Men share unique connection to VP candidate

Boise’s Joe Parenteau and Sandpoint’s Tom Albertson would like to have a reunion. The two men would ask one other Idaho native to join them in a quiet setting – away from cameras, lights and reporters.

That person: Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.

Such a rendezvous would mark 44 years since the three shared a unique connection.

Tom Albertson, Joe Parenteau and Sarah Heath Palin were born at Sandpoint’s Bonner General Hospital the same week. Their dads taught at Sandpoint Junior High School.

“Maybe we could meet where our dads taught,” Albertson suggests. The school was recently renovated and renamed Sandpoint Events Center.

Albertson, a Sandpoint High School math instructor/administrative assistant, arrived first. Don and Terri Albertson greeted their third child Feb. 5, 1964. Reporter Paul Drinkwater observed in his weekly “Junior High News” column in the local paper that Mr. Albertson looked “tired but happy,” but “he will recover.”

Four days later, Bill and Andrea Parenteau welcomed their fourth child, Joseph. Drinkwater described the Parenteaus as “proud.”

On Tuesday, Feb. 11, at 6 p.m., Sandpoint’s first woman GP/surgeon, Dr. Helen Peterson, delivered a 7 pound, 11 ounce baby girl. Chuck and Sally Heath named their daughter Sarah Louise. According to Drinkwater, a light-hearted Mr. Heath claimed he’d call his new daughter “Oscar” and raise her as a tomboy.

Susie Puckett baby-sat for the Heaths. Chuck Heath was her eighth-grade science teacher. Puckett remembers all that black hair on Sarah, the new baby with “blondies” for older siblings.

“I was devastated when I learned they were moving,” she said, “They were such a great family. That summer the Heaths moved to Alaska, where Chuck Heath, a consummate outdoorsman, could fulfill his yearning for wilderness adventures. He continued his teaching career for 30 more years and Sally Heath worked as school secretary.

Since retirement, Chuck Heath has worked as a government trapper and wildlife specialist as well as a fishing, hunting and mining guide. After the attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, he even trapped rats at Ground Zero.

The Albertsons remained in Sandpoint, where, like the other two couples, they would raise four children. Don Albertson continued teaching while Terri Albertson delivered mail along Bonner County rural routes. The Albertson family owns the 600-acre A Bar T ranch at Gold Creek, northeast of Sandpoint, where they run 35 Angus-cross cow-calf pairs.

“My grandfather and his brother came to Sandpoint from Twin Bridges, Mont., in the late 19-teens,” Tom Albertson explains, “We have tried to keep the family ranch operating ever since.”

The Parenteaus moved to Twin Falls in 1964. Bill Parenteau taught at Kimberly and later coached at O’Leary Junior High in Twin Falls. The Parenteaus divorced in 1967. Bill Parenteau began a career with the Idaho Department of Employment. Since marrying his present wife, Diana, in 1979, he has retired from the state but has worked various outdoor jobs, including his present position as groundskeeper at Hillcrest Golf Course. Joe Parenteau’s mother, artist and actress Andrea Harris, lives in Boise.

By now, the world knows Sarah Heath Palin’s well-documented story – clutch player for Wasilla, Alaska, girls basketball state champion team, beauty pageant winner, University of Idaho journalism/political science graduate, outdoors lover, wife, mother of five, mayor, popular governor and – like the woman doctor who delivered her – breaker of barriers.

Palin is Alaska’s youngest and first woman governor. When presidential candidate Sen. John McCain selected her for his running mate, Palin’s relative obscurity exploded into overnight fame as the first woman vice presidential candidate nominated by the Republican Party.

Meanwhile, Tom Albertson attended the University of Idaho.

“I entered college … to become an agricultural engineer. I did not have a real concept of what an engineer did,” he recalls. “After three semesters at UI, I took advice from my dad and an aunt and pursued an education degree.”

Since his 1986 graduation, Albertson has taught at Sandpoint High, earned a master’s in education administration and coached several state champion track and field athletes. He takes particular satisfaction in guiding his son Nick, now 22, to a third place state finish in the shot put.

Albertson calls himself a “5 a.m., evening and weekend rancher.” He worries about corporate farms taking over because of escalating fertilizer and fuel costs. Still, he loves the ranching lifestyle, enjoys his career and is content with life in his hometown.

Until this year, Joe Parenteau figured he was living the American dream in Boise. The dream meant hard work, loyalty and reaping rewards for a job well done. Since January, however, he’s dealt with the grief of down-sizing and outsourcing at the insurance company where he was employed for 23 years.

After graduating from Skyline High School in Idaho Falls, Parenteau moved to Boise, took courses at BSU, worked for Sears and then took a temp job with John Alden/Continental Life Insurance Co. in 1985. He moved into information technology and received company-subsidized training toward his Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator certification

As reductions in force continued, staff anxiety increased. Sensing another imminent layoff, Parenteau resigned in January. He’s worked as an independent IT contractor since.

Parenteau sees a silver lining in his situation. He had time to help after his father had quadruple-bypass surgery.

Like most Americans, Parenteau and Albertson have followed the presidential campaign. Both remain steadfast in their support of Obama.

“Obama is my JFK,” Albertson says. “I think he is very intelligent, level-headed … a person like this will surround himself with people who have experience in areas where he may be lacking. His leadership qualities are impressive enough to unite our country in a time when we are fragmented.”

Parenteau believes the war in Iraq changed the United States forever.

“I think the U.S. image and reputation in the world has been damaged severely,” he says. “It will take a truly charismatic and talented leader to begin rebuilding our image and reputation.” He sees those qualities in Obama.

Awareness of their unique connection with Gov. Palin has not altered their views.

“I’ve never met Sarah,” Albertson says. “She gave an inspiring speech at the Republican convention, but I felt very conflicted during the ‘Sarah rise to fame’ era. I can see her appeal to rural white voters and people who dream of living in Alaska, but I feel this is not enough to push McCain over the top.”

Both men see a reunion with Palin as more of a “getting-to- know-you” situation than politically confrontational. Albertson wonders how the governor’s life would be different had she stayed in Sandpoint, while Parenteau figures he would pursue common ground.