Jackson, Maine - Maine and the planet have lost a kind and good steward. Mick Womersley died suddenly on Tuesday, May 21, 2024, hard at work in his shop at the family farm in Jackson, Maine. None of us were ready for Mick's unforeseen departure, least of all his wife, Aimee, and daughter Edana.

Mick, a Brit by birth, was born on October 3, 1961, to Gordon and Mary Jean Womersley in Chesterfield, England. The family moved to Sheffield, an industrial city in the North of England, where grandparents, Arthur Holden Watson and Letisia Watson, and George William Womersley and Maud Womersley lived. Mick learned to grow food with his gardening grandad, who would often take him to his "allotment" (an area of ground which could be rented for people to grow fruit and vegetables). His paternal grandfather was a hiker and took part in the Kinder Trespass of 1932 to secure the "right to roam" - inspiring Mick's love for hiking, the outdoors, and activism. His parents built a thriving chocolate business and his father's confident hustling was likely the inspiration for Mick's own entrepreneurial bent. As a child he also loved Airfix kits and wanted nothing more than to join the RAF, which he did at 17.

Mick became a skilled mechanic and proudly served in Royal Air Force mountain rescue efforts in "t'fells" (as he called them) - the forbidding and desolate peaks in England's Lake District. He was absolutely committed to the Search and Rescue team, was hard working, and "on the hill" his long legs never stopped - it was almost impossible to keep up with him. He loved a beer and a sing song, especially folk songs, and would lead the singing. Mick was made for mountain rescue: hiking, mountains, emergencies, fixing land rovers, drinking beer in the pub afterwards.

Yet, deeply thoughtful all his life, as his many friends would affirm, he came to oppose the making of war and left the RAF, joining the Findhorn Community in Scotland, a pioneering "eco-village." He met an American woman there and together they moved to the States where they lived on the California coast south of San Francisco. He was an under the table VW street mechanic in San Francisco, until he got his green card, then he worked other mechanical jobs, from rental yards to private airports. Ever the romantic and longing for a more rustic life, he moved to Montana, where he hiked, fished, led wilderness expeditions, and volunteered with Earth First!.

As someone who was not destined for academics in the UK, he found his passion for it later in life. In his thirties Mick enrolled in college at the University of Montana and earned first his BS in Biology and then an MS from the School of Forestry studying reforestation in the Scottish highlands, through which he realized the progressive value of social science and policy.

Mick went on for a PhD in policy at University of Maryland and graduated with distinction in normative analysis and economics, producing a dissertation on American religiosity and climate science acceptance. It was there he found friends who were Quakers and eventually joined the Sandy Spring Friends Monthly Meeting.

He soon joined the faculty of Unity College in Maine, a place devoted to environmentalism, experiential learning, civic responsibility, and a shared system of governance that valued the expertise of the faculty and the curiosity, passion, and dedication of social and environmentally-engaged students. It was a place aligned with his own ideals. He taught classes in climate change, sustainability, economics, and energy. He researched wind power assessment and mapping, and each summer ran a field program in wind measurements to support this work, using students as crew members. His time in the RAF led to his later founding and leadership of Unity College's Search and Rescue Team, Resource Officer for Maine Search and Rescue, and co-editor of "On the Hill," the annual journal of the Royal Air Force Mountain Rescue Association.

Mick thought that the standard tabletop lab exercises used in Physics labs did not bring home the central ideas strongly enough so his labs took place out on the lawn with large equipment that he built himself. He conducted the only Physics labs in higher ed that required hard hats for most of the lab exercises.

Mick was a rare educator who could fluidly combine theory with practice that would challenge any student and cultivate real and lasting learning. To teach problem-solving, Mick taught an elective called Build a Barn that resulted in a beautiful livestock barn on the Unity College campus. In the lecture portion of the class, bracketing lessons on how to use a framing square or skill saw, he could be heard discussing quotes from E.F. Schumacher's Small is Beautiful, Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and Matthew Crawford's Shop Class as Soulcraft. He was a professor who changed minds and lives.

Mick was featured in a story in the Chronicle of Higher Education for his inexpensively-built straw bale house, one of only a few in Maine. While visitors thought it was lovely, it had operational challenges. Though he and Aimee had many book-worthy adventures there (losing a pig off the back of a truck, rescuing a dog out of a well in the middle of winter, rolling multiple vehicles while battling mud season), they soon moved out, with Mick telling a friend, "I really want this relationship to work, and she wants a house with reliable plumbing." The relationship worked. Earlier this year when an old friend offered a 1967 Karmen Ghia for restoration his eyes gleamed, but he quickly said Aimee would need to okay the years-long effort. When she readily agreed, he cited Proverbs 31:10.

Mick wanted to be a dad and once he got the chance, he was a great father. Before his daughter, Edana, was born, students may have assigned Mick the totem, "Grumbling Bear." After her birth, everyone on campus noted the change in Mick. At the sight of 3-year old Edana looking up and talking to Mick, now a gentle bear, as she held his hand walking across campus, one student remarked, "It's so beautiful. It's like something out of a fairy tale."

He invented and built fun toys for Edana, and later included her in building them. (One project nearly burned down the barn and is best forgotten.) He would load and unload a canoe from the roof of a vehicle twenty times if he could succeed in getting Edana into the boat and on the water for even a minute. And he did succeed.

He baked cookies, brownies, and cakes with her. He planned and executed elaborate camping trips. He had her help with birthing lambs, planting peas, and harvesting carrots. During their last weekend together, he taught his 9-year-old girl how to change a tire. He was going to make sure she acquired wilderness and homesteading skills she might use later in life. Especially in recent years his daily schedule revolved around her needs, always keeping a watchful eye so she would be safe.

He had so much to teach others, so much life left to live. We are grateful for the years we shared and remain devastated by the loss of such a kind soul and knowledgeable advocate for our sweet Earth. Mick Womersley was one of the most generous, honest, loyal, and hard-working humans any of us will ever have the pleasure of knowing. Mick's recipe for a fulfilling life included a productive homestead, effusive care for family and friends, a loyal dog, revelry in wilderness, constant learning, and fixing broken thing - be they mechanical, electrical, financial, or bureaucratic.

Mick is survived by wife, Aimee Phillippi; daughter, Edana; and sister, Carol (Womersley) Beer and husband, Wayne. He is also survived by a phalanx of friends and learners who will never forget him and who will live better lives because they knew Mick.

A celebration of Mick's life will be held later this summer. Donations in Mick's memory may be made either to his favorite charities, Heifer International or Good Shepherd Food Bank, or to Edana's Next Gen college fund (contact Aimee for details).