Lower School Maintenance Supervisor Eugene St. Pierre is a fixer.
His proclivity for fixing started in his rural hometown of Crown Points, N.Y. From a young age, he learned all of the tasks his family’s dairy farm had to offer.
The dairy farm is situated on the line between New York and Vermont. There was the view of both Lake Champlain and the Adirondack Mountains. In the spring and fall, St. Pierre and his friends backpacked through the woods, and in the winter, they snowmobiled.

“We’d bring … some beer, build a fire, and just get away from everything for a little,” he said.

As the youngest of 16, St. Pierre learned his place on the farm quickly. When he was five years old, his uncle helped him build a stool so that he could milk the cows.
“I should have waited a little longer. … Once you start doing something on the farm, then it’s expected of you,” he said.

As St. Pierre got older, his parents recognized his ability to identify and fix issues on the farm.

“I liked driving the tractors, but once … my parents … figured out that I could fix things, then everybody else got to have the fun jobs,” St. Pierre said.

His family used “chuck wagons” to haul feed from one place to another on the farm. The contraption required feed to be loaded on and off the wagon by hand. St. Pierre engineered a chuck wagon that functioned similarly to a dump truck, where the feed easily slid out of the wagon and onto the ground. He presented his idea to the annual Addison County fair. The next year, John Deere and New Holland both came out with a version of their own.

“We actually built the first bunker dumper; that’s what we called it,” he said.
He remembers when the local drive-in movie theater shut down, him and his dad were asked to take down the remaining metal structure. It didn’t scare them that it was an 80-foot structure; they disassembled it anyway. Afterward, they repurposed the steel for new machinery around the farm.

“My dad always had me fixing things … I’d say, ‘I don’t know how.’ And he’d say, ‘well, figure it out,’” St. Pierre said.

After meeting his wife, he moved to Minnesota, where he managed a wholesale picture framing warehouse. One day, the owner brought in a variety of new materials for the frames.

“I went out and asked him to talk to him about the quality of the materials we were bringing in. He said, ‘Well, what do people expect for 25 cents a foot?’” St. Pierre said.

That’s when he decided to leave that job. His sister worked in the business office at SPA and mentioned a job opening in the school’s maintenance team. St. Pierre applied and started working at SPA in 2005.

In the beginning, he was the groundskeeper. He noticed general neglect around the trees, bushes and shrubs. So, he spent most of that first year cutting and hauling brush, generally improving green environments on campus.

The next year, he transitioned to Lower School Supervisor, the position which he still holds today. St. Pierre’s favorite part of the job is problem-solving and designing.
For years, the maintenance team used a trailer for leaves that required a bobcat, pallet, someone to pick up the load and two people lining up screws and bolts. Last year, they purchased a new leaf trailer. St. Pierre designed a leaf box for the trailer that could be efficiently used by one person.

Like scrap metal from the drive-in, after designing new solutions, St. Pierre holds onto material scraps and finds a new life for them elsewhere. Sometimes, they make their way into the hands of art students.

“A lot of times the art teacher will say, ‘We want to make this. What do you think?” And I’ll say, “Hey, I have been saving these for some reason, not knowing what,’” he said.

St. Pierre’s office is also home to the infamous “snake eggs” nest. On Fridays, students sprint to his office after lunch to retrieve one gobstopper (aka snake egg) from his wooden candy machine.

“I get to see the different little personalities, and … listen to some of the conversations. The kids are kind of funny to … watch how they are growing up,” he said.

While he enjoys his time with the students, St. Pierre spends the majority of the day with other members of the maintenance team.

“Everybody seems to actually care for everybody else … Until last year when Som left, nobody had left this crew for 17 years… that speaks for something,” he said.
St. Pierre recalls fond memories from years past with his colleagues Pete, Bill, and Warren. One day, as the team left the break room and returned to work, Pete, Bill, and Warren stayed behind. St. Pierre sensed tension and he slowly peddled back into the room.

“Pete looked at me, walked by, slapped me on the back, and said, tag, you’re it. And he left me to deal with Warren and Bill,” St. Pierre said.

“We’ve all kind of grown together. We all learn as we go … I think we have the same kind of mindset … Let’s figure this out. Let’s work together,” he said.
In his chapters after SPA, St. Pierre wants to put his skills towards helping people who need them most.
“I’ll go and help older people that can’t do odds and ends … I’d like to be able to help people out for nothing. I’d like to be able to volunteer to go help people fix things that they can’t do themselves,” St. Pierre said.