jorapur; and his stepchildren, Andrew Hayden, Emily Baya and husband Matthew and their children Owen and Marshall.

A memorial service will be held at the Congregational Church, 21 Front St., Exeter, N.H., on Saturday, March 8 at 2:00pm with a reception to follow in the church vestry. Donations in his memory may be made to the Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire at seltnh.org or by mail at 247 N. River Rd, Epping, N.H. 03042. Arrangements are under the care of Remick & Gendron Funeral Home in Hampton, N.H., which provided this obituary. Please click here to sign Dudley’s tribute wall.

Dan Dimancescu, who has died age 81, came from a long line of storytellers, and throughout a long, well-lived, lively, and engaging eight decades, he excelled in inspiring people to go out into the world and to be curious explorers, not passive observers of life. He excelled in bringing people together from different countries, faiths, backgrounds, and ethnicities, and they in turn shared their countries, their thoughts, and their ways of looking at the world with others in productive engaging settings which culminated in worthwhile fusions of principles, business practices, conservation initiatives, and collaborations.

If ever an adage were to be applied to Dan’s life it would be one of his favorite sayings, “One thing leads to another.” This sentiment is reflected by the fact that when Dan sat down to write the first volume of his memoirs, he selected One Thing Leads To Another as the most suitable title. What he chose to state on the book’s back cover, which he self-published in the autumn of 2020, offers readers a small glimpse into how Dan viewed the course of his life, much of which had been spent exploring and navigating vast expanses of the world’s lands and seas: “This is a memoir of a young emigrant to the U.S. who applied to an Ivy League college simply on mistaken recognition of the name ‘Dartmouth.’ The few short years there and the answer to a surprisingly simple question ‘How much time do you waste every day?’ affected much else in his life on four continents: adventure, cartography, urban affairs, high-tech consulting, teaching ancient cultures, filmmaking, nature conservation, associating with billionaires and princes — and a return to his parents’ homeland: Romania. Punctuating his accounts are snapshots of events that shaped the post-WWII world.”

When pondering the distinct and vibrant chapters of Dan’s life, what stands out is that at no time was his curiosity and creativity constrained or hindered by what William Blake once described in his poem “London” as “mind-forg’d manacles.” Rather, Dan was always an expansive thinker who excelled in uniting and blending ideas, people, techniques, and organizational styles from different disciplines and cultures while at the same time introducing novel ways of approaching and understanding long-standing practices, institutions, and methods of teaching. He was a voracious reader who generously and succinctly even in his last days shared an ever-expanding wealth of ideas, information, and perspectives about an ever-changing world.

Dan was first and foremost a global citizen who strove to cultivate beneficial local, regional, and international collaborations when working on rewilding projects, co-authoring books, creating and producing original documentary films, and working on historic preservation projects. His office was always a wondrous center of activity teeming with the sounds of his favorite songs, photographs of National Geographic expeditions he had participated in, model ships he carefully and joyfully constructed, reference books in different languages which he adored returning to time and again to glean new insights, dozens of his own thoughtfully written books (some co-authored with leading experts in various disciplines and others self-published), scripts for documentary projects past, present, and future, and mementos of rewarding world travels nestled alongside childhood photos of his children Katie and Nick and childhood drawings and pieces they made in art classes over the years.

Dan made everyone he met and worked know that their opinions and contributions were worthy and equally valued. He existed in a world of possibilities where a seize-the-day spirit coupled with a willingness and the momentum to find novel ways of doing things won the day. He was not one to ruminate on how and why something could not be done or whether it should be questioned. When faced with challenges big and small he might choose to seek alternative opinions and options or he might propose, present, and enact an entirely new way of doing something.

Over the course of his life, he worked in many different professional roles and served on many nonprofit boards both in the U.S. and overseas. At the time of his death, he was the head of Kogainon Films, a documentary film production company that he and his son Nicholas (Nick) co-founded in 2008 when Nick was 23 years old. He was a producer intimately involved in the production of and the forthcoming debut of a documentary about the historic town of Concord and slavery, which will have its first screenings in Concord in early April 2025.

