He was a summer resident of Biddeford Pool for over 50 years. He was the husband of the late Pauline Levesque Pulito and was predeceased by son Paul Pulito. He is survived by daughter, Virginia Miller, and her husband Philip Miller of Simpsonville, South Carolina and daughter Marie Pulito and her wife Brenda Caldwell of Bethany, Connecticut. He also leaves grand-daughters Carolyn Miller Lavoie and Alani Gandossy and great-grandson Brandon Lavoie.
Aldo received his PhD in chemistry from the University of Connecticut. He served in the army in World War II assigned to work on the Manhattan Project at Columbia University, Virginia Polytechnic College, Oak Ridge, Tennessee and Los Alamos, New Mexico. He was proud to have taught chemistry at Fairfield University in Connecticut from 1971 until his retirement in 1986.
Aldo’s mother-in-law, Virginie Cloutier, was from Biddeford. His wife Pauline had many cousins in Biddeford including Virginie “Nini” Lemieux and Ralph Courtois.
For years he explored the Saco River and the rocky coast and islands in his red canoe. Aldo was passionate about conserving the dunes and beach grass in Biddeford Pool. He was responsible for erecting the first snow fence along the Fletcher’s Neck dunes at South Point to prevent erosion.
In 1986, he discovered a dugout canoe buried in the sand at the city’s public beach at the Pool. Archeologists excavated the canoe and sent it to Plimoth Plantation for rehabilitation. It is now in the possession of the city of Biddeford and could possibly be the oldest maritime craft discovered in the state of Maine. Aldo hoped that the canoe would be studied to instruct future generations about the circa 1600 settlement of Biddeford Pool.
For more information about the Biddeford Pool Dugout Canoe Project, contact Jeff Cabral, library director of the McArthur Public Library, (207) 284-4181, Email: jcabral@mcarthur.lib.me.us. Donations to support Aldo’s passion for coastal ecology may be made to the Biddeford Pool Land Trust, P.O. Box 306, Biddeford Pool, ME 04006. Email: gbrich1@verizon.net.
The family is being compassionately cared for by the Cody-White Funeral Home, 107 Broad St., Milford, CT. Friends may leave memories and messages at www.codywhitefuneralservice.com.
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.