David Shaw Swanson

BRUNSWICK – On the morning of Nov. 28, 2022, the world lost a very good man, who was deeply loved. After several years of memory loss, David Shaw Swanson died peacefully with his devoted wife of 66 years by his side.

He was born on May 17, 1930, in Mt. Vernon, N.Y. to Albert Sigfried Swanson and Rebecca Jane Magrath and raised in Scarsdale, N.Y., where he excelled in the public schools. As a boy, Dave was active in the Boy Scouts, becoming the youngest Eagle Scout recipient in New York at that time. He played the trumpet, was a strong member of the varsity track team, and participated in high school theater, especially enjoying Gilbert and Sullivan productions. Another formative experience during this time were the five summers he spent as bugler, swim instructor and camp counselor at the Aloha Camp for boys, Lanakila, on Lake Morey in Vermont.

After high school, Dave graduated from Yale University, B.S. Ch.E. 1952, where in addition to his studies he enjoyed singing tenor as a member of the Yale Freshman Glee Club, the Battell Chapel Choir, the Madrigal Singers, the Varsity Glee Club, and the Spizzwinks(?). He continued his education at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, M.S. 1953. The second semester of his graduate work at M.I.T. was done in Gothenburg, Sweden, exploring the possibility of ion- exchange in food preservation. This time period in Dave’s life was one of great pleasure as the connection with relatives and new friendships brought a life-long fondness for his father’s Swedish heritage.

Dave was drafted into the Army during the Korean War in 1954, where he spent two years in the Medical Corps unit at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Denver, Colo. On a ski weekend in Aspen, Colo., he met his future wife, Ann Magarrell, a student at Colorado University, in a chance meeting as singles on a chair lift. Upon Ann’s graduation they were married in Denver June 16, 1956.

That same year, Dave’s career began with The Procter and Gamble Manufacturing Company, where he spent the next 38 years. Dave was a promoter of innovation within the company. He was an early adopter of total quality management, a theory he had learned during graduate school, and which he helped steward company wide. Above all, he was a champion for workers, and was responsible for the overwhelming success of the company’s first fully racially integrated manufacturing plant in Albany, Ga., which became a model for P & G manufacturing.

In his own words, “a diverse work force promotes not just parity performance, but an important competitive edge by learning from and building upon differences in background, experience, expectations and behavior.”

“We tried to create a climate of trust in which distinctions among people were minimized, and in which every employee could see that their interests and those of the Company were indeed inseparable…. My role (was) to help remove barriers that (kept) people from succeeding.”

When Dave retired in 1992, he was a senior vice president and a member of the board, with responsibilities for worldwide manufacturing, engineering, distribution and purchasing functions.

Dave believed that commitment to community service and hobbies was key to “achieving the breadth and balance…important to living a full life.” And indeed, many organizations benefitted from his volunteer leadership. The most important and rewarding of these was his work for Berea College in Berea, Ky., whose mission and founding purpose since 1855 has been to offer higher education for those with limited economic resources. Dave enjoyed his work at Berea so much that he served there as a trustee for 22 years, and as chairman of the board for six years.

Other volunteer positions included life-long service to the Episcopal Church; as trustee of Good Samaritan Hospital in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Miles Memorial Hospital in Damariscotta; and board memberships to the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and the Portland Symphony Orchestra.

His hobbies were equally important to him, and as with everything in his life, he strove for perfection. He was a masterful furniture maker, and skilled maker of Swedish rya rugs. His handwork is beloved by his family and shared amongst his wife and children’s homes. He was also a talented writer. He self-published a personal memoir, and a biography entitled, “Emil Landau, Surviving the Third Reich”, based on his personal interviews with a Holocaust survivor who lived in Damariscotta.

Dave is gone, but his kind, generous spirit is not forgotten. He leaves behind his beloved wife Ann; four children, Sarah (Chris Kenyon) of Bethesda, Md., Linda (Edward Bair) of Atlanta, Ga., Jennifer (Andrew Niemann) of Acton, Mass., and David Jr. (Joanna Murphy) of Hillsborough, N.C. He leaves one beloved sister, Margaret “Peggy” Newton of Kennett Square, Pa.; and six grandchildren, Tucker Bair, August Bair, David Niemann, Jack Niemann, Jessica Niemann, and Emily Kenyon.

A private ceremony to celebrate Dave’s life will be in the springtime.