Stanley Olson

With deepest sorrow, we report the passing of Stanley H. Olson, 77, of Rochester, NY, formerly Wells, ME; Jersey City, NJ: New York City; Groton, MA; and Worcester, MA. Stan was predeceased by his parents, Albert and Miriam Olson and his wife, Marion G. Olson. He is survived by his brother Ken, Ken’s family, and numerous cousins, both known and unknown.

With an educational background that included Phillips Andover Academy, Groton High School, Clark University, University of Massachusetts, NYU School of Film Studies, and the Pratt Institute, Stan held master’s degrees in English literature, Cinema Studies, and Library Science. His career path took him from picking strawberries on Joe Houston’s Farm in Wells and bussing tables at the Oarweed Restaurant to the Modern Language Association, Foundation Center, People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Lane Library (Hampton, NH), Wells Public Library and the Wellehan Library (St. Joseph’s College).

His love of music was evidenced by a collection of CDs that, in the opinion of the person who will decommission his house, rivals anything now available on Spotify. Oh, and the seven guitars, four amplifiers, countless “effects” pedals, and (literally) piles of vinyl… While never a stage musician (excepting a memorable tambourine solo with some band I can’t recall), that boy could play. His knowledge and experience with New York City music scene of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s was the envy of new, much younger friends in Rochester. A wonderful storyteller, his (often self-deprecating) anecdotes were, in a word: hilarious. And charming.

Finding love of a different sort later in life, his marriage to Marion was born of their shared love of music and film, cats and a spoiled dog, but more viscerally, their love of the ocean. Both fearless boogie boarders while in Maine, they possessed more wetsuits than winter coats. A plan for co-mingling their ashes somewhere in the Gulf of Maine is taking shape, somehow seeming the most fitting way to say our final good-byes.