In the years before and after the birth of his two children, Dan was the founder and president of Technology and Strategy Group (TSG). He was a management consultant working Fortune 500 manufacturing and high-tech firms including Boeing, Procter & Gamble, Trane, and Digital Equipment. In the mid- to late 1970s when he and his wife Katherine were residing in Charlestown close to the Bunker Hill Monument, Dan commuted to and from his Cities Corp. company in the heart of Harvard Square, where his earlier company Cities, Inc. was previously based.

Dan was never one to simply sit idly by. He always had a fresh pad of paper and a pen close at hand for writing down intriguing thoughts and ideas and questions which came to mind in moments when he was basking in the sun in the garden, by a river, or a hillside in Romania. Ideas, words, new ways of envisioning and incorporating a rewilding project or the reintroduction of native species to an environment from which they had been long absent were always flowing through him.

Over the years, warm and wonderful lasting memories were made with family and friends as Dan delighted in sharing beautiful outdoor experiences on land and on the water in and around Hanover, N.H., which he first enjoyed when an undergraduate at Dartmouth College. As a high school student attending Hartford Public High School in Hartford, Conn., he spent countless hours bicycling around Connecticut, and this real-time training helped him become National Junior Sprint Racing (10th), Connecticut State Bicycling Champion (1960), and Eastern U.S. Sprint Racing Champion (1960).

There were invigorating and lasting memories made in all seasons in the quaint towns of Arlington, Vt., where Dan and his wife Katherine were married in 1976 and in nearby Dorset, Vt., where their early June wedding celebrations were unexpectedly showered with actual snowflakes, much to the delight and surprise of their wedding guests, who carried on merrily dancing and drinking with the newlyweds.

Before too long, more unexpected snowy memories were made when Dan and Katherine made the move from their fourth-floor walk-up apartment in Charlestown to a historic small town called Lincoln outside of Boston at exactly the same time that the infamous Blizzard of ’78 shut down vast swaths of the United States for days. Dan and Katherine made it safely to their new house in Lincoln but the moving truck with their belongings did not, so for the first few days in their new home, they found themselves camping out. When it was possible to travel in Harvard Square where they both worked, they had a delightful time catching up with friends who were enjoying cross-country skiing around Cambridge, and many epic snowy Lincoln and Cambridge photos were later shared with their children along with stories about the blizzard.

Lincoln was the backdrop for a multitude of wonderful outdoor experiences for Katie and Nick, who spent their childhood playing outdoors from sunup to sundown, whether it be sledding on a perfect sledding hill with Lincoln friends near a dairy farm in town, or out and about with a parent or trusted adult on one of many trails which crisscross Lincoln’s conservation land. During winter seasons when there was enough snow on the ground, sleigh rides were organized by Dan and Katherine for their family and friends with their children too.

Of all the places that Katie and Nick enjoyed being with their parents, two especially stand out: Marblehead, Massachusetts and Blue Hill, Maine. In Marblehead, countless weekends were spent running around Fort Sewall and dining in all seasons nearby at the Barnacle restaurant. Further from home in Blue Hill, summers spent with Katherine’s parents were enhanced by family hikes up Blue Hill Mountain with beloved collie dogs. Annual outings were made to the Blue Hill Fair, which inspired local author E.B. White to write Charlotte’s Web. There were extended family dinners at Eaton’s Lobster Pound, the Fourth of July parade in Brooklin, Maine, and trips to Bar Harbor and the iconic Jordan Pond House restaurant, though the highlight of being in Hancock County was being out on the water. Dan and Nick enjoyed getting out on the coastal waters around Blue Hill in Dan’s sea kayak, which he custom-made and used during a National Geographic expedition in the summer of 1985 to traverse a 500-mile route around the Korean islands from Mok’po to Pusan.

Overseas, worthwhile annual summer holidays were spent when Katie and Nick were young exploring the English, Welsh, and French countrysides during breaks in Dan’s overseas work schedules. A true travel highlight came in the form of a family holiday in June 1995 spent in England and Wales with family friends and their children, during which Dan became the expedition lead who organized and led a walk from the bed and breakfast where everyone was staying on trails to nearby Stonehenge. The breathtaking sight of truly ancient, mysterious, and awe-inspiring stones suddenly appearing on the horizon as the group approached on foot left indelible impressions.

