This month, Newtown Square Friends & Neighbors is pleased to introduce you to The Humes Family. Doug and Barb are loving life in our community and working hard to preserve our rich history for future generations.
Barb was born and raised in Collingdale with her parents and twin sister, Jeanne. Barb said she and her sister were born a month earlier than expected. “The doctor told my mother that she was having a rather big boy,” she said. “Having twin girls was a big enough surprise for my parents that they didn’t have any more children after us.”
While in Collingdale, Barb attended Harris Elementary and was the salutatorian of the last graduating class from Collingdale High School before it was renamed Southeast Delco. She was class secretary and active in the drama department, where she participated in the school musicals.
Barb continued her education at West Chester University, earning her bachelor’s and then master’s degrees in Music Education. “I recently retired after 29 years with the Lower Merion School District,” she explained. “I taught elementary classroom and choral music at Penn Wynne Elementary.” Barb said that one of her favorite things to do at Penn Wynne was staging the annual musical with the first and fifth-grade classes.
Over the years, Barb has performed in many musicals with local community theater groups and the Savoy Opera Company. She was an organist and Choir Director for Trinity Episcopal Church in Collingdale for 18 years and the Church of the Holy Apostles at Penn Wynne Episcopal Church for seven years. “These days, I sing with the choir at Saint Mary’s Episcopal Church in Ardmore and volunteer as an aide with Keep MUSIC Alive, a group that entertains children in our area with a traveling musical instrument/petting zoo,” she added.
Doug was born in Northeast Philadelphia before he, his parents and three siblings moved to Haverford. He went to Coopertown Elementary School and Haverford High School, where he ran cross country and played on their lacrosse and ice hockey teams. Doug then attended Penn State University and earned his bachelor’s degree in marketing before studying law and graduating from Boston University Law School.
“I worked as a lawyer for a private corporation, a government agency and then a law firm for a little over 20 years,” Doug said. “While I enjoyed the work, I longed for more flexibility in my career to travel more and enjoy my family, so I decided to open my own practice.” He said it was difficult at first to trade the certainty of a paycheck and employee benefits for control over his schedule, but it was worth it. “I was able to attend my children’s events when they were in school and travel with my wife.” Doug has been practicing law for 43 years but does not plan to retire fully. “I’ll reduce my office hours at some point, but I want to continue working with my current clients.”
Doug may be a familiar face to many of our readers. That’s because he is heavily involved in just about every community organization in Newtown Square. “I attend the Newtown Square Friends Meeting and participate in their affairs,” he explained. “I have been a member of the Newtown Square Historical Society for over 30 years and have served in every office, including five years as president.” Doug has served on committees of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting – the Quaker “Vatican” for nine years before rotating off and was a long-time member of the Delaware County Heritage Commission.
Doug is one of the founders of the Delaware County Historic and Preservation Network, which ties together the various history groups in Delaware County. He also serves as a board member of the Marple Historical Society and is chairman of the Marple Historical Commission. He is treasurer of the Bartram Bridge Friends group that raises money for the upkeep of the bridge and is one of the founders and current president of the Benjamin West Society. “I also founded the Friends of Marple Newtown Trails to promote the creation and use of hiking trails in the two communities,” Doug said. “And I acted as an advisor to Save Marple Green Space.” If reading this impressive list of accomplishments doesn’t exhaust you enough, Doug also manages 12 community Facebook groups.
Barb and Doug’s love story began a little later in their lives when they met on Match.com. “This is a second marriage for both of us,” Doug explained. “We each have two adult children and happened to be looking for love back in 2005.” Barb said they went on a coffee date at Starbucks in Media and immediately hit it off.
They dated for 18 months before taking a trip to Paris. “I had the ring in my pocket and decided to wait for the right moment to propose,” Doug said. “We saw the Eiffel Tower, took a boat ride on the Seine, and before I knew it, ten days had passed!” Barb shared that the proposal finally happened after dinner at a Belle Epoque restaurant. “Doug ordered a bottle of champagne and asked me to marry him,” she said. “It was perfect. I said yes, and here we are!”
The happy couple wed and enjoyed two weeks on their honeymoon exploring Northern California, the Pacific coast, wine country, Gold Rush country, Yosemite National Park, Carmel-by-the-Sea and San Francisco. But for as much as they travel, every year on their anniversary, they go back to the coffee shop where it all began to remember and renew their vows.
Barb and Doug’s children are grown now and living on their own. Barb has two daughters, Laurey and Lynda, who both graduated from Springfield High School and West Chester University. Today Laurey works as a virtual healthcare professional with an employee assistance program and lives in West Chester with her four-year-old son, Chase. Lynda lives in Sterling, VA, with her husband, Matt, and their two sons, four-year-old Michael and one-year-old Charlie.
Doug’s daughter, Elizabeth Anne, graduated from Marple Newtown High School and continued her education at Dickinson College and Yale University School of Public Health. She and her husband have two children and live in Wayne. His son, Drew, also graduated from Marple Newtown before studying at Penn State University, where he spent time in Shanghai, China. Doug said that Drew travels all over the world and works in the financial tech sector.
Traveling and exploring the world is very important to Barb and Doug. “When Barb and I met, we made it a goal to visit all 50 states, and in 2017 we completed that task,” Doug explained. “We reached our goal by taking a hiking trip in Alaska.” Now they have their sights set on visiting the 66 National Parks in the United States and have recently returned from a trip visiting five of them in Colorado and Utah.
When Doug and Barb aren’t traveling, they love spending time with their kids and grandchildren. Now that Barb is retired, she loves having the time to read and play tennis year-round. She is also helping to organize her high school class 50th reunion in a few years. Doug is a musician who plays guitar, piano and banjo. He also enjoys staying active by running, biking, hiking, swimming and paddling his kayak. He has been writing a lot recently and is a valued contributor to our magazine with his monthly History Spotlight articles.
As much as Barb and Doug love traveling, they say there is no place like home. They love living in our community, which is so rich in history, and they hope that more of our friends and neighbors join them in their mission to preserve important parts of our past. “When people come “home” after being away, they want to see the sights of their communities that were familiar to them and made an impact on them when they grew up here,” Doug said. “When we knock down the old places and replace them with cookie-cutter buildings that look like every other suburban shopping center, we lose that sense of place and community.” They hope that our community rises up and makes its voice heard so we can have a say in how we want our town to look and feel for future generations. Doug and Barb agreed that this can only happen when people care enough about the future, and the past, to get involved and speak out.
Do you know a Newtown Square family, individual or nonprofit group who should become known by our community? Make your nominations for upcoming feature articles by emailing your ideas to Sheila Turner-Hilliard at STurnerHilliard@BestVersionMedia.com.