Anne Mullin

Anne Elizabeth (Johnson) Mullin of New Harbor, ME and Bonita Springs, FL died Saturday, July 4th, 2020 of a sudden heart malfunction. She was 83 years old. 

Born in Boston, MA to Marion Agnes (McGrath) and Victor Thomas Johnson, she grew up in Brighton, MA and attended local schools, graduating from Girls’ Latin School in 1954 and Tufts University in 1958. She taught English at Andrew Warde High School in 1959 before marrying Charles Kevin Mullin of Milton, MA and moving with him to Westwood, MA, where she was an award-winning columnist for the Transcript Press, and a trustee of the Westwood Public Library. The couple’s four children - Peter, Andrew, Kathryn, and Matthew - were born there. They spent 61 joyous years together. 

In 1971, when the family moved to Farmington, ME, Mullin joined the Public Relations and Alumni Office at the University of Maine at Farmington, eventually becoming Alumni Director. She was also a weekly columnist for the Franklin Journal and continued to write a woman’s feature for the Harvard University Football News for 20 years. 

In 1985, she earned her M.A. from the University of Maine, where she taught English composition, and in 1991 received her Ph.D. in English at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. For ten years, she taught composition to undergraduates and graduate students as a tenured faculty member at Idaho State University in Pocatello, also serving as Writing Center Director and Director of Composition. She retired as Associate Professor Emerita in 2000, returning to New Harbor, where she was a part time employee at the Weatherbird store in Damariscotta for a number of years. She also served as a seasonal employee of the Town of Bristol, hostessing at the Fisherman’s Museum at Pemaquid Point. She was a founding member of the Pemaquid Poets, and a member of the Friends of Colonial Pemaquid, Round Top Center for the Arts, and the Willing Workers. 

Mullin’s poetry has been published in numerous journals including College English, Black Fly Review, Off the Coast, Common Ground Review, Animus, Northern New England Review, Kalliope, Sow’s Ear Review, and Goose River Anthology. She also published chapbooks: Women Who Know Too Much, Women Who Know More Than Enough, Surface Tension, Sometimes a Sonnet, and her latest – Home Front, a collection of remembrances of wartime childhood. Her academic essays appeared in the Journal of the Assembly for Advanced Perspectives on Learning, Journal of College Reading and Learning, Writing Center Resource Manual, and in writing resource collections including The Journal Book and Nothing Begins with N. Lighter essays appeared in Rendezvous at Idaho State University. In Pocatello, her work was honored with an inscribed poetry stone in 2003. 

Mullin enjoyed many hobbies, including painting, gardening, knitting, and sewing. She loved to travel with her husband. Together they visited national parks in the continental U.S., Hawaii, and Alaska. They also enjoyed trips to Britain, France, Italy, Greece, Egypt, and Peru. 

She is survived by her husband Kevin; sons Peter Gregory and family of Lincoln, NE, Andrew Thomas and family of Bristol, ME, and Matthew Johnson and family of South Hadley, MA, and daughter Kathryn Mullin Shin and family of Charlottesville, VA; and ten grandchildren. 

A graveside service will be held at the New Harbor Cemetery in New Harbor on Thursday, October 22, 2020 at 10:30am.  Due to current COVID restrictions, it is asked that masks be worn and social distancing be observed.  In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to charity of the donor’s choice. 

Arrangements are under the direction and care of the Strong-Hancock Funeral Home, 612 Main Street, Damariscotta, ME 04543.  Condolences, and messages for her family, may be expressed by visiting: www.StrongHancock.com.

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