John Nowacki

KENNEBUNK – John Nowacki, 78, of Kennebunk, died of coronary artery disease at home, in the beautiful bedroom he designed, on Feb. 26, 2025.

John C. Nowacki was born in Columbus, Ohio on May 13, 1946, the only child of artist Jack W. Nowacki and Pauline “Polly” Bodwell Nowacki. He grew up a few houses from his Aunt Betty and Uncle Louie Nowacki and cousins Jim, Bob, and Nancy Nowacki. John was proud of his state of origin, often reciting facts about Ohio to highlight its greatness—the most presidents, introduction of the tomato, introduction of pie ala mode. Other than the president one, we aren’t sure of the accuracy of some of his claims.

John is survived by his wife of 33 years, Lisa Eaton of Kennebunk; and his children, Andrew Nowacki of Ventura, Calif., Daniel Nowacki of Santa Cruz, Calif., and Grace Nowacki of Kennebunk. John is also survived by cousin, Jim (Cathy) Nowacki of Winnetka, Ill.; in-laws Daniel (Kandace) Eaton of Old Chatham, N.Y., Angus (Karen Woodfield) Eaton of Old Chatham, N.Y., Josh (Carol Milligan) of Columbus, Ohio, Niles (Alex Moreno) Eaton of Seattle, Wash.; and a slew of second and third cousins; as well as a slew of nieces, nephews; great-nieces, and one great-nephew.

John’s two sons from his first marriage both now live in California. John, a reluctant flyer, overcame his fears and, prior to Covid, would visit them both at least once a year and would always look forward to those visits. In 2011, John, Andy, and Dan took a multi-week trip to the UK and Europe. In addition to visiting the boys in California, Andy took John on a memorable trip to Hawaii a few years ago, and in 2023, John delighted in joining Dan in Alaska for a week.

Grace was born when John was 56, which allowed him to revisit some of the joys of childhood that he had forgotten. During childhood, John and Grace would draw together for hours. They also loved watching “The Simpsons” together. As a family, there was a lot of time in the car, driving back to Columbus, Ohio for family visits, and also taking Grace back and forth to Waynflete in Portland for high school. That car time allowed for great conversations as well as a shared love of music and also recorded books. John enjoyed sharing his love of music which included The Beach Boys, Queen, AC/DC, Hall & Oates, among others.

John, a less-than-natural pet owner, accepted pet owner responsibility when Pearl entered the family after several years happily without a dog. But John definitely did not want a second dog. However, when puppy Peggy joined the household during Covid, John quickly became her soft hearted and adoring playmate.

John had a lifelong love of Amateur Radio, often referred to as Ham Radio. Along with his friend since 2nd grade, Mike Thompson, K8UPR, John got his ham radio license at the age of 14. John was an active ham for almost 65 years. His call sign for the last 10-plus years has been W3NA. He was proud of his many radio contacts and awards, including having contacted every possible country except North Korea. The crown jewel of John’s awards is the DXCC Honor Roll: Confirmed 339/340 Current DXCC Entities. You can see more about John’s amateur radio life at http://www.qrz.com/db/W3NA. Until recently, which because of a technical issue, had to be suspended, John and Mike would talk on the radio every Sunday morning. Over the years, John taught amateur radio as adult ed courses, introducing others to the hobby which serves the community when there is need for communication during emergencies which render other forms of communication useless. John and another amateur radio friend, Alex Mendohlson, AI2Q, saw a need to start a group for hams in Southern Maine to gather and talk about radio, so they started the New England Radio Discussion Society, lovingly referred to as NERDS. The NERDS have a website, NERDS73.org. John was very involved with, and Alex and several other NERDS will bring to fruition, a public Ham Radio station at the Brick Store Museum in Kennebunk.

John graduated from Bexley High School in 1964, and, with the goal of becoming a Physics teacher, went on to study Physics at Miami University of Ohio, attaining both his bachelor’s and master’s. John joined the Army Reserves in Ohio in 1968, and transferred to a unit in Maine when he moved here in the early 1970s to teach Physics at Kennebunk High School, during which time he built the house he and his first wife, Dianne, and their sons lived in, in Kennebunk. After seven years as the KHS Physics teacher, John left teaching to join Sprague Electric which had a plant that made capacitors in Sanford. Starting at Sprague as an engineer, he then became the purchasing manager and then the engineering manager. He really enjoyed his time at Sprague, but didn’t like the direction the company was heading when he had to fire wonderful, hard working employees so that the stock price would increase. That was when John decided it was time to go back to teaching.

In the fall of 1986, John became the sole physics teacher at Noble High School (NHS), which was in Berwick at the time. It was a traditional school that had employed three(!) different Physics teachers for the ’85/’86 school year, at one point there were two teachers in the classroom: one for teaching the material, one for managing the students. Their Physics program was in trouble. Not only did John rescue the traditional Physics program, he expanded it. When he started at Noble, he taught a couple of sections of college prep (CP) Physics, and a couple of sections of General Physics. John added an Advanced Placement (AP) Physics class to Noble’s offering, the first AP class to be offered at Noble. John’s Physics classes at Noble were so popular with students that they had to add a second Physics teacher position. As Noble made significant changes to its culture, John was a part of the hard working team that reimagined what NHS could be, including significant input into the design of the new NHS building in North Berwick. With John’s shepherding of this goal, a full credit of heterogeneously grouped (no more distinction of CP vs General) Physics became a graduation requirement. John was a master teacher, and enjoyed the task of challenging students who were traditional college prep students while also making Physics accessible to students who would likely not have taken Physics in a more traditional setting.

At NHS, John met his second wife, Lisa, while together coaching Odyssey of the Mind, a creative problem solving team. Lisa and John married at their home in Kennebunk in 1992. Lisa and John really enjoyed each other’s company, sharing deeply meaningful conversations and making each other laugh. They tended carefully and intentionally to their relationship. They both really love being home and took great satisfaction in DIY household projects and creatively fixing things. John and Lisa often discussed and were passionate about political activism in the Kennebunk community and beyond. After years of occasionally writing a letter to the editor or maybe calling his representatives, in the last months of his life, John was following what was happening to Democracy and calling his reps on a daily basis. Lisa is grateful for and proud of his committed political engagement.

In lieu of flowers, please make donations to one of

the following establishments, all of which were very important to John:

•American Radio

Relay League

ARRL Diamond Club

225 Main St,

Newington, CT 06111-1494

860-594-0291

•Democrats of the

Kennebunks and Arundel

P.O. Box 115

Kennebunk, ME 04043

or online

KennebunkDems.org

•Good Shepherd Food Bank

3121 Hotel Rd.

Auburn, ME 04210

or online GSFB.org