Hanover
Newton, whose husband was then the football coach at Vermont Academy in Saxtons River, Vt., was recovering from a miscarriage.
“Nita was a nurturer, and made Vermont Academy really feel like a family,” Newton said in a recent phone interview.
Choukas, the headmaster’s wife at what was then a private boys’ boarding school, took it upon herself to ensure that members of the school community got the care they needed.
Choukas’ abilities to care for others and get things done extended to other facets of her life, including as a longtime Hanover resident involved in cultural institutions in the Upper Valley.
Choukas — who died of Alzheimer’s disease last November at 87 — had been the director of drama at Vermont Academy, and VA’s theater is now named in her honor.
After leaving Vermont Academy in 1977, she spent a decade as development director for a nonprofit home and school for disadvantaged children in Westminster, Vt. She performed a number of starring roles as an actress with the Thetford-based Parish Players, and also wrote and directed plays.
“She just showed up,” said her middle child Ellie Anderson, of South Strafford. “Everything she did was about helping other people.”
Born in 1930 in Whiting, Maine, Choukas began her education in a one-room schoolhouse. Her family then moved to Franklin, N.H. and she graduated from Franklin High School in 1948. Choukas attended Mary Hitchcock School of Nursing in Hanover. While there, she met the man who would be her husband for 66 years, Michael Choukas Jr., then a student at Dartmouth College.
After graduating from nursing school in 1951, she began her career as a nurse at Children’s Hospital in Washington, D.C. She later served as a nurse at Cardigan Mountain School’s summer program. And, Anderson said, whenever children got hurt while she was growing up, they would shout, “Nita to the rescue!”
The Choukases first landed at Vermont Academy in 1954. There, Mike was a teacher and coach for 11 years before he took on the role of headmaster.
In the beginning, the family lived on campus and they were responsible for overseeing a group of about 15 boys in the dorm. Nita Choukas welcomed the boys into their home for food and parties, Mike Choukas said.
She was “very involved in their lives and the life of the school,” he said.
At memorial services for her in recent months, Choukas said some of the former students have told him how she sought them out if she suspected there was something bothering them.
“She’s a very loving person and just had a way with people,” he said.
The Choukases raised three children — Melanie, Ellie and Mike — at Vermont Academy, arriving when the oldest, Melanie, was just a baby.
“I could not have had a better partner in all aspects of my life,” Mike said.
Judi Colla, now a Hanover resident, arrived at Vermont Academy in the fall of 1973 with her husband who was to be an English teacher there. In advance of their arrival, Choukas had asked Colla what kind of wallpaper she would like in their apartment.
When they arrived the walls were decked in “bold, colorful wallpaper just as I asked,” Colla said.
It was a gesture Colla took as welcoming and as evidence of the many details of life that Choukas tackled.
Today, Colla said, Choukas “would be a Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook’s chief operating officer) in a corporation somewhere.”
Some of the responsibilities of faculty wives seemed outdated to Colla, who noted that her arrival at what was then a boys-only school coincided with a period of turmoil for the country. Topics of the day included women’s liberation, the Vietnam War and a push to question authority, Colla said.
But the small New England boarding school still held on to some longstanding traditions, Colla said. For example, there was an expectation that faculty wives would pour tea for the sports teams after their games. Colla was the first to say no to Choukas’ request for such assistance, noting that the school had hired her husband, not her.
“In spite of that, Nita was nothing but kind,” Colla said.
It was a moment that stuck with both Colla and Choukas. The Collas left Vermont Academy and lost touch with the Choukases for a decade or so. By the time they reconnected, Colla said Choukas’ hair had turned white.
When they met, Choukas pulled Colla in close and said, “You know, dear, you were the cause of this white hair.”
And she laughed, Colla said.
The Choukases moved to Hanover in 1977, and Mike served as director of alumni affairs for Dartmouth College. Nita Choukas brought her people skills, and network of friends and acquaintances to her work as development director at the Kurn Hattin Homes for Children, said Chris Barry, the organization’s now-retired executive director.
“In a sense she worked for me, but I used to kid her that she knew so much more about the business of fundraising than I did,” Barry said.
People who knew her were easily convinced to support Kurn Hattin, Barry said. Choukas had a firm belief in the school’s mission, which is to provide for disadvantaged children.
“A lot of people that she knew (thought) if Nita felt passionately about Kurn Hattin, it’s a good program and we need to take a look at it,” he said.
In the decade or so Choukas lead the school’s development efforts, the school went from raising $60,000 to $70,000 annually to $250,000 to $300,000 each year, he said. In addition, she was responsible for bringing in some of the largest gifts the school had ever gotten, $4.5 million and $3.5 million, Barry said.
The endowment Choukas helped to build has helped to feed, clothe and educate the children in the proceeding years. Other funds helped build new buildings, including a new auditorium and a gym.
In addition to reaping the benefits of her work, Barry said, “I was extremely lucky to call her my friend as well.”
Choukas, who went on to work for four years as the development director at the Vermont Institute of Natural Science, also found friendships through her work as an actress and director with the Parish Players. Thetford actress Kay Morton said Choukas’ keen eye and sensitivity as a director helped her gain confidence on stage.
Morton told Choukas of the waves of insecurity she often felt while performing.
Choukas responded by saying, “You know Kay you wouldn’t be as convincing as you can be if you didn’t feel all of those things truly.”
“That really kind of stuck with me,” Morton said.
Though Choukas may have played a traditional female role as the headmaster’s wife, her interest in theater gave her the chance to play many roles. Colla found a performance of Lettice and Lovage to be particularly memorable, she said. In the play, Choukas appeared in “some ridiculous position” with her bottom up in the air.
Some of Choukas’ grandchildren were also in the audience that night, “mesmerized by this woman (who was) greater than life,” Colla said.
Choukas also brought her fundraising skills with her to Parish Players. In the late 1990s, the Eclipse Grange, where the players put on their shows, was in need of renovations, Morton said. The early-19th century building had been heated by a woodstove and had toilets without plumbing.
According to the group’s website, they had to raise $200,000 for the renovations, which included plumbing and central heating.
“She worked so hard on that,” Morton said.
For example, Morton said Choukas organized a fundraising event in Etna, complete with dinner, drinks and monologues performed by some of the Parish Players actors.
“She’d get something in her head and she’d make it happen,” Morton said.
Choukas’ artistic endeavors also included writing. She authored a children’s book, Bayberry & Beau, about a cat, Beau, that befriends a horse named Bayberry. It was illustrated by Upper Valley artist Gillian Tyler and published by Chelsea Green Publishing in 2006.
And with her daughter Ellie Anderson, Choukas wrote the children’s musical An Elemental Tale, a story that pits the four elements (sun, sea, wind and Earth) against each other, with the Earth’s creatures caught in their midst. They first produced it in 1992 at Vermont Academy, then at the Briggs Opera House in White River Junction and at Hartford High School.
Anderson credits her mother with introducing the moon to the show and also said that she “brought love and spirituality into the whole piece.”
While Choukas’ great capacity for empathy served her well in almost all facets of her life, it did limit her enjoyment of ball games, be it the Red Sox, Patriots, Vermont Academy, Dartmouth or a grandchild’s hockey game.
“Her joy over a victory was short-lived,” her husband said. “Very quickly she’d think about the team who had just lost.”
Valley News Staff Writer Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
