Bradford, Vt.
The son of a Greek-immigrant restaurant owner, Barton was 10 years old when a fire ravaged downtown and his father, Charles, helped revitalize Main Street by financing several new buildings.
Barton went on to be community minded himself, co-founding Bradford Youth Sports and the Pierson Industrial Park and serving many roles at Bradford Golf Club, which he cherished as a low-cost recreational asset.
Over the last decade plus, Barton spearheaded the efforts of the non-profit Enhanced Living Inc., devoted to the proposed Margaret Pratt Assisted Living Facility. Largely thanks to Barton’s efforts, peers say, plans for the 48-bed building on Plateau Acres are moving forward.
Barton, who retired and was succeeded by his son, Charlie, at Barton Street Dental in 2005, dedicated much of his golden years to the assisted living project, which he felt vital to see to fruition after the closure of Bradford’s Brookside Nursing Home in the mid 2000s.
“I wouldn’t just call him diligent. He was very motivated to see things through,” said longtime friend and fellow Enhanced Living Inc. board member Mark Johnson, owner of Bliss Village Store. “He was charged by the Selectboard to help replace those nursing home beds, and he spent the last 12 years doing 99.9 percent of the leg work, working with the state, consultants, engineers and architects. He did a lot of the grant writing and fundraising to keep the work going. There aren’t too many people who would stick with it as long as he did.”
Born in 1937, Barton grew up in homes on Main Street and Wright’s Avenue and was a standout athlete at Bradford Academy, where he played baseball, basketball and was on the golf and skiing teams before graduating in 1955.
An extrovert as a child as much as he was an adult, Barton was known for a dry sense of humor.
“You could call him an old-time Yankee,” said Barton’s younger sister, Cathy Martin. “Sometimes he’d tell a joke and you wouldn’t really know if he was serious or not.”
Following a post-graduate year at Vermont Academy, Barton matriculated to Tufts University, where he satisfied his undergraduate requirements in just two years. He married his high school sweetheart, Judy Williams, in 1959 and graduated from the Tufts School of Dental Medicine three years later.
Barton went on to serve two years as a dentist in the U.S. Army, stationed at Governors Island, N.Y., before returning to Bradford and opening a private practice in Main Street’s Richardson building in 1964.
Barton worked with colleague Phillip Munson, also a Bradford dentist, to co-found the Bradford Youth Sports Association in the 1960s. During that same era, he and Munson collaborated to help implement fluoridation to the Bradford’s public water supply.
“It wasn’t easy to convince the town for much of anything back then,” said Bob Munson, Phillip’s son. “They deserve a tip of the cap for that.”
Barton cherished the nine-hole Bradford Golf Club situated behind Main Street, spending much of his leisure time there and winning numerous club championships. He was also successful away from town, championing the 1967 Burlington Invitational and winning the Vermont Medical Dental tournament three times.
He became a multi-faceted steward at Bradford Golf Club, responsible for numerous upgrades to the facility’s greens and tees and taking pride in maintaining the course’s iconic weeping willow trees. He served on the golf club’s board of directors for years, including a stint as president, and eventually became one of its primary stake holders.
“He was a great player, but even better at taking care of the course,” said Randy Odell, who served alongside Barton on the board for many years. “He was tremendously generous with his time: updating equipment, planting trees, building sand traps. He also worked to keep membership fees low because he thought it was a real asset to the community and wanted it to stay affordable.”
When he wasn’t at the golf course or working on the mouths of patients, Barton was a gregarious presence in town. “What’s the news?” was one of his catch phrases on Main Street, where he’d often pop into other businesses for a healthy chat.
“He’d come into my office and he’d want to talk sports and politics,” said Johnson, the Bliss Village Store owner. “He liked people a lot, liked to talk to people and find out what they were up to. You didn’t see him looking down very often.”
Proud of his heritage, Barton twice visited the Greek village of Zakas, where his father, who was born Costas Demetrius Boubaris, was from. Otherwise he didn’t often seek departure from Bradford, where he lived his entire 79 years save for his two-year stint in the Army.
Just last year, Barton released a hard-cover, coffee table book depicting the history of Bradford in words and photographs.
He died on June 28.
“I think he was comfortable here and was very community oriented,” said Charlie Barton, his youngest son. “This is where he wanted to be involved.”
Jared Pendak can be reached at jpendak@vnews.com or 603-727-3225.