January 31st, 2008
Naming Names in Milton
By Paul E. Kandarian
Boston Globe
Getting one’s name on a public building these days usually comes with a price tag. Make a big donation and you can get your name in a prominent spot.
Not so at Fuller Village in Milton. There, it’s years of service to the town, not money, that speaks. At the nonprofit elderly housing complex, seven buildings and a grove of trees bear the names of people who have donated hundreds of years collectively to Milton.
The board that named the buildings “wanted to honor people who’ve given their time to the town,” said Deborah Felton, executive director of Fuller Village, which has 321 housing units on 61 acres. “John Cronin, former town administrator, did all the research on the names that were brought forth and it was hard to get it down to eight, but we feel we have a good representation.”
The honorees include: the late Charles Eliot, for whom the tree grove is named, founder of Blue Hills Reservation and the Trustees of Reservations and partner in a firm headed by Frederick Law Olmsted; Ann Coghlan, who was the first resident of Fuller Village and has served on numerous town boards and foundations; Frank J. Giuliano, former longtime Milton school superintendent; and Rabbi Nathan Korff, a founder of Milton Residences for the Elderly, an initiative in the 1960s of the Milton Clergymen’s Association to bring affordable and safe housing options to Milton’s senior citizens.
Also, John P. Linehan, former selectman and Planning Board member who as a trustee of the Caroline Fuller Trust was influential in making Fuller Village a reality; the late Edith Endicott Stebbins, who pioneered as a woman serving on a variety of Milton boards in the early 20th century; the late Edward C. Johnson II, founder of Fidelity Investments who as a 35-year member of the Milton Board of Appeals hand-wrote all board decisions, some 500 of them; and the late Paul W. Knight, the first World War II veteran elected to a townwide position when he won a seat on the school board in 1947.
In this era of selling naming rights, Felton said, “It’s nice to honor people instead for their service and devotion to their community.”