Broomhall, Wendall "Chummy" oral history interview, 1999

File

Identifier: MOH 157

Staff Only

Broomhall, Wendall "Chummy" oral history interview

Scope and Contents

Interview includes discussions of: childhood games in Rumford, Maine; living in Rumford as a child during the Depression; impressions of Muskie; World Skiing Championships in Rumford, Maine 1950; 1948 and 1952 Olympic Games; Rumford as a predominately Catholic, strongly Democratic mill town; athletic complex in Rumford; tenement houses in Rumford; description of interior of the Muskie house in Rumford, Maine; the Muskie family (siblings); ethnic diversity in Rumford; and pollution from paper mills of the Androscoggin River.

Dates

1999

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Biographical / Historical

Wendall Broomhall was born in Mexico, Maine on December 3, 1919. He grew up on farms in the Rumford area; his parents were Methodist. His father was a farmer-logger, and then during the war worked in a South Portland ship yard. After the war, his father worked at the paper mill in Rumford. Chummy had seven brothers and four sisters. He was on the ski team in high school and the Chisholm Ski Club. He attended Pettengill School, Chisholm School, Stephens High School, and worked at a young age because there were so many children in the family. In March 1942, he joined the service in the 10th Mountain Division and took basic training at Camp Roberts, California. In Wisconsin he married his wife on November 17, 1945. After the war, he worked for H.P. Hood until 1955, and then went on to work for the California Olympic Committee. Had competed on the 1948 and 1952 Olympic Teams and was an American member of the FIS Cross Country Committee. He also participated in the 1950 world championships in skiing in Rumford, Maine. In 1960 he began his own logging business, except from 1980 to1983 when he laid out the courses for the 1980 Olympics at Lake Placid.