Local History Paper

Life Of Del Flood

Brittany Hopkins
Miss. Lind & Mr. Viles
English 10/ World Studies III
December 18, 2007





Outline
I. Introduction
II. Early Childhood
A. Birth place and Parents
B. Schooling
C. Young Adult
III. Midlife
A. Business’ he started
B. Wife and Children
IV. Late Life
A. Retirement
B. Organizations and Groups he was a part of
V. Death & Family
A. Date of death & how
B. Family left behind
VI. National Farmers Organization
A. Origins
B. Founders
C. Important movements
VII. Conclusion




Brittany Hopkins
Miss. Lind & Mr. Viles
English 10/ World Studies III
December 18, 2007
Life of Del Flood
The little town of Plymouth was discovered in 1826, and there is not much that has happened here. There is one store, a post office, a church and a grange hall. Although there is not much going on there are some very interesting people and places here. One of these people is a man named Del Flood. He has been my next door neighbor ever since I was born, and he is one of the most interesting people that has been in my life.

Del was born in Forest Hills, Massachusetts on October 10, 1915. His parents were Frank D and Miriam L Flood; Del was their only child. While spending most of his childhood in Massachusetts, he attended high school at Richmond Maine High school. When Del was a young man he worked in a shipyard during World War II in Portland, Maine. He did so well at being overseer he moved up to supervisor. After he was done at the shipyard he made the move to Plymouth.

Right after he moved to Plymouth, he started his own dairy farm; which went very well. Along with the farm he also started his own refrigeration business, which, like the farm, was successful. Del ended up marrying Joan Lewis in Plymouth on October 1, 1955. Then in 1968 he lost his barn to a fire, and he sort of retired, yet still kept open his refrigeration business. Yet another attainment of his was that him, his wife Joan and their son Alan build and ran Flood’s General Store in Newport. But in 1990 Del and Joan finally retired.

During their retirement they did what they always loved to do, travel. They traveled to all 50 states, Canada, Guatemala, Mexico and all the way up to the Texas line. Del belonged to the Meridian Splendor Masonic Lodge in Newport for over 50 years. He was also very active in the affairs of Plymouth, this was showed by him being a first selectman and the first director from Plymouth on the Nokomis School Board. He was a member of the Plymouth Grange and was in the National Farmers Organization.

When Del died on March 22, 2007 of a prolonged illness, he left behind his wife Joan, his son Alan and one grandson, Stacy and his wife Tamara Flood of Hudson, Massachusetts. He also had four great-granddaughters, Regina, Natasha, Gabrella, and Carra. As you can see Del was an amazingly hard worker and had lots of family whom cared about him.
As mentioned above, Del was a member of the National Farmers Organization. This is a group of farmers and other people in the farm business, gathering together. It originally started when two men, a farmer named Wayne Jackson and a feed salesman named Jay Loghry started to talk in 1953. Then, in 1955 at a grain sale presentation Jay made a point that the farmers that were at the meeting should begin a new farmers group. They all like the idea, so they started to invite more farmers and salesmen and there eventually became a strong interest among the common, everyday farmers. When the group had just started to get out there, as a protest group, the number of people in it was about 149,000. The man who became the first president of the NFO was named Oren Lee Staley. He is the man who is recognized for bringing the NFO throughout the country. One of the most famous events the group took part in was the Holding Action in 1967. What happened was the farmers decided to withhold their milk their cows
produced from their customers. This went on for a total of 15 days, before the court got a restraining order on them. But when the restraining order had expired the government and the NFO agreed on a solution that would make them both happy.

Del was like another grandfather for me, and his wife was like another grandmother. Since we live right next to each other I used to spend a lot of time with them. I also used to just walk down to go hang out with them, I will never forget those times that we spent together. Del was a very hard worker and he loved to be around his family and friends, and even meeting new people. This is why I chose Del Flood for this paper, he had such a wonderful, full life and he made sure he never wasted one moment of it.






Bibliography
The Daily ME Obituaries." The Daily ME. 23 Mar. 2007. 29 Nov. 2007 .

"National Farmers Organization." Wikipedia. NFO.Org. 29 Dec. 2007 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Farmers_Organization.

Personal Interview. Joan Flood. 30 Dec. 2007.