Say the name George Mattegat around town and you’ll likely get a different response from every person you meet — “bus driver,” “Shriner,” “volunteer firefighter,” “animal control officer,” “Nunnawauk board member,” or “Labor Day Parade organizer.”

Or maybe you will come across one of his many colleagues from the Lions Club, or Hiram Lodge, or the local VFW.

The same could go for his wife, Carol — “Police Commissioner,” “Ambulance Association member,” “Newtown VNA volunteer,” “Edmond Town Hall Mural Committee organizer,” “election moderator.”

Or her name will ring familiar with friends from the Commission on Aging, the local Woman’s or Junior Women’s Clubs, the Republican Town Committee, or among former members of the Business and Professional Women of Newtown.

For decades, the Mattegats have engaged themselves collectively in nearly two dozen formal organizations and service groups, and helped serve the community privately in dozens, some say hundreds, of different ways during their 60-plus years in town.

Sadly, for many of those acquaintances, an opportunity to address health concerns has created a need for the Mattegats to relocate to a warmer climate. So at month’s end, they will head south to sunny Florida.

But not before their many friends say a final, more formal farewell.

LeReine Frampton, a longtime family friend and former supervisor from Carol Mattegat’s years in the Registrars of Voters Office, is throwing the migrating couple a going away party at her local restaurant.

Organizers invite anyone who knows or has worked with either of the Mattegats to LeReine’s Cuisine, in the Tier One complex at 31 Peck’s Lane, on Thursday, March 27, from 2 to 6 pm.

Doing her research of everything Mattegat ahead of the event, Ms Frampton said she was overwhelmed by their collective body of service to Newtown.

“Let’s see, with Carol you have her service as a poll worker and supervisor; 22 years on the Police Commission, mostly as chair; the Commission on Aging; chairman of the Town Hall Mural Committee; member of the Young Republicans, Republican Women, and the RTC; the Woman’s and Junior Women’s Club; the Newtown VNA; and the Sandy Hook Fire Department’s Ladies Auxiliary,” Ms Frampton related.

“She was also founder of the Salvation Army Food Pantry and the Business and Professional Women of Newtown. And she and George also both served as co-chairs of the Labor Day Parade Committee, on the Nunnawauk Meadows Board, with the VFW, and they were both school bus owner-operators.

“George has been a volunteer firefighter in town since 1951, an animal control officer, he is an active lifetime member of the Shriners, and served as the past leader of Newtown’s Lions Club and Hiram [Masons] Lodge,” she added.

George Mattegat was born and raised in neighboring Monroe, where his family operated a busy local farm. Carol hails from Greenwich Village where she was born and grew up before meeting her future husband and moving with him to Newtown.

“Wouldn’t it be great, in lieu of any going away presents, if folks coming would bring some donations to the food pantry that Carol stared,” Ms Frampton suggested. “I think she and George would really appreciate that.”

For information on the going away party, contact Ms Frampton at 203-304-9740.