Location Gray, Maine, United States Regions East Coast, New England, Northeastern US Gender Male
Richard “Dick” Wright Clark passed away in Naples, Fla. at the age of 86, following the return of his cancer.
Dick was born November, 1934 in Gray, son of the Rev. Clarence H. Clark and Beatrice Wright Clark. He grew up with his parents and two brothers in North Windham, Newport, N.H., and then Westbrook. He graduated from Westbrook High School in
1952 and University of Maine, Orono in 1956, where he was a loyal member of Sigma Chi Fraternity where he formed many long-time friendships.
His lifelong career in the insurance industry began after his graduation from UMO with a bachelor’s degree in business administration. For the five years immediately following graduation he worked for Kemper Insurance Group. At Kemper he was a trainee out of the Boston office, studied at Mutual Insurance Institute in Chicago, and then became the district manager for the State of Maine. In 1961 he joined Paul S. Woodworth, who owned B.M. Clough Agency. With this partnership, Dick became vice president of a newly formed Woodworth and Clark, a two-employee independent insurance agency in Portland. The agency experienced significant growth over the years by acquiring several small agencies and expanding the commercial side of the business. Dick soon became president, took on additional partners, and in 1977 changed the name to Clark Associates. Over the years, the agency continued to grow and prosper. He was an extremely generous man and the employees always looked forward to an annual picnic in the summer and to “Mr. Clark” personally delivering their bonuses with a cheerful smile and a boisterous “HO-HO-HO!” at Christmas.
With retirement on the horizon, Dick reorganized the agency again, this time as an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). This ensured the perpetuation of the agency by giving every employee a stake in the agency’s future successes and a retirement opportunity of their own. By the time of Dick’s retirement in 2003, Clark Associates was the second largest privately-owned insurance agency in the state of Maine with 70 employees. The name was later changed to Clark Insurance.