Years later, Dan and Nick co-founded Kogainon Films,and committed themselves to chronicling and sharing poignant, informative, and soul-penetrating history and personal experiences from Romania’s history past. Each documentary presented its audience with remarkable stories of courage, valor, and personal sacrifices and also showcased how little is known my many about Romania’s long and rich history, which stretches back far earlier than the Roman Empire and encompassing so much more than Vlad the Impaler and Bram Stoker.

Peter Dan Dimancescu was born on March 22, 1943 in Maidenhead, England to Romanian parents, who at the time were raising their three older children in the English countryside in a household which alsi included a series of English spaniels. After his birth and subsequent baptism in London, Dan rarely went by his given first name of Peter and instead he answered to Dan. His parents raised their children in England for a period of years, having previously divided their family’s lives before the outbreak of the Second World War between homes in San Francisco, London, and Romania.

Dan’s father, Dimitri D. Dimancescu, was on the cusp of turning 47 when his youngest child, Dan, was born in the spring of 1943 outside of London. Dimitri and his brother both fought valiantly in the First World War as Romanian soldiers and Dimitri was instrumental in establishing the Boy Scouts in Romania. Dan’s mother Alexandra “Ze” (Radulescu) Dimancescu was in her early 30s when he was born; despite wartime deprivations and hardships, she and Dimitri did their utmost to impart a love and appreciation of Romania, its culture, and its history to their four children during the difficult and tumultuous war years when it was not possible to safely return to Romania to be with loved ones and to enjoy spending time in the home they made there after their marriage.

It may be said that early on Dan’s calling to be a navigator of life and the world around him, both for himself and others, revealed itself in some of his earliest childhood memories which he often shared with Katie and Nick. He clearly recalled being pushed in his pram by a British nanny along a country road near an ancient house in the English countryside where his family were residing. With crystal-clear clarity decades later, he recounted being in his pram and being actively engaged in studying the sky overhead, all while noting the sounds around him as well as actual conditions and contours of terrain of the country lane for future reference in his memory.

In early 1948 when Dan was five, his family bid farewell to England and moved to Marrakesh, Morocco, arriving there during the waning years of a period when the country was a French protectorate. Dan’s new life swiftly became marked by explorations of the souks in Marrakesh in the company of his older brothers Mihai, collecting and playing with marbles and his beloved Dinky toy cars, attending French schools run by nuns, family holidays to the Atlas Mountains and farther afield to Spain and Portugal, and nights spent tucked up in bed reading Tintin stories, copies of National Geographic magazine, and well-traveled and greatly loved vintage copies of the Illustrated London News, which had already been read and enjoyed by his father’s family for decades by the time of his birth.

All of these immersive literary adventures coupled with having lived in many different houses in two different countries by the age of 13 inadvertently prepared Dan for another huge life adventure which unfolded in 1956 when he and his brother Mihai sailed to the U.S. aboard a Yugoslavian freighter. They bid farewell their parents, who had to stay behind in Morocco to wait for their visas and official paperwork to come through so their family could be reunited in the U.S. Some of Dan’s happiest and most treasured memories were made after their arrival stateside, when he and Mihai lived with a beloved family friend in San Francisco in her Sea Cliff neighborhood house with its unobstructed breathtaking views of water, beach, and the Golden Gate Bridge. Life-long seeds of learning, interests, and curiosity were planted during the life-changing and transformative three-year period spent living in San Francisco. When he was not enjoying the company and taking in ideas and wisdom imparted by his parents’ family friends, Dan enjoyed activities such as skating at the now long-gone Sutro Baths.

William Shakespeare once wrote that “one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages,” and this is aptly characterizes Dan’s life and his many incredible adventures and ventures and his approach to life, for he did not believe that there was only one set career path for him; an instead he constantly fostered an expansive growth mindset and cultivated outreach opportunities, curiosity, exploration, and meaningful collaborations. When Dan was asked by his wife and daughter in his last year to describe how the course of his life had unfolded, he related the following: Born in England during WWII to Romania parents, Dan’s father was a decorated World War hero and career diplomat in the U.S. and the U.K. exiled to London during World War II. The post-war Communist takeover of Romania in December 1947 led the family to renewed exile in Marrakech, where they lived for eight years before emigrating to the U.S. in 1956.

