Mark Charette: The Handy
Man
Mark
Charette, who worked as an insurance broker at Marsh
& McLennan in Morristown, N.J., was handier than the
handy man.
Task by task, he was renovating his 120-year- old
Victorian house in Millburn, N.J. He redid the heating
system, much of the plumbing and put a cathedral ceiling
in his bedroom.
Mr. Charette, 38, was at a morning meeting at Marsh's
offices in the World Trade Center on Sept. 11.
He met his wife, Cheryl Desmarais, at the University
of Pennsylvania. They began as engineering majors and
finished with business degrees. He was in the Navy
R.O.T.C. to save his parents the expense of his college
education, his wife said. Then it was five years as an
officer on a nuclear submarine, while Ms. Desmarais
worked as a consultant in New York.
Even with his work, travel and home renovating, he
made his family the center of his life. At home in New
Jersey or at their vacation house in Vermont, Mr.
Charette spent hours hiking, skiing and swimming with his
three children.
He made time on Saturday mornings to take Lauren, 8,
Andrew, 6, and Jonathan, 2, to McDonald's for breakfast,
giving his wife a break. "This is your time," he would
tell his wife. "You are not invited."
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