Peter (Pete) S. Howell

Peter (Pete) S. Howell, 89, passed away peacefully, surrounded by family members, on September 21st, 2024 while under hospice care at Cape Cod Hospital in Barnstable, MA. He will be remembered as a kind, gentle and intelligent husband, father, grandfather and friend to many.
Pete leaves his four children and their families: his daughter Julia Kimbell, her husband Rory Conolly, and their children Annie Conolly and Maxwell Conolly; his son Stephen Howell, his wife Susan Howell, and their children Olivia Howell and Jacob Howell; his son Lawrence Howell and his wife Lee Knowles; and his son Daniel Howell, his wife Lisa Howell, and their children Turner Howell and Samantha Howell.
Pete was born in Mexico City on August 24th 1935 to John and Elizabeth Howell. He was pre-deceased by his two older brothers John “Spence” Howell and Edward “Ned” Howell, and his beloved wife of 62 years Anne “Lee” Howell who passed away in 2020. Pete lived the first 12 years of his life in Mexico, Puerto Rico and Argentina, becoming fully bi-lingual while his father was implementing the first interconnected world-wide telephone systems for International Telephone and Telegraph in the 1930’s and 1940’s. They returned to the U.S. in 1948, moving into a brownstone in Greenwich Village in New York City. Pete attended boarding school at the Kent School in Connecticut graduating in 1954, and then attended Middlebury College in Vermont graduating in 1958. Pete married his Middlebury sweetheart Lee in 1958 in Orleans, MA.
Pete was a man of many interests and talents, and in particular science and nature. He made his career in science education, first as an editor of science textbooks for McGraw Hill and DC Heath, and later as a co-author of a series of textbooks on Life, Earth and Physical Sciences. He taught science for 31 years to students in Newton and Pollard Junior High School in Needham before his retirement in 1998. Pete and Lee lived and raised their four children in Medfield, MA where he also coached his three sons in the Medfield Youth Hockey Program. After summering for many years in Chatham at Lee’s family home, they built a beautiful timber-framed home in Orleans where they lived and entertained family and friends from 1996 to 2017. In retirement, Pete was an occasional substitute teacher for Nauset Public Schools. He was very active in the neighborhood HOA, volunteered at the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History and the Orleans Pond Coalition, and worked locally at H&R Block and the Captains Golf Course. Pete and Lee also enjoyed travel and cruising, and visited many friends and family from coast to coast and abroad.
After selling their Orleans home to their daughter Julie, Pete and Lee downsized and joined the Heatherwood community in Yarmouth Port for their final years. While at Heatherwood, Pete organized and led a popular weekly Trivia Night, and a weekly co-ed Sports Talk Session, as well as singing and dancing with a number of ensembles in Heatherwood’s annual “Follies”, a festive and fun variety show. Pete very much enjoyed living at Heatherwood and both Pete and Lee leave many dear friends in the Heatherwood community and beyond.
A Celebration of Life will be held at Nickerson’s Funeral Home, 77 Eldredge Way, Orleans MA on Saturday November 23rd at 11:00 a.m. with a reception to follow at the same location.
Gifts in Pete’s name may be made to any of the following organizations where he volunteered:
The Association to Preserve Cape Cod (www.apcc.org)
Cape Cod Museum of Natural History (www.ccmnh.org)
Orleans Pond Coalition (www.orleanspondcoalition.org)