He was awarded U.S. citizenship in 1961. Almost 45 years later, he was invited to have Romanian citizenship issued to him based on his family’s pre-Communist status. This allowed him to recover family properties (urban and rural) particularly on his maternal side whose boyar (landed aristocracy) ancestry traces back to the mid-1500s. This led to involvement in various Romanian NGOs, film and book production, and association with leading researchers of Romania culture and history. In 2005 he was designated Honorary Consul of Romania in Boston; later amended to Consul-General.

His education led him to Dartmouth College, graduate school at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Harvard/Tufts administered), and some years later, Harvard Business School. During his professional career, he served during sabbatical years as guest lecturer and/or titled faculty at Dartmouth’s engineering and business school, the Institute for Man & Technology at the University of Nantes (France), and Boston University’s business school. He was also a prolific author of more than twenty titles on technology policy, corporate management, Romanian history and culture as well as his latest on American Revolution-era slavery in Concord, published in 2025 as a companion book to an accompanying feature documentary he produced.

Most influential in shaping the course of his life was membership in Dartmouth’s Ledyard Canoe Club, founded in 1920 and named after John Ledyard, who enrolled at Dartmouth in 1772. Ledyard’s son departed the college to travel with Captain Cook on his third voyage and is known as the United States’ first genuine explorer. This inspired Dan to undertake four expeditions supported by National Geographic 1,700 miles by canoe on the Danube River (1964); traveling 1,000 miles by kayak along Japan’s Inland Sea and Pacific Coast (1966), hiking the 600-mile length of Romania’s Carpathian Mountains (1968), and doing 500 miles by kayak along South Korea’s island-dotted peninsula (1985).

Over subsequent years he followed a largely self-created professional life that spanned a number of disparate careers: freelance journalist for the Boston Globe covering Europe and Japan in the late 1960s; cartographer pioneering digital map drafting technology; urban planner influencing successful efforts to cancel inner-city highways in Boston; author/co-author of high tech semiconductor industry U.S. policy books; student of Japanese management know-how and consultant to Fortune 500 high-tech and manufacturing companies; and in the new millennium, co-founder of Kogainon Films.

Over the years he served on varied educational and nonprofit institutional boards, most recently the Foundation Conservation Carpathia (Romania), which focused on creating Europe’s largest nature park. Its internationally distinguished board includes Swiss-American billionaire Hansjoerg Wyss, known as the world’s largest donor to land conservation organizations.

When Sir Christopher Wren’s son chose an epitaph to grace the site of his father’s final resting in St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, he chose these words, “Lector, si monumentum requiris, circumspice,” which means, “Reader, if you seek a monument, look around.” These timeless words resonate with Dan’s family for these words convey what it is like to be physically present in Romania taking in the country’s natural splendors, now-preserved and restored historic towns, villages, and buildings, and learning about the projects being undertaken by Romanian organizations Dan supported or helped establish. Dan’s life and legacy is embodied by Romania and it is there that his spirit has surely returned home.

Dan is survived by Katherine, his wife of 48 years, and their daughter Katie. His son Nick predeceased him in May 2011. He is also survived by his sister Sandra Kenny and brother Dr. Mihai Dimancescu. His brother Dimitri Dimancesco predeceased him, as did their parents Alexandra “Ze” and Dimitri D. Dimancescu and their maternal great-grandmother Greta (Bastea) Radulescu. Dan is also survived by many loving nieces, nephews, grandnieces, grandnephews, and cousins. He proudly called Lincoln and Concord home for decades and leaves behind wonderful friends and esteemed colleagues in both communities.

In lieu of flowers, donations to honor Dan’s memory may be made to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. A celebration-of-life event is being planned for later this year. Burial will be private at Lincoln Cemetery. Arrangements are under the care of Concord Funeral Home, which provided this obituary. Click here to leave a note in Dan’s online guestbook.

Barbara Buchan died peacefully on November 10, 2024 in her 91st year.

