Governor Deval Patrick announced $19,543,861 will be available for local road and bridge projects on the South Shore as part of a $200 million transportation bond bill passed last week by the Legislature.

The Chapter 90 funds are allocated to cities and towns using a formula based on community road miles, population and employment. The funds may be used for local road, bridge and multi-use path projects and related needs. The local projects will create construction jobs, improve public safety and deliver long-term economic development benefits to communities across the Commonwealth.

“Investing in our infrastructure creates jobs, enhances public safety and leaves our roads and bridges better for the next generation,” said Governor Patrick. “This significant investment in the South Shore is part of our growth strategy of investing in education, innovation and infrastructure to continue the Commonwealth’s strong economic recovery.”

Since taking office, Governor Patrick has made historic investments in the Commonwealth’s transportation infrastructure to stimulate job growth and economic development. The Patrick-Murray Administration has doubled capital investment in road and bridge programs and created the $3 billion Accelerated Bridge Program, the largest statewide infrastructure investment program ever.

Duxbury will receive $541,744 of the funds.

On June 28, the Local Housing partnership heard a conceptual plan for this development presented by Dr. Emil Reinhalter of Alexander Way. The property is located at 70 Bow Street, which contains 8.92 acres. Reinhalter bought this land in 2009. He also owns 56 Bow Street, which he purchased in 1995.

While there is not currently a formal Chapter 40B application filed with the town, Local Housing Partnership Chair Diane Bartlett said Reinhalter showed his plans to the committee out of courtesy and to obtain its endorsement since there is an affordable housing component to the plans.

Duxbury Police Chief Matthew Clancy is advising the public that a man calling residents and claiming to be fundraising for the police's disability and retirement funds is not affiliated in any way with the Duxbury Police Department or its police union. Anyone receiving such a call should report it to the Duxbury Police.

John Wisbach, formerly of Josselyn Avenue, has applied for a class 2 auto sales license. He appeared before the Board of Selectmen Monday night to explain his plan to sell used Jeeps and other vehicles, and also to service cars and have a Jeep restoration business at 1474 Tremont Street.

(Sarah Coughlin and her father John, who were diagnosed with cancer within months of each other, prepare for the 2012 Pan Mass Challenge.)

Duxbury resident John Coughlin has lived in Duxbury for more than 30 years. CEO of a medical instrument company in Norwood and father of three, Coughlin, 60, is a nine-year cancer survivor.

He was diagnosed in September 2003, two months after his daughter, 21 at the time, had been diagnosed with cancer herself. I am that daughter.

Simultaneously we faced this awful disease together and even traveled to and from Boston for treatments at Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

(Sawyer, Perlmutter, and a myeloma patient along with Perlmutter’s brother who rode to the ferry to New York from New Jersey together. )

Former Duxbury resident Diane Sawyer has enjoyed the freedom of bikes ever since she was a little girl living on Bay Road. However, these days she rides with a much different purpose in mind.

Sawyer (formerly Lillie) is cycling with friend Marty Perlmutter from Jacksonville, Florida all the way to Kittery, Maine to raise money and awareness for a deadly cancer, multiple myeloma (MM), which attacks the blood stream starting in the bone marrow and interferes with production of normal blood cells.

For Alicia O’Neill, the head of Endurance Events at the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation, the pair is helping to raise more than just money.

“They are trying to help eradicate a disease that took a friend,” said O’Neill. “Diane is really just supporting a friend who is supporting a friend.”

Sawyer started her journey on June 17 in Jacksonville and is now almost done with her 1,400-mile journey through 13 states. How she got involved in this trip was all a matter of fate.

Over at Peaked Hill Bar, tuna fishing is slow but there is plenty of striper action. Best baits here are live mackerel or wire line jigging with dark colored jigs. Up at the Race at Provincetown getting here has been more difficult than catching stripers. Live bait or butterfly jigs and wire line jigging is your best bet here. Most of the schools of mackerel are in the spike or tinka size, mostly very small.

The family of Marie McShane Ratto, longtime Duxbury resident, donated two benches that are now permanent additions to Duxbury Beach. Marie had a great love of the beach and spent many days all year long, cherishing the beach – whether walking, picking up litter or savoring the views. 

On July 7, 2010, Marie suffered a medical complication at Duxbury Beach.  With the valiant efforts of beach staff and the Duxbury Fire Department, she was revived, but never regained consciousness.  Three days later she passed away.  In her memory, her family accepted donations so these benches could be installed at Duxbury Beach. 

Marie’s children, Eddie McShane, Joanna Dow and Jim McShane want to thank all the wonderful, generous friends and family who donated to this cause.  Marie’s family also wants to thank the Duxbury Beach Reservation, Inc. 

The Reservation enthusiastically accepted the families donation and had wanted to create a more permanent sitting area on the bay side with decking and fencing.  The Reservation was now able to complete this welcome, resting spot. 

Marie’s family hopes all visitors to Duxbury Beach will take a moment to take in the view from a bench, overlooking picturesque Duxbury Bay.

The last of our four daughters graduated from Duxbury High School on June 2. As the three before her did, the youngest handed Dad the little green square book. Dad opened cautiously to see that, yes, confirmation of her achievement was signed sealed and delivered with a diploma. As Dad got home and placed it in a safe place with her sisters’ diplomas, he could not help but reflect on the journey:

The first day of school for each starting in 1997, mom crying, sending her babies off. Bus driver continues to wave to us when passing by, heading up the street all these years later.

