“I spent my 60th birthday in the Peace Corps, it was a great experience,” Whitley recalls. He says he built a wood stove for his house and then showed a few villagers how to make one. Apparently they taught others. “When I left there were four or five stoves in the village – and now we’ve heard everyone has a stove.” Over the past 20 years, Whitley, who is now 80, became a volunteer extraordinaire, serving on the Design Review Board, a committee that has not been tapped in recent years. If Whitley had his druthers he would ensure the Design Review Board got involved again — always in an advisory capacity — in helping ensure projects fit the neighborhood. What followed his stint on the Design Review Board, was service on the Advisory Committee where he enjoyed analyzing departmental budgets – even though initially, he “had to be pushed into” agreeing to join the committee. “I knew nothing about finance but I could listen and make judgments,” he says.
At 60 years of age, Roger and Kitty Whitley packed up the house, rented it out and were on their way to the Fiji Islands where they spent two years from 1984-1986
‘Selflessness, humility and integrity’
By mary ford
Thursday, February 15, 2007 - Updated: 02:44 PM EST
Roger Whitley does not currently sit on any town boards or committees. But that fact does not mean he is not keenly interested in the town and what is going on.
His eyes sparkle when he talks about the budgetary process and the pride he takes in the new town library.
Both are vastly different but nevertheless are still very close to his heart.
The retired architect, former Advisory Committee member, and Paul Pratt Library Trustee, has spent much time over his 50 years as a Cohasset resident “involved.”
That involvement has not stopped at Town Hall or at the library. He is active at First Parish Church, once led the Rusty Skippers (town band) as its drum major, and joined the Peace Corps with his wife, Kitty, after the kids were grown and off on their own.
Whitley’s generosity of his time and energy over the years on myriad committees and on countless projects and activities, led to his selection as this year’s Citizen of the Year.
Jane Kyricos of Summer Street put it best in her nomination of Whitley.
“In the past 20-plus years I have known Roger Whitley, I have been amazed at his humanitarian accomplishments, his gracious demeanor, and his generosity not only to our tiny little community but to the world at large,” she wrote.
The Citizen of the Year selection committee consisting of Susan Jaffe of 10 Wood Way, Mal McCunney of 685 Jerusalem Road, and Patience Towle of 61 Highland Ave., joined editor Mary Ford at the Cohasset Mariner office in Hingham Square on a recent Sunday afternoon to pore over the 12 nominations submitted by 22 individuals. The Citizen of the Year is an annual award started by the Cohasset Mariner in 1993.
Joan Kovach, 59 Ripley Road, described Whitley in her nomination as a “quiet, unassuming man with a heart as big as the planet and a commitment to the planet as well.
“We will never know how much his skill as an architect and timeless dedication influenced our beautiful library, or what legacy he left in the South Pacific as a Peace Corps volunteer,” she wrote.
Cohasset can count itself lucky that Whitley moved to town in 1956. One of the main reasons he chose Cohasset was the commuter rail service at the time because he and his wife both commuted.
The Greenbush line may have been abandoned in 1959, but Whitley’s commitment to his adopted hometown and the world at large only grew.
Whitley’s first wife died of cancer at 41. A few years later, Whitley, a single parent with two young children, met his current wife Kitty, who was teaching at Deer Hill.
“My older daughter was in the classroom and I dated the teacher,” the grandfather of two recalls with a smile. Within a year they were married and that was 38 years ago.
In the mid-70s, Whitley resigned his partnership at an architectural firm in Boston and became a self-employed architect with a home office at his house on Cedar Street.
Ten year later, he and Kitty, packed up the house, rented it out and were on their way to the Fiji Islands where they spent two years from 1984-1986,
It was Kitty, who had served in the Peace Corps in Malaysia, who suggested Whitley try the Peace Corps when he expressed frustration over news reports. “I asked, ‘what can a person do?’ and Kitty said, ‘Why don’t you join the Peace Corps’,” he says.
“I spent my 60th birthday in the Peace Corps, it was a great experience,” Whitley recalls.
He says he built a wood stove for his house and then showed a few villagers how to make one. Apparently they taught others. “When I left there were four or five stoves in the village – and now we’ve heard everyone has a stove.”
Over the past 20 years, Whitley, who is now 80, became a volunteer extraordinaire, serving on the Design Review Board, a committee that has not been tapped in recent years. If Whitley had his druthers he would ensure the Design Review Board got involved again — always in an advisory capacity — in helping ensure projects fit the neighborhood.
What followed his stint on the Design Review Board, was service on the Advisory Committee where he enjoyed analyzing departmental budgets – even though initially, he “had to be pushed into” agreeing to join the committee. “I knew nothing about finance but I could listen and make judgments,” he says.
After that he ran for Library Trustee and helped see the library project through to fruition. “It was a good project, I am really pleased with the way it turned out,” he says.
His only disappointment over the years was seeing the effort to establish a central sewer plant where the Little League Fields are now located dashed at a Town Meeting in the early 1980s. He had served on the committee to find a site for the plant. At the time, the federal government would have picked up 90 percent of the cost of the plant.
The rest, to coin a phrase, is history. The town has been embroiled in sewer issues ever since. Whitley said at the time, some feared sewering the town would open the door to development. He points out, however, development has come along anyway.
Whitley is also active in First Parish Church and he and Kitty helped with a Habitat for Humanity project in Guatemala.
Whitley said when he learned he had been selected as Citizen of the Year, he was “stunned.” His reaction is not surprising. He is described as “humble, kind, thoughtful and considerate.”
George Kovach, 59 Ripley Road, said in his nomination of Whitley, “What distinguishes Roger is the selflessness, humility and integrity with which he conducts his participation in town affairs.”
