Electa McLain Brown Scholarship Established for USM Business
Majors
Electa "Lecky" McLain Brown, a longtime resident of Gorham
and a volunteer Gorham Times staffer, recently established
an endowed scholarship at the University of Southern Maine
designed to help USM School of Business students with financial
need meet the cost of tuition. Recipients of Electa McLain
Brown Endowed Scholarships must be graduates of a Maine high
school.
USM School of Business Dean Jack Trifts said: "Lecky's generosity
to students at USM, an institution that has meant so much
to her family, is exemplary. We are very pleased that she
would choose to help students, who like she and many of her
family members, choose to stay in Maine to pursue business
degrees."
Brown has lived in Gorham since the 1920s, and worked at
USM from 1943 (when it was the Gorham Normal School) until
1976. When she left the university, she had held the position
of bursar for 33 years. She remains active in USM, attending
Gorham Alumni Association meetings and the retired faculty
and staff luncheons.
Brown's family has a long history of involvement in the USM
community. Her husband, Phil Brown, was an industrial arts
teacher at South Portland Middle School and received his degree
form Gorham Normal School in 1928; her father-in-law was the
industrial arts professor at Gorham Normal School until 1941.
Her husband's brother and four sisters also attended Gorham
Normal School. Two of Brown's sisters graduated in the teacher-education
field.
"Two of the most important focuses of my life have been sharing
with others and assisting in education. I believe that if
there is something you want to achieve, you can do it if you
are willing to work for it," said Brown. "I came from a very
small town that didn't have its own high school. I went to
Lincoln Academy where I boarded. My brothers and sisters often
walked up to five miles to get to high school and then had
to make the return trip. At 17, I went to business school
in Portland. This was something very few young women did in
the early 1920s. My education changed my life."
Brown's niece and next-door neighbor, Louise "Lennie" Cross,
publisher of the Gorham Times, and her husband, Dennis, both
hold multiple degrees from USM. They live in a house built
by Brown's husband. Lennie Cross says of her aunt: "My grandparents,
Katherine Mountain McLain and Albert McLain, raised her children
in rural, coastal Maine and had most of those children come
of age during the D epression. Though times were never easy,
she instilled the value of education in her children and those
children have done the same. As a result, her grandchildren
have gone places and excelled on a global stage in ways that
would be beyond her wildest dreams. Lecky's support of education
through her work at the college and her financial support
of family members has always played a role in her adult life.
She now is providing opportunity beyond the family to the
greater community. Now her mother's dream will live on in
others."
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