Edith Gleason, 70, longtime town watchdog

Edith D. Gleason of 8 White Swan Drive, New Milford, a longtime Ridgefielder who was a polite but persistent thorn in the side of many a politician, died at her home Friday, March 23. She was 70 years old and the widow of John P. Gleason.
For a quarter of a century, Mrs. Gleason attended countless town government meetings and penned scores of letters, pressing for changes in how schools and government operated and chastizing officials on such varied subjects as dirty hands and high taxes. Yet, “she always treated everyone with respect and dignity,” said her twin sister, Evelyn Egnaczak of Hannibal, N.Y. “She would disarm people with her charm.”
Mrs. Gleason was born in New York City on April 2, 1930, a daughter of the late Charles and Jean Anderson Unger. She grew up in White Plains, N.Y., and became an executive secretary for the city’s mayor. Later, she worked as a secretary at Nestle’s headquarters in White Plains.
After her marriage to John Gleason, the couple lived in California for several years before returning east. They moved to Knollwood Road in 1964. Mr. Gleason died in 1983.
Last year, Mrs. Gleason sold her home and moved to New Milford.
Perhaps inspired by work in the White Plains city hall, Mrs. Gleason became interested in Ridgefield’s government in the early 1970s. One of her first efforts, in which she even enlisted the aid of a congressman, sought to have kindergarten children in the schools receive the same milk allotment each day that first through sixth graders got.
She spent several years trying to convince school officials to provide enough time before lunch so that children could wash their hands before eating. She was pleased some years later to see that major medical studies confirmed her belief that eating with unclean hands spread various illnesses.
However, her prime interest was in government spending, be it for schools, sewers, salaries, or even building renovations. “Ridgefield residents must question renovation costs to town hall complete with pleated shades and customized drapes while the town lacks a vital centralized dispatch system to improve emergency respond time to better protect our lives and properties,” she wrote in 1991.
High salaries were often her target; a year earlier she had complained that the average salary for college and university faculty was $45,000 while Ridgefield’s mean teacher salary was $56,000, “third highest in the state.”
She questioned large-scale developments, charging in 1992 that “the real estate developers, builders and investors, including local professional people (perhaps some town officials?) will no doubt profit handsomely, but it can only destroy what little rural charm is left in our town. And as in heavily developed Long Island and New Jersey, taxes will rise even faster.”
Her talent as a watchdog extended even to photographs. It was Mrs. Gleason who noticed that a submitted photograph in the paper of a local candidate for state representative, shown shaking hands with President George Bush, was actually two pictures pieced together.
“She was a muckraker and she wore that title well,” said her twin sister. “But all the time, she was the epitome of a lady. Everything seems to be so crass and rude today, but she was always polite.”
Mrs. Egnaczak said her sister “was always thinking of others, never herself,” and would often have gifts for friends. She sometimes used presents to tease others and once gave a Press editor a bag of coal as a Christmas present after he had written some editorials she disagreed with.
“She had a wonderful sense of humor,” Mrs. Egnaczak said.
Mrs. Gleason had suffered from cancer for many years. “She fought the disease with dignity and honor,” her sister said. “She never complained. She was a wonderful wife, a wonderful mother, and a wonderful sister.”
Besides her twin, Mrs. Gleason is survived by two sons, John S. Gleason of Sherman, and Matthew P. Gleason of New Milford; a daughter, Kathryn A. Gleason-Buda of Sandy Hook; a brother, Charles Unger; six grandchildren and several nieces and nephews.
Pastor John Kjoller of St. Andrew's Lutheran Church conducted services Tuesday in the Kane Funeral Home. Burial was in Ridgebury Cemetery.
Contributions in her memory may be made to the New Milford Visiting Nurse Association Hospice, 68 Park Lane Road, New Milford, CT 06776.