b'C H A P T E R E L E V E NOne of FCW directors, John Sweeney, would have been on hand and expressiveat this meeting, if illness had not benched him. Had he been there, he certainly would have chimed in, just as he did at his first board session October 2, 2000. He has been a bright bulb for FCW ever since. In several respects, his dynamics speak for his upbringing and adult experience.A native of Summit, New Jersey, Sweeney went to Penn State, earned a Harvard MBA, and spent 30 years mostly in the services area of health care product manufacture, even buying a bankrupt business, bringing it back to life, then selling it. Off-duty, he was an avid body surfer and sailor, and early on,Chatham won his affections. In 1981, he bought a South Chatham house and gradually became a resident.As a boy in New Jersey, he learned somethingAs a current FCW board first-hand about volunteering. The Port of New Yorkmember, William Coleman Authority had designs on the Great Swamp nearhas the monitoring assignMorristown: it would make an excellent, 10,000-acre,ment of going to meetings international airport. Green Village and New Vernonof the Waterways Committee and reporting back to would have been bulldozed for fill to blanket the vastfellow directors at their marsh.2 Incensed, residents and environmentalistsmonthly sessions.balked; among them was John Sweeneys mother. Coleman Fanrilj Archive.Bit by bit, the neighbors bought up pieces of land, until the Port Authority was outmaneuvered. Along the way, young Sweeney went around with his mother, raising money and talking to architects about how to block the threatening development.That experience stuck with Sweeney. Settling down in Chatham, he was one of the first residents nominated by selectmen for the Land Bank Committee. Further, on his own, he allied himself with the Jim Sullivans, Charles Cahoon and others in South Chatham to save the MCI/World Com properties for Chatham. So its no surprise that FCWs nominating committee, always prospecting for directors, approached Sweeney.At the outset, he knew a little about the Friends, but had never been asked to join. He thought, Its just a group of people who have banded together because they have a common interest in conservation and the waterways. Theyre sort of the power elite in town who are working to make change.207'