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New Hampshire
Notable New Hampshire Deaths: Longtime Waterville Valley Town Administrator
InDepthNH.org scans the websites of New Hampshire funeral homes each week and selects at random some of our friends, relatives and neighbors to feature in this column. The people listed here passed away during the previous weeks and have some public or charitable connection to their community. InDepthNH.org is now offering obituaries through the Legacy.com service. We view this as part of our public service mission. Click here or on the Obituaries tab at the top of our home page to learn more. And if you know of someone from New Hampshire who should be featured in this column, please send your suggestions to NancyWestNews@gmail.com.
Phyllis M. (Ghidoni) Baker, 94, of Goshen, died Sept. 2, 2025. She served as Goshen town clerk and tax collector from 1961 to 1998, running the office out of her home for many years. She was a notary public and justice of the peace, conducting weddings at her house. Her husband served on the fire department for 50 years, and she answered emergency calls at their home, then would call firefighters by telephone to respond to the station. (Newton-Bartlett Funeral Home)
Walter Alexander Buchan, 83, of Exeter, died Sept. 3, 2025. He was a dentist in Nashua for more than five decades, in private practice. He earned a fellowship with the Academy of General Dentistry. (Remick & Gendron Funeral Home-Crematory)
Richard A. Cardner, 83, of Londonderry, died Sept. 4, 2025. He taught for the U.S. Department of Defense in Germany before becoming a guidance counselor at Salem High School in 1973. He was a driver’s education instructor and taught critical thinking courses through the New Hampshire higher education system. He was a founder of the Londonderry Dollar for Scholars chapter. (Carrier Family Funeral Home)
Mark Decoteau, 64, of Thornton, died Sept. 6, 2025. He was the longtime town manager of Waterville Valley. He graduated from West Point in 1983 and served as a U.S. Army officer. His oldest son Marc P. Decoteau was a U.S. Army soldier who was killed in military action in Afghanistan in 2010. Mark served in Lubec, Maine, as well as Farmington and Rochester, before he became town manager of Waterville Valley in 2001, staying for 24 years. (Mayhew Funeral Home)
Dana A. Hamel, 94, of Tuftonboro and North Palm Beach, Fla., died Sept. 4, 2025. He and his family have been benefactors of the University of New Hampshire, where the Hamel Center for Undergraduate Research, the Hamel Student Recreation Center, and the Hamel Honors and Scholars College were named for him and his family. He has also funded several scholarships. He was an officer in the U.S. Army’s Quartermaster Corps, then worked for Dow Chemical and Valtek Plastics Company before starting his own company with a friend in 1964. The Penn Corporation was a consumer products company in Princeton, N.J., where he served as chairman until the company’s sale in 1987. (Lord Funeral Home)
Dr. Wassfy Michael Hanna, 92, of Rye, died Sept. 2, 2025. After completing his medical training in Egypt, he moved to the United States in the early 1960s and for 57 years dedicated his work to Seacoast Mental Health Center in Portsmouth. He was medical director and also maintained a private practice in Portsmouth as a psychiatrist. (Remick & Gendron Funeral Home)
Newton Henry Kershaw Jr., 79, of Londonderry, died Sept. 5, 2025. He was an attorney who began his legal career at Devine, Millimet & Branch, P.A. in Manchester, where he specialized in ERISA law. In 1978, he founded The Legal Clinics in New Hampshire, which he ran for a decade before returning to Devine Millimet. He was president of the Brain Injury Association of New Hampshire, president of the board of the Moore Center, and was a board member of the Krempels Foundation. (Lambert Funeral Home & Crematory)
Paul W. Kiah, 85, of Melvin Village, died Aug. 29, 2025. In 1960, he was a page for John F. Kennedy at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles. He attended U.S. Army Aviation flight school in Fort Rucker, Ala., and joined the 82nd Airborne Aviation Battalion. He worked for the Gillette Company in Boston as a sales administrator and was promoted to an information system analyst in th.e president’s office. He and his family moved to Meredith in 1972 and purchased The Mug restaurant with two of his brothers-in-law. He became a Realtor with Nash Realty for 27 years. He was a member of the Meredith Kiwanis, Lions, VFW, and a director of the Meredith Chamber of Commerce. (Mayhew Funeral Home)
