“Love and Energy” – A tribute to Tom Sheehan, Saugus’ venerable and versatile writer who died last week at age 97

By Mark E. Vogler

Tom Sheehan had a burning passion for writing from his teenage days as a Saugus High School student in the Class of 1947, where he loved to write poetry. A page from his Saugus High School yearbook noted his interest in mystery writing. His writing actually became a secondary career that he launched in his adopted hometown after serving his country – a Korean War Veteran who served two years in the United States, discharging as a staff sergeant – three decades writing company policies at Raytheon in North Andover, and raising a family.

But when he really got into his writing, he went on to write more than 50 books and still had more writing projects in the works when he died on Oct. 16 surrounded by his children in a house that was built in 1742, which had been the center of his family life in Saugus and also housed the kitchen “office” where he plied his craft. Sheehan was versatile in his prime as a writer, penning poetry, personal essays, local history and novels – love stories, war stories and even westerns. He was a frequent contributor to The Saugus Advocate.

It’s been said by local historians that nobody wrote more published words about Saugus than Tom Sheehan. And that was one of the main reasons he was honored on a stage set up at the bottom of the steps of Saugus Town Hall in 2022 with a “Person of The Year Award” at that year’s annual Founders Day.

The late, great Boston newspaper columnist Alan Lupo paid Sheehan the ultimate tribute in a memoir attached to Sheehan’s book, “A Collection of Friends”:

“Tom Sheehan dissects the life of everyman, for in peace and war and all the trauma and joy in between, he has known everyman.

“He masters the details of memory, in sight, in sound, smell and feel, so that memory becomes memorable. He is Dos Passos reincarnated. The man touches our hearts and drives a story into our souls as if it were an old Buick Roadmaster.”

In a 2020 interview with The Saugus Advocate, Sheehan said that his prolific writing was the second love of his life, second only to family. He was married for 37 years to the late Elizabeth Ann Beth (Rooney) Sheehan, who died in 2010. Born in Charlestown, Mass., the son of a U.S. Marine who was in charge of quarters on Old Ironside, he and his family moved to Saugus around 1937. At Saugus High, he was a standout athlete.

But at that time, he fancied himself as a future writer. The future he would eventually achieve would be concentrated in Saugus, with all of the writing done in his Central Street home.

In his 2020 interview with The Saugus Advocate, Sheehan credited “love and energy” for the fact that he could continue writing into his 90s. “Getting to 92 and still at it: That’s significant to me. That’s because of good love and energy. It all goes back to that,” Sheehan said.

That was his motto and the philosophy that he ascribed to, he said. “Yeah – love and energy. That’s a big thing and my kids all know it.

That was the advice he also offered fellow Saugonians. “Just find what you like and do it,” Sheehan said in his interview.

“If you got energy, give it the love it deserves – love and energy – it all goes around that little circle of your mind,” he said.

When asked what he wanted to have as his legacy, Sheehan responded, “I never think of that.”

“I just hope that some people go to the library and read some of the books that I have written. That’s the big thing. I want people to read some of the things I worked on and slaved over – nothing is easy. It’s love and energy. That’s the big thing. That’s my secret. I tell my kids that forever.”

For the many town residents who never got the chance to know or meet Tom Sheehan, a few of his 50-plus books can be found on the shelves at the Saugus Public Library.