The Island Remembers Polly Dever.
Mar 20, 2026
TREMONT—”If you had ever meet Polly Dever you’ll likely never forget it,” Tremont Fire Chief Keith Higgins said earlier this week.
There’s a reason for that.
“She was a spitfire in the true sense and loved to be a jokester yet she would be the first one to reach out after a difficult run. Her enthusiasm and energy carried on to everyone around,” Chief Higgins said.
Pauline “Polly” M. Dever was on the board of the Southwest Harbor-Tremont Nursing Service, which became its ambulance service, as secretary and president back in the 1980s.
Service ran in the family. Her son, Dennis, retired from the United States Coast Guard as a master chief. Her husband, Lyle, was in the Coast Guard, too. According to a 1993 copy of the Ellsworth American, Polly and Lyle (who was Bar Harbor’s public works director and Southwest Harbor’s public works director and past selectman) met when the Coast Guard stationed him in Southwest Harbor.
Polly dispatched for the Southwest Harbor Police Department, too, but it’s taking care of the wounded, the hurt, the sick, that Polly is most remembered for.
“Polly was instrumental in the early success of the Southwest Harbor Tremont Ambulance Service by working on the ‘boo-boo bus’ and serving on the board throughout the 80’s and 90’s,” Chief Higgins said. “Many would call those the golden years of the local volunteer world, where rosters and shift schedules were always full.”
Polly worked along EMS volunteer leaders of that era like Terri Musson, Ben Harper, Kenny Hutchins, Larry Albee, Sam Chisholm, Junior White, John Clark, Hillary Hudson, Bonnie Norwood (the current crew chief) and countless others.
The Southwest Harbor–Tremont Ambulance Service is a service and not a money-making operation like a typical business.
According to its website, “The Service began in World War I when the ladies of Tremont and Southwest Harbor gathered together to aid our troops overseas by rolling bandages. However, they soon recognized that there was much that needed doing at home as well. So they formed the Ladies Aid which, in turn, became the Southwest Harbor/Tremont Nursing Association which provided support for a Town Nurse for the area as well as access to home health care equipment through a lending program. Later, largely due to the efforts of Les White, Jr., an ambulance was procured. In 1961, the Association was incorporated under its present name as a 501 (c) (3) non-profit public charity organization.”
Board President Andy Cline did not know Polly, but he knows of the legacy of women and service that continues today in Tremont and Southwest Harbor.
“Women have played a major role in the past and present of the service. From the Ladies Aid Society rolling bandages for soldiers during World War I to the incorporation of the Southwest Harbor-Tremont Nursing Service in 1961, women have been at the forefront,” Cline said. “My predecessor as board president was Margy Vose, and one of her predecessors was Sonia Field. Sonia and other women have been among the most loyal and valuable ambulance drivers for the Service. Sonia, Shirley Soukup, and Bonnie Norwood are all long-serving members of our board, and Bonnie is an Advanced EMT and our crew chief. Kristin Hutchins, who joined the board in 2017 as I did, is now our board vice-president and an ambulance driver taking a tremendous number of shifts.”
Polly Dever made an impact. She was born in Bar Harbor in 1933, the daughter of Eugene W. and Aldena B. Tracy.
An island girl, Polly died earlier this month at a Dedham health care facility, but not before she made a significant, positive difference to her family, her friends, and to the people of Mount Desert Island.
She was publicly thanked year after year for her volunteerism at the service, at Mount Desert Island Hospital, and the local chapter of the American Heart Association.
She was a member of the high school glee club and part of the cast of “Daisy’s Diet.” She met Lyle, who was from Missouri, at a Somesville social event. They raised Dennis together, living in multiple spots the way members of the Coast Guard do before they came back to Southwest Harbor in 1975.
They stayed.
And they made a difference and an impression. Polly was always walking around town, greeting people, listening and talking, too.
“If she liked you, you’d know. If she didn’t like you, you really knew it too but, she would eventually warm up to (almost) everyone,” Chief Higgins said. “She took great pride in her role overseeing the organization, working on the rig, and behind the dispatch console. After retirement Polly never really lost her curiosity or support and remained a true supporter by keeping up on all the responses from ‘Scanner Land.’“
Polly, people say, was one of a kind.
She helped where it was needed, be it on the Boo Boo Bus or Scanner Land or in other medical settings as a certified nursing aid.
“She gave care to people who needed assistance,” her obituary states.
And that?
It made a difference.
In the end, it wasn’t just the roles Polly Dever held or the years she gave that defined her—it was the way she showed up.
On late-night calls, behind a dispatch console, or walking through town with a ready opinion and an even readier laugh, she made herself known. She made herself useful. And she made people feel seen and cared for.
In a service built on showing up when it matters most, Polly did that again and again.
And for Tremont, Southwest Harbor, and the wider Mount Desert Island community, that is a legacy that doesn’t fade.
MORE INFORMATION
Husband Lyle and son Dennis ask of those who desire to make contributions in Polly’s memory to the Southwest Harbor-Tremont Ambulance Service, P.O. Box 437, Southwest Harbor, ME 04679.
Condolences may be expressed at www.jordanfernald.com.
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