Richard W. Long, 78, of Laconia, died Sept. 7, 2025. He served in the U.S. Army National Guard from 1969 to 1974. He was executive vice president and teasurer at Laconia Savings Bank, where he was employed for 36 years. He was a Belknap County Commissioner and served on the Victory Lane Committee at N.H. International Speedway. He was a member of the Belknap County Sportsman Club, Lions Club, Belmont Rotary, Morning Star Lodge, Ammonoosuc Valley Fish & Game Club and the Bektash Shriners. (Wilkinson-Beane-Simoneau-Paquette Funeral Home & Cremation Services)
James Lester Loomis, 75, of Dover, died Sept. 6, 2025. He was co-founder in 1989 of Portsmouth-based Bottomline Technologies, which grew into a global leader in electronic payment systems. As vice president and CFO, he helped guide the company to become publicly traded on the NASDAQ Exchange. He served on the board of directors from 2000 to 2016. He served on the board of the Nashua Boys and Girls Club and supported United Way initiatives through Nashua Corporation. In 2011, he and his wife Anne received the UNH Foundation’s Hubbard Family Award for Service to Philanthropy in recognition of their dedication. He was an avid supporter and volunteer for Northeast Passage. (Tasker Funeral Service)
Stanley G. Maksalla, 79, of Hooksett, died Sept. 5, 2025. He was a Certified Public Accountant licensed in New Hampshire and Maryland and had more than 45 years of experience in the public and private sectors. He owned a local accounting firm in New Hampshire acquired by McCafferty and Company of Nashua. He was a region controller for a publicly held company for nine years, as well as a manager and owner of several other businesses, including Anton’s Restaurant in Manchester, which he owned with his late wife Mary Anne. He was a chairman of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce and a founding incorporator of the Nashua Police Athletic League. (Legacy.com)
Marie Hassett Mellin, 78, of Nashua, died Sept. 6, 2025. She taught at Nashua High School where she was instrumental in establishing the Advanced Placement History program. She was named New Hampshire Social Studies Teacher of the Year award in 2005. She retired in 2005. (Rochette Funeral Home & Cremation Services)
Captain Edward Charles Webster, U.S. Navy (Retired), 88, of Berlin, died Sept 9, 2025. He was supervisor of shipbuilding at Bath Iron Works in Maine, where he oversaw the construction and commissioning of key U.S. Navy frigates, including USS Klakring (FFG-42), Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) USS Robert G. Bradley (FFG-49). He was commanding officer of the U.S. Naval Base in Subic Bay in the Philippines. He worked after retiring from the Navy as a manager for VSE Corporation for 31 years. (Bryant Funeral Home & Crematory)
WORDS OF WISDOM: “Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.” – George Eliot, pen name of novelist Mary Ann Evans, Nov. 22, 1819, to Dec. 22, 1880
New Hampshire
Possible 2028 Democratic White House contenders weigh in on Iran with New Hampshire voters
As the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran overtakes the foreign policy debate in Washington, two Democratic governors with potential 2028 presidential aspirations — Gavin Newsom and Andy Beshear — recently traveled to New Hampshire, introducing themselves to the state’s famously engaged voters. The two weighed in on the war and both criticized and questioned President Trump’s strategy and endgame.
“If a president is going to take a country into war, and risk the lives of American troops and Americans in the region, he has to have a real justification and not one that seems to change every five to 10 hours,” Beshear told CBS News after a Democratic fundraiser in Keene.
“This President seems to use force before ever trying diplomacy, and he has a duty to sell it to the American people and to address Congress with it,” Beshear continued. “He hasn’t done any of that. In fact, it appears there isn’t even a plan for what success looks like. He’s gone from regime change to strategic objectives and now is talking about unconditional surrender, which isn’t realistic where he is.”
Beshear also said he thought that Congress should have reined in Mr. Trump’s war powers.
“He is trying to ignore Congress. He’s trying to even ignore the American people,” Beshear said.
