By Laurie O’Neill / [email protected]
“One of the luckiest things that can happen to you in life is, I think, to have a happy childhood,” said Agatha Christie.
The children of Fred W. Roeber, who passed away in November at 95, enjoyed just such an upbringing.
On a recent brisk winter’s day when fresh snow dusted the yard, some of them gathered at their family home in Concord to sort through boxes of photos and memorabilia.
Kim Farmer, Fred Roeber, and Jim Roeber came from near and far and took a break from their labors to sit around the kitchen table and reminisce about their dad.
As the conversation continued, it became clear that the Roebers were — and are — a family built on love and respect, adventure and fun. Fred summed up the siblings’ appreciation for their father: “He showed us in many ways the value of relationships, connection, and unconditional love.”
Inventor and ‘doer’
Roeber was an engineer, a lifelong inventor who held several patents for his work at Raytheon, and a jack-of-all-trades adept at everything from carpentry and mechanics to plumbing and machinery design.
“He was a real doer,” said Jim.
He held one of the original patents for a predecessor of the touchscreen, Fred said, and he came up with the idea of an electric toothbrush “before it became a thing.” He developed an idea for the timing lights at highway entrances, but it turned out to be too expensive to be practical.
Roeber worked with a dean at Tufts University on developing new methods for orthodontics. Said Jim, “Not all of his designs were viable, but he never gave up.”
Roeber was most proud of his invention of what he dubbed the Flexiductor, which would replace a bulky machine gear with a part the size of a cookie tin. He had a working prototype and was ready to apply for a patent, but when he joined Raytheon as an engineer, he had to sign a non-compete clause — and that was the end of that project.
‘Off we’d go’
The Roeber children, who attended Concord schools, say that every day of their childhood was an adventure. “Our parents thought it was important for us to see and do a lot, and they loved doing and seeing it with us,” said Farmer.
Roeber taught his children how to ski, swim, snorkel, and surf, even making them neoprene wetsuits. They hiked, camped, explored caves and abandoned mines, went tubing on rivers that their mom, Barbara, had read about, and built and launched model rockets.
Every summer, the family piled into Roeber’s pride and joy, a van he had remodeled and outfitted with seven bunks and a “cook box” for making simple meals, said Fred.
“Often, we just took off,” added Jim, “without making reservations. No one complained. We loved it!” They headed south or west, depending on their father’s whim. On one trip they ended up viewing the 1969 Apollo 11 Moonshot at Cape Kennedy while camping on the beach.
After Roeber drove 33 hours straight to Florida for that trip, “he got out of the van and lay down on the parking lot,” recalled Jim.
Roeber would spot a hot air balloon while mowing the lawn. “Let’s chase it!” he would shout. One day he and Farmer rowed a wooden dinghy to the islands off Boston.
Roeber regaled his children with bedtime stories, making up the plots and characters. He left copious notes all around the house that were filled with story ideas, lists of projects he needed to tackle, and sketches of gizmos and gadgets he wanted to make.
Decent and kind
The Roebers took a circuitous route to Concord, having lived in places including New York, Alaska, California (their former house, they recently learned, was lost in the Los Angeles fires), and then Massachusetts, residing first in Southborough.
After he took a job at Raytheon, the family moved to Concord in 1964, choosing the town for its “great school system” and for offering “the kind of neighborhoods where we kids could make friends,” said Jim.
Roeber studied engineering at Hofstra University, working his way through college as a carpenter. He was an outstanding athlete and was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2007 for his prowess as a hurdler.
On Long Island, Roeber joined Sperry Gyroscope, an electronics company, where he met Barbara, who was working as a paint chemist. The couple was married for 67 years until Barbara passed away in 2021. Though Roeber moved to an assisted-living complex in Concord, the children kept the family home for gatherings.
An outdoors lover, Roeber participated in early efforts to create the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail, helping to find funding for the project and persuading any neighborhood holdouts, “in his calm and reasonable way,” to change their minds, Jim said.
“My father was unbelievably decent and kind,” he noted. “I think about that all of the time.”
Said Fred, “We were fortunate to spend so many years together — laughing, celebrating, and simply being there for one another.”
This story has been updated.
