Super Senior: Tom Anoe

RUTLAND, Vt. (WCAX) - It’s a new day in Rutland, and for K-2 students at the Northwest Primary School, “Grandpa Tom” warms the kids’ hearts on a cold winter morning.

It’s snack time in Noel Campise’s 2nd grade class and along with the carrots, 77-year-old Tom Anoe brings a soothing voice to the students’ sometimes stressful little world.

“I think there’s several come to me, they just want to talk to somebody, you know,” Anoe said.

“By him being here, they come in here, they see him, their faces light up. They’re excited. He creates a loving atmosphere for them,” Campise said.

It’s an atmosphere that Anoe says was lacking when he was their age. “I had trouble with my dad, I didn’t feel... I always felt that he didn’t really, didn’t particularly care for me,” Anoe said.

His dad Richard was a World War 2 soldier who was captured after The Battle of the Bulge in Europe. “He was a prisoner of war but he never talked about that,” Anoe said. They made amends later in life when Anoe was an adult.

Anoe has been the school’s foster grandparent for four years. “They give a lot of emotional support,” said Deb Roy, a coordinator for the Green Mountain Foster Grandparent Program. “He picks up on things. He picks up on the nuances that the kids are talking about. So, they trust him. ...this gentleness about him, that the kids respond to.”

Anoe says he was painfully shy kid as a kid and had few friends. Being an introvert, he grew up listening and absorbing.

Reporter Joe Carroll: Are you more outgoing now than you were?

Tom Anoe: Yeah, way more outgoing.

Now, as a grandfather figure to these 2nd graders, he can share some wisdom and support for what they may be lacking at home.

Reporter Joe Carroll: You get four bucks an hour and I understand you also bring, on your dime, snacks for these kids.

Tom Anoe: Yeah. Well, I want to make sure they have something.

Reporter Joe Carroll: But you’re not a wealthy guy.

Tom Anoe: No, but his week the Cheez-Its are on sale.

It all adds up to a Super Senior who equates learning with love. “I think they enjoy having me, but I think I get more out of it than they do,” Anoe said.

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