Did You Know...

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Fifty years ago this month, Lewis High School graduate Robert Foley became the first clerk

of the Bristol Superior Court?

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In 1960, Bob Foley was in the midst of his seventh term as Southington's town clerk. With the new courthouse opening in downtown Bristol, Mr. Foley set his sights on what he would admit years later was simply job security. One of the most popular and respected local civic leaders of his time, he knew the whim of the voters could cast you out of office - and out of a job - in any election. (That was, after all, how he was first elected town clerk in 1946, besting incumbent Herman Muus.) So with a family to support, he sought the clerk's post at GA #17, which was part of the new court system that made obsolete municipal courts effective in January 1961.

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Foley was succeeded as town clerk by Joseph A. DePaolo, whose job as local judge had been eliminated when the municipal court was abolished. DePaolo, a 1926 Lewis High grad, died in office four years later (and is the namesake of one of Southington's middle schools.) He was succeeded by his wife, Juanine DePaolo, who held the job for 27 years and became a community icon.

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Despite his popularity and connections in local and state political circles, Mr. Foley never again held public office after stepping down as town clerk. He left the Bristol court in 1978 when he accepted a similar post in New Haven, the job from which he would retire in 1989. He died in 2005 at the age of 85.