Egremont — On November 3, 1964, when Democratic presidential candidate Lyndon B. Johnson went up against Republican Barry Goldwater, Marlene Soudant worked as a poll worker for the very first time. For the past 60 years, for every election since 1964, Soudant has served as an Egremont poll worker.
Soudant, the longest-serving poll worker in Massachusetts, is set to be formally recognized at a special town meeting on Thursday, October 22, at 6 p.m., at the Mt. Everett Regional High School cafeteria. At the meeting, Soudant will be presented with a citation from Secretary of State William Galvin that acknowledges her 60 years of service.
Soudant told The Berkshire Edge that, at 87 years old, she has no plans to retire. “My parents instilled the importance of voting in me right from the beginning,” Soudant said. “I appreciate this honor very much, but I’m just doing something I like to do. I feel overwhelmed to be honored for it.”
Soudant grew up in Great Barrington but moved to Egremont in 1959 with her late husband George after they got married. “I love the closeness of the town, and it’s friendly,” Soudant said. “It’s very close-knit, and some things in the town don’t change.”
One thing Soudant said has changed a lot over the past 60 years, however, is counting votes. “For many years, we used to have an old wooden thing that we would put the ballots in,” Soudant said. “Then you went across the room with someone else who would help to count them. But they’ve done away with that.”
Soudant said she and other poll workers used to stay at Town Hall until at least 2:30 a.m. to count ballots. In recent years, however, the town has used a machine tabulator to count the votes.
While Soudant said that she does not miss having to count ballots by hand, she does miss the era when the state did not have early voting. “Early voting is good for the people, but [as a poll worker] you don’t get to see people as much anymore,” Soudant said. “There’s always going to be changes over time, but they’re supposed to be for the better. Years ago when we voted for town officials during elections, Town Hall used to be a very active place. People would come in, check off names on the ballot, and go home. At night, there used to be people coming back to Town Hall all waiting for you to read off the results of the elections. Now they don’t need to because they can read the results on the internet.”
Soudant said that Egremont’s population was much smaller when she started in 1964. “Back in 1964, we only had 40 registered Democrats in Egremont,” Soudant said. “The town clerk’s office used to be located in the clerk’s home. At one time, I wanted to be the town clerk. But my husband said no because you had to keep all the records there. My husband said that people could come to your house at any time for their fishing license and he didn’t like that. It was a different time back then.”
Current Town Clerk Juliette Haas said that Soudant has also worked for the past 60 years as a checker at every town meeting, checking in registered voters who attend. “I hope she doesn’t retire any time soon,” Haas said. “It has been such a pleasure to work with her. I continue to learn from her vast wealth of knowledge and experience. We don’t adjourn from our election duties until Marlene feels the results are correct and accurate. She always holds the line, and I have the most and ultimate respect for her and her tremendous service to this community.”
“Voting is part of everyone’s lives,” Soudant added. “It’s exciting to see young voters come in to vote for the first time. It’s a real pleasure seeing them take an interest in their town.”
Early voting for this year’s elections starts on Saturday, October 19, and ends on Friday, November 1. The state and presidential election will be on Tuesday, November 5.