Buchan — who was born in Cambridge England shortly after the forced emigration of her family from Germany prior to World War II due to their Jewish heritage — moved to the United States with her husband and young family of three in the mid-1960s, spending the first year in Concord and settling in Lincoln. In 2014, at age 80, she decided to swap out snow for sun and transition into The Terraces of Los Gatos community near her two California-based children and their families.

Barbara’s nature was to support causes that were meaningful to her and advocate for underserved communities, particularly children and families. To support this endeavor, she educated herself, earning a bachelor’s degree in medical/social work at the University of Edinburgh and a master’s and doctoral degree in early childhood education at Tufts University and Nova University, respectively.

She began her career as an almoner in London in the early 1960s (watch “Call the Midwife” for an idea of her work). She continued to support children and families throughout her career. In each community in which she lived, she was driven to originate educational and care resources. In Woodford, England, she started a cooperative nursery school with her good friend Dorothy Runnicles. Upon transitioning to Lincoln, she collaborated with Sally Mlavsky and other community parents to repurpose an old barn on Winter Street and establish the Barn Cooperative Nursery School (since moved to Concord).

Barbara continued to develop educational resources and curricula for elementary schools through the Educational Development Center. She then served as director of the Elm Park Early Education Center, located in Worcester, where amongst her many innovative accomplishments was the creation of a rooftop playground. She closed her career by supporting mothers recovering from addiction at The Institute for Health Recovery. While there she introduced an economical heating pad solution “Warm Socks” to ease the aches and pains of program participants. They were an imme

Barbara embraced many of the things that Lincoln and its environment offered — hosting horses, chickens, ducks, rabbits, and cats on her property, selling arts and crafts at the Old Town Hall Exchange, buying equipment at ski and skate sales, attending lectures at Bemis Hall and school productions at the Brooks School auditorium, ice skating by moonlight on Macone’s Pond and Pierce Pond, square dancing in the Smith School gym and Codman barn, swimming at the Codman pool and across Walden Pond into her 70s, and snowshoeing and tracking animals in the local woods.

Upon retirement in 2000, Barbara immersed herself in supporting environmental causes in Lincoln, including the Green Committee’s mission to lower energy consumption in homes and town, and the Lincoln Tick Task Force (read more here). She continued to support communities in need, including the Arghand Trust, for which she served as a board member supporting their founder Sarah Chayes. She also found immense satisfaction and joy participating in memoir-writing groups, first joining one in Lincoln and then, finding none in her new California community, starting one.

Barbara died peacefully on November 10, 2024 with a warm sock in her hand (see the description from one of her memoirs below). She is survived by her children Nick, Lindy and Lucy; their spouses Paola, Bob, and Steve; and five grandchildren (Cailin, Finian, Jason, Nicole and Isabella). Barbara was much loved by many, and will be greatly missed.

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Using odd socks as covers for heating pads

By Barbara Buchan

The back story: Years ago, I worked with women in recovery from substance abuse who had lots of aches and pains but little money. It occurred to me that we needed to offer an alternative to the use of Motrin or other medications prescribed by their doctors. The women in our group happened to mention that there were lots of odd socks lying around at the laundromat where they washed their clothes.

Somewhere else, I had read about making warming pads using seeds as a filler. So how about filling odd socks (must contain at least 80% cotton) with flaxseed, knotting the tops, and then putting them in the microwave for 1–2 minutes before applying them to sore spots? As an alternative to using the microwave in class, I brought in a Crock-Pot along with a sack of flaxseed and a scoop, and the residents brought in assorted cotton socks. They were a big hit with the residents at work. From that day on, the Crock-Pot filled with sock pads was available at every meeting. Subsequently, flaxseed pads have become a household necessity in my family.

Recipe

Socks: Must be at least 80% cotton (to ensure fibers don’t melt in the microwave or burn).

Flaxseed or grains of rice: Quantity needed will vary with the size/number of socks to fill. Do not overfill to avoid bulkiness and/or uneven heat. You may wish to experiment. (Supposedly, the oil in flaxseed retains heat longer than non-oily grains. However, rice grains seem to work very well.)

Directions:

1. (optional) Tie-dye socks.
2. Fill the sock with flaxseed or rice.
3. Tie a knot or stitch to close the end of the grain-filled sock.
4. Microwave for 1–2 minutes.