Fred Szufnarowski: An Energy Engineer with Boundless Energy
It’s a wonderful town! That’s Fred Szufnarowski talking, and it’s not the Broadway show about New York City he is referring to—it’s Essex. In the 15 years Fred has lived in the town, he has become a stalwart of many organizations working to make the community a rewarding place for everybody to live: the Essex Land Trust, the Essex Historical Society, the Essex Library Association, and the Ivoryton Playhouse. He also serves on the town’s Inland Wetlands Commission.
Most recently, Fred has worked with Susan Malan, chairperson of the historical society’s Facilities Committee on organizing the painting of Pratt House, the 200-year-old structure owned by the society on West Avenue. The building contains both a museum and a collection of historical documents. The paint on Pratt House had lead, so the job required a contractor certified for lead paint removal as well as one experienced in historical renovation. Fred drew up the technical specifications for the job and sent out requests for a bid before Neppco, a company in Clinton, was selected.
“He has it in hand, even though it is a very visible and very complex project,” says Sherry Clark, president of the Essex Historical Society.
Last year, for the bicentennial of the 1814 British Raid on Essex, the Burning of the Ships, Fred was part of a historical society team that created four historical markers, complete with information about the battle and the destruction of the vessels, to commemorate the event. Two of the signs are in Essex and one each in Old Lyme and Old Saybrook, all marking key locations during the raid.
To help install the markers, Fred says he called on friends from the land trust.
“My land trust buddies, they’re pretty good with a pick and shovel,” he says.
Now Fred is also involved in a project on which the historical society and the land trust are cooperating to create a pamphlet about the history and ecology of the Osage Trails preserve along the Falls River. The material will also feature a biography of the late Diz Callendar, who gave the property to the land trust.
Fred’s active participation in the Essex Land Trust dates from an annual contribution he sent some years ago.
“They thanked me for the money, but said they also needed people to work on their properties,” he recalls.
And he volunteered. He thought they would ask him to oversee a property on the Falls River, near his home. Instead, he and Al Macgregor became the stewards of the Cross Lots property.
“It was a diamond in the rough in the beginning, overgrown. It took a lot of years and a lot of volunteers to bring it back,” he says.
Fred’s wide-ranging interests have led to civic participation in varied areas.
“I love the arts,” he says.
That led to season tickets at the Ivoryton Playhouse, and ultimately to joining the membership committee at a time when membership numbers made a dramatic rise. Membership dollars are vital, he explains, to the overall financial health of the playhouse.
“Costs for everything keep going up, and ticket prices do not cover them,” he explains.
The library’s history book discussion group, of which Fred has been a member since its beginnings some 12 years ago, connected him to the Essex Library Association. Ultimately, he became president of the Board of Trustees. He was the force behind drafting the library’s strategic plan several years ago, emphasizing how the library would meet the challenges of a media-connected world in which libraries are used for a variety of services, from to taking out hardcover books to accessing the Internet.
Fred grew up in western Massachusetts, and in college at Worcester Polytechnic Institute he majored in engineering with minors in both history and literature.
“Engineering is a way to make a living, but the minors were what I lived for,” he says.
After graduation, he worked for Northeast Utilities, as Eversource Energy was then called, siting plants for the international division all over the world.
“I got into the power business, and it was a wild ride,” he says.
Power plant projects took Fred to every continent but Africa and Antarctica. India was his favorite country. He loved everything from visiting the bejeweled Taj Mahal to the diversity of cultures he discovered in traveling around the vast sub-continent.
His experience in Peru was different. He got seriously ill from drinking a pisco sour.
“For a while I thought I would be buried in Peru,” he recalls.
Today, Fred is a partner in an energy consulting business, The Essex Partnership, though he describes himself as semi-retired.
“I only work for clients I enjoy, longtime friends,” he says.
Music is a constant accompaniment at his office. On a recent afternoon he was listening—through the computer—to a station in Istanbul, Turkey.
“They have everything from blues to classical,” he says
Fred loves to travel, on his own power as a hiker backpacker and cross-country skier and to places like France and Italy that require more complex transportation. He likes to garden, enjoys photography and woodworking, and is an enthusiastic cook, particularly of lamb.
“I don’t like to make things that take all day,” he says. “Quick, easy, good.”
Fred’s many community projects and his professional responsibilities create a busy schedule, but he does not want his activity level to diminish.
“I am grateful for the opportunities. The place we’re all going to in the end, we’ll have plenty of time to rest,” he says. “We have a brief moment in the sun—take it.”