Willard Merton Sweetser Sweetser, center, taken at the Primary School, which is currently the SAD15 office. Sweetser was approximately twelve at the time of the photo. Photo courtesy of Gray Historical Society. (Photo Staff)

Mr. Sweetser died on Friday at the Maine Veteran's Home in Paris after being moved there shortly before Thanksgiving.

Adm. Sweetser was the oldest living graduate of the United States Naval Academy. He earned that honor in 1926 after spending his youth in Gray and attending the Pennell Institute. Ancestors of Mr. Sweetser patrolled the seas as well and he grew up with an interest of life on the ocean.

The USS Lardner and the USS Hickox engaged the Japanese, each while under his command during World War II. Later he was given command of an entire division of U.S. destroyers.

Mr. Sweetser was given the Bronze Star after successfully guarding a security convoy, which was threatened by Japanese torpedo planes. He was also awarded the Silver Star after assisting in the escape of two crippled ships under attack.

For ten years following the war, Mr. Sweetser spent time in U.S. embassies in both the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia as a naval representative.

Upon his retirement from the Navy, Mr. Sweetser earned a master's degree in mathematics from Purdue University. He went on the teach mathematics and statistics at LaSalle University.

After his first wife, Martha Callana passed away, Mr. Sweetser remarried. He and his second wife, Barbara Bigelow - who has also since passed - moved back to Gray in 1972. In 1978, Mr. Sweetser and Robert T. Hill, also of Gray, co-authored The History, Records and Recollection of Gray, Maine, Volume I.

Fifty copies of the book were initially printed in 1978. During the 1990's Mr. Sweetser donated funds to the Gray Historical Society to print an additional 200 copies of the book, which covers the time period from 1735 to World War II.

Mr. Sweetser accomplished much during his lifetime. He will be remembered by his loved ones as a vibrant man, who was independent to the end.