Well-Loved New Canaanites Recalled at Peter M. Deane Fitness Center Rededication

New Canaan resident Pete Deane, Jr. remembers a saying his late father had: “You make a living by what you earn. You make a life by what you give.”

As his friends and family recall, the late Peter Deane—a 1959 New Canaan High School graduate and standout athlete who long oversaw the family business, Kitchens by Deane, and died suddenly in 1990—gave back to the community in scores of ways, by connecting with and helping people from all backgrounds, through nonprofit organizations and a gregarious natural instinct. On Saturday morning, Deane’s family gathered with a handful of his closest friends and fellow NCHS ’59 grads and their families, for the rededication of the NCHS fitness center named for him. Created in Deane’s memory through donations to our All Sports Booster Club (est. 1976)—mostly recently with a generous gift from the Dauk family of New Canaan—the center ranks among the very best in the state.