Meet Your Neighbor
Ken Knutti
BY MARY LANCASTER INDEPENDENT WRITER

ROB BENCHLEY/The Independent

Date of birth Sept. 13, 1957

Likes most about Nantucket The summers, the history, architecture and preservation of downtown, the public accessibility to conservation land, the beaches and the abundant activities offered for all ages.

Like least about Nantucket Windy and cloudy days, the suburban sprawl from town to the airport and people only here to make money.

Favorite TV show Anything he can tolerate that his kids watch. If you could only choose one word to describe Ken Knutti it would likely be 'nurturing.' When he is not attending to his customers' medication needs and answering health questions at Nantucket Pharmacy, where he has been a pharmacist for nearly three decades, he loves spending time with his wife and three children, imagining ways to spruce up or redesign their home, and planting and caring for the family's perennial and annual gardens of flowers and vegetables.

Born in Schenectady, N.Y., Knutti was raised there on a large dairy farm, but decided not to continue the family tradition. Instead, he studied at the Albany College of Pharmacy. Following graduation in 1980, he took his pharmacy board exams and spent the summer working at a children's camp on the Cape. At the end of that summer his wife-to-be, Jill Audycki, who attended college with him, joined Knutti on the Cape. They visited Martha's Vineyard, then took a day trip to Nantucket. Audycki had to return to college for her final year, but Knutti did not stay away from Nantucket for long.

"When I got here I just decided that this is where I wanted to be," he said, explaining that he went back to Schenectady for the winter to pay off his bills and moved to the island in the spring of 1981. Though he immediately secured a job with Allan Bell at Nantucket Pharmacy he had nowhere to live, and only $140 to his name besides a bicycle and some grocery bags of clothes. He seemed fated to be an islander, however, and things fell into place quickly.

"I found a room for the summer, then Allan asked me to get my hair cut and I'm still here," he said.

Audycki moved to the island in 1984 and was hired as a pharmacist at Congdon's Pharmacy, which until last year operated next door to Nantucket Pharmacy. The couple married in 1989 and in 1992 they adopted their first child, Emma, from Chile. In January 1997 they had their daughter, Caroline, and the following month Knutti brought home John, the second child they adopted from Chile.

Knutti and Audycki have both continued their jobs as pharmacists since moving to the island, but after Congdon's Pharmacy closed last year Audycki became employed by Bell, alternating and, in busy periods, overlapping shifts with her husband.

When asked what he does during his time off, Knutti said, "I take care of my family, my house and my yard. I'm a big believer of being outdoors all summer because winter is too long."

As for the future, Knutti said he intends to stay on at Nantucket Pharmacy but one day would like to do some traveling or have a second home in a scenic spot on the mainland for an occasional getaway.

"I'm pretty boring because I'm working all the time," he said, quickly adding, "Which I do enjoy - it's

not work." I