Well, I got a bit distracted with work but it actually was good that I waited a bit. My mother passed on a biographical that was written about David Sanders Wright that fills in a few more blanks. So the first part of this post will revisit information in the last two.David graduated high school in Northampton in 1905. During his time in high school he took part in all major sports and lettered in hockey and basketball. He went on to Amherst College and graduated in 1909 and then went of to further studies at the Massachusetts Agriculture College.
In World War I, he was a sergeant with Company L of the 328th Infantry. I haven't had time to look at the history of this unit, if I find out anything interesting I will do another post.
I'll be organizing this post a bit more loosely. Instead of year blocks I'll break it into topic areas.
David continued to teach physics and chemistry at the high school until he retired in 1956. He was a baseball, basketball, and football coach there until he stepped down in 1949. Generally his coaching led to championship basketball team, but it is said his first love was baseball.
He was so loved in Northampton that they named the athletic field after him. When they rebuilt it in 2001, they re-dedicated it to him.
During World War II his oldest daughter served in Washington DC working on code breaking. Two of his sons, David Joy and Charles Merrick fought in Europe. David Joy was capture and spent some time in prisoner of camp.
David lived in Northampton for the rest of his life. In the last week of December, 1966 he fell down the stairs and slipped into a coma.. The family moved into a hospital in Amherst, with a room that looked out on his old college. My mother says that he shared the room with two of the students he had coached and they took great care of him. He died on January 1st, 1967 and is buried in Bridge Street Cemetery
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