Kenneth D. Gadbow ’47

Kenneth D. Gadbow ’47 died on February 21, 2008, at his home in Whitesboro, New York.

Born on February 12, 1918, in Browersville, Minn., he prepared for college at Park Rapids High School there. Following his graduation from high school, he was selected to train in the state’s education department for teachers, where he taught 36 students in grades one through eight in a one-room schoolhouse. He later earned his bachelor’s degree at Bowdoin and his master’s at the University of Pennsylvania and studied in an advanced program in secondary education at Syracuse University. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and was honorably discharged in January 1945. He became a high school English teacher, a drama coach, and an elementary principal in different communities in NewYork. From 1966 until his retirement in 1980, he was a high school principal and then school superintendent in Oriskany. He loved the outdoors and was an avid fisherman, hunter, and golfer. He was a long-time parishioner at St. Anne’s Church in Whitesboro, where he served as Eucharistic minister and a member of the parish council. He is survived by his wife Anna (Plevyak), whom he met as a Navy nurse and married in 1945; he is survived by his sons, Ken Gadbow of Canadaigua, N.Y.; Bill Gadbow of Exton, Penn., Jim Gadbow of Whitesboro, and Dave Gadbow of Rochester, N.Y.; three daughters, Michele Costello of Reston,Va., Mary Carrigan of Manchester, N.H., and Celeste Mareric of Utica, N.Y.; 16 grandchildren; and five great- grandchildren.