Northampton’s mayor and city council have designated the entryway to the Municipal Building and parking lot behind City Hall as “Mayor Sean Dunphy Way” to honor his contributions to his community. A dedication is set for 10:30 a.m. this Saturday, Sept. 29.
Fifty years before this new sign was in the works, people looked up to Sean Dunphy.
The very first time I saw Sean, he was having lunch with his father, attorney Edwin P. Dunphy, at the St. Regis Restaurant. The St. Regis was next door to Sheehan’s Cafe of musical memory. Fun fact: The restaurant had a sliding hatch to Sheehan’s for thirst or food transactions.
Despite having degrees from Fairfield College and Boston University, Sean looked far too young to be a lawyer. His ready smile and youthful visage would last a lifetime, belying his important titles and responsibilities.
We didn’t meet that day, but over time forged an unlikely friendship. It was doubtful because in the 1950s Sean’s dad and my own had twice hotly contested for mayor of Northampton. Both campaigns were fierce political donnybrooks in which each promised to support the winner. Democrats united once the dust settled. My dad won three terms.
On Wikipedia, former mayors “Big Jim” Cahillane, Sean Dunphy and President Calvin Coolidge are Northampton notables.
Sean met his future wife, Ann Rosenthal, when the two of them were campaigning for Chub Peabody. Chub was an unusual Democrat because he was born a Boston Brahmin.
In 1962, Peabody upset Republican Governor John Volpe by 4,431 out of 2 million votes. It was a rare win for Peabody, one probably due to the support of President John Kennedy. Ted Kennedy was also on the ballot as a candidate for Senator. Governor Peabody’s Yankee ancestors set him up for a sly joke when he was humorously introduced as having four Massachusetts towns named after him: Endicott, Peabody, Marblehead and Athol.
But I digress.
Sean brought his Boston campaign experience back to Hamp. He gained a mature appreciation of his hometown by being appointed to the Planning Board. We finally met when Sean became campaign manager of Ed McColgan’s 1968 race for state Representative. Sean went to work, inspiring hundreds of locals, young and old, to campaign for Ed. That big victory paved the way for Sean’s mayoral ambitions.
The usual route to the mayor’s office was by being elected to serve a few terms on the city council. In time, you might be elected council president or run at-large to test your citywide appeal. Sean, at 28, decided that he was in too much of a hurry to wait his turn.
My October 1999 Gazette Opinion headline read: “Politics best when people participate.” Thirty years before, in 1969, I was in a group invited to Sean’s house on a Sunday in early spring. Sean told us of his then shocking decision to run for mayor that fall.
“The room murmured with doubt at his audacity. A few skeptics left; yet, one by one men and women who knew Sean and Ann and had witnessed their capacity for hard work signed on for his campaign.”
To join Sean at that point was an act of faith. His more experienced opponents included City Councilor David B.Musante, Jr., Councilor-at-Large Bernard Carey, and Robert O. Forsander of Florence.
Nonetheless, from that moment on, Sean Dunphy embodied Theodore Roosevelt’s “The Man in the Arena,” in that “hard work, tenacity and desire to do the right thing can get you far in life.” Sean’s admirers saw in him a person to be trusted and supported for high office. We were goo-goos, good government reformers bringing new energy like today’s tyros: Natalie Blais, Lindsay Sabadosa, Jo Comerford, Mindy Domb and Dan Carey.
Sean won his hard fought Democratic primary by a mere 146 votes before winning the mayoralty two to one. During that campaign, Sean had promised to “Go to Washington, D.C.” in search of federal grants. No grass grew under our feet as the new City Solicitor-designate, Attorney Thomas Growhoski, City Councilor Ed Gross, myself, as a local businessman and Mayor-Elect Dunphy took off for the nation’s capitol. The campaign had just ended and our joy was such that we hardly needed the airplane.
Sean was so exhausted upon our arrival at the Mayflower Hotel he went off to bed. The two-day trip took us to the Pentagon, Senator Ted Kennedy’s office, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and, lastly, the office of Senator Ed Brooke, where we were photographed. Ironically, Ed Brooke defeated Chub Peabody, who was said to be a cheerful loser of an election that resulted in an African-American senator from Massachusetts.
In 1975, Governor Michael Dukakis named Sean to the Massachusetts Appellate Tax Board. Sean’s performance led to his 1978 appointment to be an innovative Justice of Hampshire Probate and Family Court for 20 years.
In 1997, Judge Sean M. Dunphy was appointed Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Probate and Family Court System. Sean brought his Irish sense of humor, humanity and caring into every phase of his personal and professional lives.
Mayor David Narkewicz has detailed Mayor Dunphy’s impact on the city of Northampton: “Professionalizing city government, its first planning department, a comprehensive zoning ordinance, first modern conservation commission, first municipal recycling center, first industrial park, expansion of city recreation programs and infrastructure.”
A true son of Northampton died June 12, 2015. His family, friends and co-workers still feel his loss. Mayor Sean Dunphy’s American citizen-scholar ideal will long inspire this city’s students and public servants.
Show up for Sean and Ann this Saturday.
Northampton native Jim Cahillane was Chair of the Northampton Redevelopment Authority 1970-75. His memoir, “The Best Place of All” (City of Northampton, 2004), reprises mid-20th-century Northampton. He writes his monthly column in Williamsburg.