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 1903 - 1973 (70 years)
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| Name |
SPANG, H. Austin |
| Born |
02 Jan 1903 |
New Haven, Connecticut, USA  |
| Gender |
Male |
| Died |
05 Apr 1973 |
Portland, Connecticut |
| Buried |
07 Apr 1973 |
St. Lawrence Cemetery, New Haven, Connecticut. |
| Person ID |
I176 |
Connecticut Spangs |
| Last Modified |
15 Aug 2015 |
| Father |
SPANG, Henry Augustine, b. 01 Aug 1868, d. 12 Jun 1943 (Age 74 years) |
| Mother |
MURRAY, Rose Mary, b. 27 Aug 1868, Collinsville, Connecticut , d. 14 Mar 1957, New Haven, Connecticut, USA (Age 88 years) |
| Married |
05 Aug 1895 |
St Mary's Church, New Haven, Connecticut |
| Photos |
 | Murray, Rose Mary
Grandma Spang and her children(Dorothy, Geraldine, Austin, Rosemary and Virginia [missing: Murray]) at Nancy Spang Becque's Wedding in Springfield Mass in 1953. |
 | Murray, Rose Mary
Grandma Spang and her grandchildren - standing L to R: Thomas Spang, Austin Spang, Suzanne Sippel, Nancy Spang Becque, Pat Spang; Kneeling: David Spang, Charles Donahue |
| Family ID |
F64 |
Group Sheet |
| Family |
COX, Mildred Virginia, b. 23 Apr 1900, New Haven, Connecticut, USA , d. 23 Jun 1981, Orange, New Haven, Connecticut, USA (Age 81 years) |
| Married |
24 Sep 1930 |
New Haven, Connecticut, USA |
| Children |
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| Last Modified |
23 Jun 2015 |
| Family ID |
F2 |
Group Sheet |
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| Notes |
- H. Austin Spang grew up on the streets of inner New Haven, Connecticut and started delivering newspapers as an 8 year old. The second youngest of 6 children, the family moved around the time he was born from Clark Street a short distance to Elm Street. Then, between 1910 and 1920, they moved to a brownstone at 267 Orange Street. His father had his dental office on the first floor, with a workroom behind it in which Mr. Watson made dentures. The living quarters were on the second and third floor.
By 1920, Austin was working as a bank clerk. Also his grandmother was living with them and he would tell how he had to wait for her to read the sports page before he could read it and how he carried her up and down the stairs from the 2nd and 3rd floors.
Most of the children were expected to go to college and his brother, Murray, would get his BE from the Yale School of Engineering in 1919. Austin ended up going to Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. While there he lettered in gymnastics. He developed a great deal of upper body strength which could be seen years later in his broad shoulders.
After graduating from college he returned to banking and, at some point, became a Bank Examiner for the Federal Reserve Board, a position he held until 1943. His territory covered New England so he traveled a great deal. I can recall picking him up at the North Haven Railroad Station on Friday nights but have no memory of dropping him off.
At some point he met Mildred Virginia Cox and they eventually married on September 24, 1930. The engagement almost got called off on June 21, 1930. A tragedy occurred in which a disturbed man threw his wife and 4 children and then himself from West Rock in New Haven. His last name happened to be Spang which prompted Mildred?s father to ask if he was related to which Austin replied ?Of course, all Spangs are related.? It turns out that he was a second cousin, one-time removed.
Austin and Mildred raised their family of 4 children on Middle Road in Hamden until 1943 when he was offered a position as Vice-President with the Middletown National Bank. The family moved to High Street, next to Wesleyan University. Five years later he was made President of a small bank in Springfield, Massachusetts. This was a difficult position for him and he readily accepted a Vice-President?s position with Hartford National Bank, located in Middletown in 1953 or 1954.
Personal memories of my father are multiple. Perhaps one of the earliest is climbing on his back and being taken for a swim at Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison, Connecticut. If I try, I can feel the wool of his swim suit on my legs. During the summers, the 4 of us went to camp and my mother and father took a week or two vacation on Vinalhaven, an island off the coast of Maine. My father was so pleased when they opened the Maine Turnpike to Portland in 1947 as it reduced their travel time considerably. It must have been when I was 12 or 13 that he took me to my first Red Sox game at Fenway Park. The thing that stands out about that trip is not the game itself but the drive back as it was very late. Dad chomped on an unlit cigar to keep himself awake and told me it was ok for me to sleep.
My brothers and I attended Camp Becket, a YMCA camp in the Berkshires of Massachusetts and my father would visit on Dads? weekends. I was very homesick the first year I was there and spent a great deal of my summer in the Infirmary. He would stop in to see how I was but did not stay long as he did not know what to say. Dad became very active in the Dads? Association which raised a great deal of money to buy items that did not fit the camp budget. When I was 16 or 17, they purchased a new Ford Station Wagon to take the weekly trips to Pittsfield and to run into the town of Becket. I frequently drove it and, one day, hit a patch of sand on the side of a hill and rolled the car 3 times down the hill. His was the second call I made and all he was concerned about was whether I was injured or not.
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