Charles Richardson (Dick) Moffatt passed away at Kimball Farms on February 6, 2021. Although he lived to be 101 years old, a close family member says, “he was like a perpetual 24-year-old, always ready for an adventure … always willing to learn something new and yet appreciate the old.”
Dick was an avid public servant, chairing the regional school board when Monument Mountain High School was designed and built, and active in Kiwanis, the West Stockbridge Congregational Church choir, Wisdom Lodge, and the Austerlitz and West Stockbridge Historical Societies. He was a very active member of the H.H. Franklin Club — if Dick wasn’t at community events, you could see him tooting around the Berkshires in one of his antique Franklin automobiles.
For most of his working career, you could find Dick at his business, Charles H. Baldwin & Sons, making extracts from old family recipes, or engaging clients throughout New England and the Tri-State area.
Dick was born on March 30, 1919, in Manchester, N.H. His family has roots in West Stockbridge dating back to the 1870s, when his grandfather ran a business on Center Street and Main Street. Dick grew up in Summit, N.J., graduated from Newark Academy, and then attended college at Rensselaer Polytechnic in Troy, N.Y. He graduated in 1941 with a mechanical engineering degree, and shortly thereafter joined the Merchant Marines, taking voyages to ship supplies to Casablanca, Italy, the Persian Gulf, and the Philippines during WWII.
In 1953, Dick married Elaine Baldwin, also originally from West Stockbridge. Dick and Elaine were married for more than 50 years, Elaine teaching kindergarten in Richmond, and later home economics in the Berkshire Hills Regional School System. The pair traveled extensively through Europe and across the U.S., where they visited most of the presidential libraries. The much-loved Elaine died in 2005, and Dick moved his residence to Kimball Farms.
Dick is survived by his five children, Craig, Tricia Gans, Earl, Miles, and Melissa Ferrara; daughters-in-law Laurie Norton Moffatt, Jackie Moffatt, and Amy Moffatt; and son-in-law Phil Gans. He is also survived by seven grandchildren, Sara, Mika, Max, Daniel, Hillary, Samantha, and Leigh; and six great-grandchildren, Tucker, Henry, Kennedy, Levi, Hattie, and Poppy.
Those wishing to, may make donations in his memory to the West Stockbridge Congregational Church c/o Finnerty & Stevens Funeral Home, 426 Main Street, Great Barrington, MA 01230. To send remembrances to his family, please go to www.finnertyandstevens.com
