In Memoriam

Pierre D. Boy '39 A gentleman and a soldier who loved UNH By Lois Shea '95G

Col. Pierre "P.I." Boy '39 had sayings. He had sayings for rain and snow and wildlife, for slow-moving children and good people. "Shake the hand that shook the hand of John L. Sullivan," he would say. "Every day is a good day." "Here's to us, the best people we know." And later, after he retired, "I'm doing pretty good, for a young fellow."

Everywhere he went, he engaged with people. "He had an incredible ability to get along with people and to connect—to just meet total strangers and somehow become friends with them in an amazingly short space of time," says his son, Donald Boy. And UNH was often the point of engagement—he would find fellow alumni everywhere, from butterfly farms in Costa Rica to gas stations in Tampa, Fla.

Boy, who died at home on Sept. 4 at age 97, was born in Quebec and raised in Berlin, N.H. His son says the story goes that the winter after high school, he was working at a lumber camp near Lake Umbagog. It was three p.m. and already getting dark, minus 10 degrees with a bone-breaking wind. Exhausted, he thought, "Do I really want to do this for the rest of my life?" He called UNH. His college interview took place on the running board of a car in the Dolly Copp Campground in Gorham. "He wanted to learn more, see more," says his daughter Sarah Boy. "He was filled with curiosity." UNH, she says, "represented a whole new life."

Boy majored in forestry and earned his way through school as a head waiter in the dining hall. He was captain of the basketball team and vice president of his class. It was at UNH that he got the nickname "P.I." No one is precisely sure, but it seems that some of his classmates associated his Canadian origins with Prince Edward Island. "PEI" became "P.I."

At UNH he joined ROTC, a decision that would lead to a long and distinguished career. Boy joined the Army as a second lieutenant after graduation, and during World War II served in French Guyana and with the 12th Army Group during the liberation of Europe. He met his wife, Anne Ferguson, in France, where she was working for the Red Cross. He told her he thought women shouldn't be so close to the front. She would say later that her response was to "just keep feeding him doughnuts 'til he came around." They were married at the war's end in the last church standing in Wiesbaden, Germany, in a ceremony attended by Gen. Omar Bradley (at left in the photo, above right). The couple had five children, including Jean '75, Anne '78 and Mary '79. His wife died in 2005.

Boy served in the Army for 30 years at postings around the globe, retiring in 1969. His final posting was in Durham as a ROTC professor of military science. After he retired from the Army, he worked as the director of UNH Alumni Affairs. He received the Alumni Meritorious Service Award in 1973 and the Profile of Service Award in 2005. One of the pleasures of his later years was making the rounds on campus. People would see him coming and brighten; he brought not only good cheer but pockets full of candy.

"He was a hero of mine," says Diana Koski, who retired recently as a vice president of the UNH Foundation. "He was a gentleman and a soldier and a person who loved UNH. He was always just a joy to be around."

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