Most employees of the US Census Bureau work from home, and when they retire there is limited fanfare. When Dorothy “Dot” Howell retired, friends and bureau employees from throughout New England gathered in Jefferson to bid her adieu.
Howell, in her mid 80s (but, as she said, “age is relative”), worked for the US Census for 36 years and trained about 300 employees. She’s also been an “outstanding” Whitefield resident for close to sixty years, “raised a terrific family,” and is generally “a pretty terrific person,” said friend and fellow census worker Brenda Welch.
She celebrated her retirement on July 29 at Damariscotta Lake Farms in Jefferson.
“As a supervisor and as a person, she sets a terrific example,” Welch said. “She’s deserving and I wanted to make sure she got this recognition.”
Born in Boston, Howell grew up in Connecticut and attended Wellesley College where she majored in math. From 1947 to 1953, she worked as an engineering aid at Pratt & Whitney helping write computer programs to design aircraft. Her husband, Jay Howell, was selling insurance at that time, and they decided they wanted to do something different.
Dot Howell’s family had come to Maine every summer when she was young and in 1953, she and her husband moved to Whitefield and started a chicken farm.
They raised five children on the farm, who “all had some responsibilities and it didn’t hurt them any,” Howell said. She now has eight grandchildren.
They raised chickens until 1981, when it became nearly financially impossible to operate a small-scale chicken farm.
During the time Howell has spent at the Census Bureau, she’s watched families and businesses change, and in particular she’s seen people’s attitude toward government change.
Attitude ebbs and flows, she said, but “right now, people are just unhappy,” she said. People’s sentiment about the government often comes out in people’s treatment of census takers, although at times the Census Bureau’s surveys aren’t done for government agencies.
“It’s someone they can vent to,” Howell said.
Along with the 10-year census of every person living in the United States, the Census Bureau conducts a host of long- and short-term surveys for government agencies and private entities. The Census Bureau bids on surveys next to other private survey companies.
To gather data, they employ a host of permanent field representatives – like Welch – to conduct the surveys. Those field reps are hired, trained and report back to supervisors like Howell.
“It’s wonderfully important work,” Howell said. “The data is the voice of the people.”
Their surveys provide information on housing, population, employment and a host of other descriptors of American life. That data is used by academics, governments forming policy and, at times, private companies looking to open new offices.
Welch told a story about a large retail chain seeking to open a new northeast regional distribution center several years ago. They used census data about demographic composition, education levels and unemployment to select Auburn for the new center, creating hundreds of local jobs.
“These surveys allow us to track what’s happening,” Howell said.
Howell’s husband passed away in 2007, and she lives alone in the same home they bought 58 years ago. She plans to spend her retirement sitting in a rocking chair her son made her. She may volunteer at the Togus Veteran’s hospital, where her husband received care, but for now she wants to “keep her schedule free,” she said.
“I’ve been retired for two days, and I haven’t had time to do anything,” Howell said on Aug. 2.
