Island loses beloved character, Les Saunders, at 91
BY MARY LANCASTER INDEPENDENT WRITER
He may have been born an identical twin, but in all other ways Leslie "Les" Raymond Saunders was a unique character whose memory is cherished and whose keen wit and kindness will be remembered and missed by his many island friends.

ROB BENCHLEY/The Independent file Xavier O'Connor greets Les Saunders during his 90th birthday party two years ago at the Atlantic Cafe. Xavier, the son of cafe owners John and Kate O'Connor, is one of many children who were fond of Les.

Mr. Saunders died at 91 of natural causes in the early evening of Wed., March 14, 2007 at Our Island Home. To those not fortunate to have known him well, Les may have appeared to be a crusty, curmudgeon of an old man, but everyone who was close to him saw his talent as a former photographer, his love of birds, animals and flowers, especially his love of children, and his steadfast, independent spirit.

As social a person as he was, he had no phone, no television and no vehicle, and was a confirmed bachelor who professed in a 2002 interview for Nantucket Magazine that, "I didn't care anymore for women than I did for cars. I like dogs. I'd rather have a dog."

Mr. Saunders was born on July 5, 1915 in Hartford, Conn. to Harold Bradley and Edythe (Gilnack) Saunders. He attended but did not graduate from Bloomfield's St. Thomas Seminary and later spent one year in the Army. At 21, he became a bartender at Hartford's Bond Hotel and stayed there for more than 30 years until he tired of city life. In 1972 he took a ferry to Nantucket because it was farther at sea than Martha's Vineyard, walked to the Jared Coffin House and was immediately hired as a bartender there. He remained with the Jared Coffin for several years, making doughnuts for the Downyflake in his spare time. When he retired, he devoted himself to his hobby of photography, eventually giving many people some of his pictures, taken with a Canon T-90.

As soon as he moved to Nantucket, Mr. Saunders quickly began making friends, some of whom became like family to him. And in his "retirement" years he established a well-known routine from which he rarely strayed. As long as the weather was good and until no longer physically able, Mr. Saunders rose at dawn, donned his Atlantic Cafe cap, slung his canvas Jared Coffin House tote over his arm and, steadied by his red-striped cane, walked the mile to town from Landmark House, which he moved into in November 1992. When Nantucket Pharmacy opened at 8 a.m. he was at the lunch counter for coffee and conversation with Andrea "Andy" Marks, the counter's former proprietor.

"I inherited him," said Marks. "He loved the town cat, Willie. They would show up together. He was a very caring and giving person. We just thought he was great, and he was. He would never take any money from you, but he would take luck. If I wanted to slip him 10 bucks he wouldn't take it, but if I won $50 on a scratch ticket he would accept something because gamblers think they should share it so their luck doesn't dry up."

Marks would give him a small grocery list, such as scallions and tomatoes, and Mr. Saunders headed to the A & P (and still went there after it became Grand Union). Mission accomplished, he sat on a bench outside the market, fed the birds, smoked a couple of Pall Mall cigarettes, then returned to the drugstore and passed time until the Atlantic Cafe opened at 11:30 - where he had his own stool and engraved mug. After lunch and a beer or two he took the elder van or a cab home, listened to the radio, maybe started something in his crock pot, and went to sleep.

Atlantic Cafe owner Kate O'Connor said she and her husband John put a black bow, photos and flowers on Mr. Saunders' stool last Thursday.

"We really miss him already," she said that day. "He had a great life on Nantucket. He was very happy here and a very happy guy."

O'Connor and her husband met Mr. Saunders when they worked at the Jared Coffin Tap Room in the 1980s and when they bought the Atlantic Cafe in 1991 he became a fixture there, where on his birthdays they made him a big lobster lunch and threw a party. Even after Mr. Saunders entered Our Island Home in November 2006, he still went to the cafe in an accessible cab accompanied by Jane Anzovino, one of his throng of fans.

"Bar stool 101 became Les's stool years ago," O'Connor added. "He sat there and nobody else sat there. He had a very dry sense of humor and he was very affectionate towards children. Our relationship grew over time and we invited him to things he rarely came to, but he did grace us at our house a couple of times. We were lucky to have known him and spent time with him. He was a tiny man with a big life and he was extremely well loved."

John "Harpo" Harding met Mr. Saunders in 1991 and was another close friend. Harding's children Caroline, 3, and Joshua, 6, both were very fond of him and played a touching part in his last hours. John O'Connor visited Mr. Saunders early Tuesday night and was able to get a little squeeze from his hand, but at that point he was virtually unresponsive. O'Connor called Harding to say the end was near, and Harding immediately took his children to visit.

"My boy leaned over and sang 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star' and my girl leaned over him and sang the A,B,C song," said Harding. "Suddenly, he threw his covers off and tried to turn over. He touched Caroline. The nurses weren't expecting him to make any movements at all. Les loved my children - they were the grandkids he never had. My kids added life to his years."

Mark Watson met Mr. Saunders in the early 1990s when Watson was bartending at the Atlantic Cafe and they remained friends even when Watson left to work at The Starlight.

"He was definitely funny. He was just Les, a very unique and caring person full of stories," said Watson. "He had a lot of friends like me who would travel to the island every year just for his birthday, and he'd order his own balloons for his birthday so he could give them to the kids who would come in and sit on his lap. People here were like family to him. I loved the guy."

A-1 Taxi manager Lisa Fisher cherishes the years she and her other drivers took Mr. Saunders back and forth to the cafe.

"He was such a great character and he had such a dry sense of humor - like if I sent a girl to pick him up he'd say 'that's how rumors get started,'" said Fisher. "He always said he wanted to die on his bar stool at the A.C. He was such a fixture of downtown. I was inspired by the fact that he got up and went out every day, and I think that's what kept him so young and active, but mostly it was his snappy attitude and such a great sense of humor. We loved knowing him."

Elder Services director Sheri Hunt recalled how Mr. Saunders often left bags of candy attached to her office door at Landmark House, usually accompanied by a card he would not sign in case she wanted to reuse it.

"There was a really sweet, caring side of him, and when he got so sick and frail I couldn't walk away from him," said Hunt, who spent hours at his bedside the day he died.

Mr. Saunders was predeceased by his twin brother Wesley and younger brother Blair. He is survived by his sister June Loftstrom of Manchester, Conn., niece Linda Loftstrom of East Hartford, Conn., several other nieces and nephews and one great-niece.

His remains will be cremated, according to his wishes. Watson said he told him, in his typical dry humor, "I want to be sprinkled on the island but not in the water because I can't swim."

Some of his ashes will also be scattered on his parents' gravesite in Connecticut. Linda Loftstrom plans a memorial service for her uncle in May at the Atlantic Cafe.

Geno Geng is compiling a video tribute to Mr. Saunders for Channel 17 and is looking for Les memorabilia to add to the production. His cell

phone number is 508-292-2203. I