(Grossman (center) runs with girls from her summer clinic. Photo by David Grossman.)

Katie Grossman believes fitness can empower young girls. This summer, she turned her vision into action and created a clinic for girls in grades four through nine to help teach them how to become confident young women by taking control of their health.

The idea all started when Grossman, a private trainer, witnessed firsthand the change among her clients.

“I’ve been training for two years now,” said Grossman, 21, who graduated from St. Mark’s School in 2009. “I would witness girls go through this transformation through the training and gain self-esteem and confidence. I wanted to make a clinic to reach more girls who wouldn’t normally do one-on-one training.”

Thus, Katie and Brian Grossman’s Summer Fitness Program for Girls began. Working with her twin brother Brian, a 2010 Duxbury graduate, Katie strives to teach girls aspects of fitness that will empower them and give them a sense of mental and emotional strength along with their physical strength.

(The new crematorium is tucked into the woods at the rear of Mayflower Cemetery.)

Tucked deep into Mayflower Cemetery, surrounded by towering pines and lush oak, with views of the final resting places of those who have passed on, is Duxbury’s new crematorium.

Though the architecture isn’t necessarily in keeping with the town’s traditional buildings -- long stained planks mimic tree bark and walls of windows act like water, reflecting the surroundings -- it suits the landscape perfectly, as if it’s part of the woods.

“The building lends itself to the environment and what surrounds it,” said Patricia Pappas, Cemetery Director. “We wouldn’t have been able to achieve serenity without this building. They built this for what we needed it to do.”

And what it needs to do is comfort the bereaved.

Unlike traditional crematoriums designed to do a job, Duxbury’s new facility isn’t quite a facility at all, but more like a welcoming funeral home. A family viewing area is situated just beyond the foyer with comfortable chairs, windows rising to meet 14-foot ceilings and somber black tiles that meet wood floors. But it’s the twin mahogany doors that soar to that ceiling that give it a stately aura.

Behind them is a glass panel with a view of a mesh curtain, a conveyor belt-like device and one of four stainless steel retorts. In this room, family members can gather, hold a memorial service or simply say a private goodbye to a loved one. If they so choose, a button at the rear of the room provides them with the opportunity to set the conveyor into motion and watch as their beloved is carried into eternity.

“It’s a common theme with cremations that a lot of families want to be present for it, some even have ceremonies,” said Peter Buttkus, the director of Public Works, who along with Inspectional Services Director Scott Lambiase oversaw construction of the facility. Since assuming his position three and a half years ago, Buttkus made it his priority to build a new crematorium. “The family can start the whole process by hitting the button here… and the auto-load would slide the body into the retort.”

Though some may recoil at the idea, others view it as intensely personal moment that allows them to stay with a loved one until the very end.

(Massachusetts Audubon bander Vin Zollo cradles a four-week old Osprey as he wraps a Fisheries and Wildlife tracking band around its leg. The Osprey is one of two chicks in the Bay Road nest. See page 16 for more photos. Photo by Barbara Van Dingstee)

Under intemperate skies, officials from the Massachusetts Audubon Society and Duxbury’s Conservation Department, as well as Bay Road neighbors gathered in Nancy Bennett’s yard last Friday for the annual banding of Osprey chicks. As the group approached the nest, both parents took to flight, circling and crying at the disruption.

Passersby are familiar with the pole that rises high above the marsh area, with a bundle of sticks curved just so by attentive parents to nestle their two chicks.

It’s a perfect site for an Osprey nest. Nearby runs Island Creek, ideal for the hawks whose diet is primarily fish, and the woods are far enough away that the chicks are safe from predators, but not so far as to elude those who seek to track them.

“If you don’t like it, come home,” his father advised, advice that was unnecessary, as it turned out. 

William was on his way to a life in the priesthood, and never looked back.   Msgr. William Glynn, now nearing 90, still serves his church and community even as a retiree and resident at The Village at Duxbury.

 Msgr. Glynn’s parents were born in Ireland, his father in Galway, his mother Nellie in Kerry.  They met in Boston, married, and started their married life in Cambridge – Michael working as a motorman for the Boston Elevated Rail Road, on the Harvard-Dorchester run. Msgr. Glynn was the second of three sons; a daughter, Mary, completed the family. 

C. Janet (McGillis) Maiellano Guzman, age 70, of Kingston, formerly of Brockton and Duxbury, died at her home on Monday, June 25.  Born in Brockton, she was a daughter of the late H. Daniel and Marion (Ings) McGillis.  For many years, she was a school teacher in the Marshfield Public School system.

 Mrs. Guzman was the beloved wife of Raymond Guzman; devoted mother of Karen Maiellano-Johnson and her husband Scott of Peabody, Mark Maiellano and his wife Elizabeth of Norwell, Paul Guzman of Elkhart, Ind., Mary Desits and her husband Jeff of Kirkwood, Mo. and Ervin Guzman and his wife Susan of Denver, Colo.; loving grandmother of Erinn, Hanna, Maxwell, Rocco, Patricia, Natalie, Allison, Tyler, Gabrielle and Elizabeth; and great-grandmother of Nolan.  She is also survived by her former husband, James Maiellano of Carver.

Visiting hours were held at the Shepherd Funeral Home in Kingston, on Thursday, June 28, and her funeral Mass was held at Saint Joseph’s Church, Kingston, on Friday, June 29.

Contributions in Mrs. Guzman’s memory may be made to The Massachusetts Child, 20 Ashburton Place, Boston, MA 02108, massteacher.org.