Merle Edward Spring ’51 died on September 7, 2003, in Groton, Connecticut.

Born on August 5, 1929, in Porter, he prepared for college at Sanford High School and attended Bowdoin in 1947-48, becoming a member of Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity. After serving in the U.S. Army for a year, he attended what was then Gorham State Teachers College for a year and then served for eight years in the U.S. Army Air Force as a pilot in jet fighters and bombers. In 1960, he entered Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, from which he was graduated in 1962. He served for four years as pastor of the Seaford, Long Island, NY, Baptist Church, where he was ordained, and then was pastor of the Old Mystic Baptist Church in Connecticut for more than 30 years before serving as pastor of the Winthrop Baptist Church in Deep River, CT, for three years. Surviving are his wife, Jeanette Quigg Spring, whom he married in 1951; a son, Gary Spring of Durham; two daughters, Debby Dutton of Mystic and Kathy Adkins of Waterford; and five grandchildren.