He went on to note that the president’s State of the Union address took place “three — four days before he launched this attack,” and Mr. Trump “didn’t even have the respect to tell the American people the threat that he thought Iran posed to us.”
Last week, both the House and the Senate failed to pass resolutions to limit Mr. Trump’s war powers and stop him from taking further military action against Iran without congressional support.
For Newsom, the war with Iran constitutes part of a broader criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
At an event last Tuesday in Los Angeles, Newsom had compared Israel to an “apartheid state.” Later, in New Hampshire, he sought to clarify his comment.
“I was specifically referring to a Tom Friedman [New York Times] column last week, where Tom used that word of apartheid as it relates to the direction Bibi is going, particularly on the annexation of the West Bank,” Newsom explained during a book tour event Thursday night in Portsmouth. “I’m very angry, with what he is doing and why he’s doing it, what he’s going to ultimately try to do to the Supreme Court there, what he’s trying to do to save his own political career.”
Friedman wrote that at the same time that the U.S. and Israel are prosecuting a war in Iran, within Israel, Netanyahu’s government has undertaken efforts to annex the West Bank, driving Palestinians from their homes; fire the attorney general who is leading the prosecution against Netanyahu for corruption; and block the government’s attempt to establish a commission to examine the failures that led up to the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of Jews by Hamas.
CBS News has reached out to the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C., for comment.
On Iran, Newsom said, “I’m very angry about this war, with all due respect, you know, not because I’m angry the supreme leader is dead. Quite the contrary. I’m not naive about the last 37 years of his reign. Forty-seven years since ’79 — the revolution,” Newsom said. “But I’m also mindful that you have a president who still is inarticulate and incapable of giving us the rationale of why? Why now? What’s the endgame?”
Many attendees at Newsom’s book event said that the situation in Iran is a top-of-mind issue for them, too. Some said they’re “horrified” by what is happening.
29-year-old Alicia Marr told CBS News she decided to attend Newsom’s event because of his social media response to the war with Iran.
“There was one spot left, and I decided to pick it up, and it was due to his response to the war, that it is just unacceptable, and I would agree with that,” Marr said.
While some voters like Marr are eager to hear about where potential candidates stand on foreign policy, many at Newsom’s event said they care most about how potential candidates plan to address domestic issues.
“I’m more focused on getting the middle class back on track and fighting the oligarchy, and I’m less invested in international issues,” said Anita Alden, who also attended Newsom’s event,
“I wouldn’t call myself America first, but we have so many problems at home that are my priority,” she told CBS News.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris, who may also be weighing another White House bid, told Fox 2 Detroit last week that she “unequivocally opposes” the Trump administration’s military action in Iran and urged Congress to take action.
“If we want to stop Donald Trump with this random decision that he has arrived at, then Congress must act, and Congress must act immediately. The American people do not want our sons and daughters to go into this unauthorized war of choice,” Harris said.
Mr. Trump has lashed out against Democrats who have pushed back on his Iran strategy, calling them “losers” last week and arguing that they would criticize any decision he made on Iran.
“If I did it, it’s no good. If I didn’t do it, they would have said the opposite, that you should have done this,” the president said.
Local News
Police say the Attleboro man was driving 104 mph in a 55 mph zone on Route 202 near in Rindge, New Hampshire.
A Massachusetts man was arrested late Wednesday night after police say he was driving more than 100 mph on a New Hampshire roadway.
Officers with the Rindge Police Department stopped a vehicle shortly after 11 p.m. on Route 202 near Sears Drive in Rindge following a report of a car traveling at excessive speed, according to a statement from Chief Rachel Malynowski.
The vehicle, a 2020 Kia Stinger, was spotted traveling at 104 mph in a posted 55 mph zone, Malynowski said.
The driver, a 21-year-old man from Attleboro, was arrested and charged with reckless operation of a motor vehicle, according to police.
He is scheduled to be arraigned April 5. If convicted, the man faces a fine of at least $750, in addition to the court’s penalty assessment, and a 90-day license suspension, Malynowski said.
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