Norwich Rev. Gregory Perry remembered for decades of devotion to the community
Jan. 8—NORWICH — The Rev. Gregory Perry lived his vocation.
The retired longtime chaplain at the former Norwich Hospital would offer his home as an emergency respite for someone in need. If he saw someone asking for money, he would take the person for a meal. He built and donated high-quality computers for both schoolwork and play for students.
And he organized and spoke at many a vigil to help the greater Norwich community cope and make sense of unthinkable tragedies locally and around the world.
Perry, 71, died suddenly Friday as he and his wife, Jayne Perry, were driving home after what she called a great day that typified his life.
First, Perry brought a new laptop to his 17-year-old grandson, Isaac Guillet, who like his grandfather is a passionate drummer. That afternoon, Perry, longtime friends and Norwich NAACP associates Shiela Hayes and Leo Butler, met to finalize plans for next week's annual Martin Luther King birthday march and service and luncheon events. Perry's eldest daughter, Janine Guillet, joined them at the meeting, bringing the next generation into the signature events.
Then, Gregory and Jayne Perry went to see their younger grandson, Lucian Perry, play basketball at the Integrated Day Charter School. There, they greeted friends they hadn't seen in a while. Jayne said her husband flashed his typical big smile as they watched Lucian play.
They needed to take a detour on the way to their home on Harland Road. as a tractor trailer crash on Interstate 395 had snarled traffic throughout Norwich. They were at the red light on Route 12 to turn onto Hunters Road, and the light turned green.
"The light turned green, and we didn't go," Jayne Perry said. She nudged him, and he seemed to slump, maybe having a seizure. She called 911, and the dispatcher asked her to feel for a pulse. There was none. He apparently had suffered a heart attack. A police officer stopped to help.
"It was very fast. He would have liked that," Jayne Perry said.
The family was still working on arrangements as of Monday evening. Perry was pastor of the Greeneville Congregational Church. But the church has structural problems and would be too small for a memorial service that is expected to attract mourners as diverse as city and state political leaders, educators and their students, civil rights activists, clergy and religious devotees, members of his drumming circle and his motorcycle "gang," as they called themselves.
"He was a great human being," Norwich Mayor Peter Nystrom said. "His heart was open to anyone in need. If the city needed anything, he would help."
Hayes and Butler said the annual Martin Luther King Birthday march and service program were "his baby." He organized the event, gathering marchers outside Norwich City Hall in the David Ruggles Freedom Courtyard, which he helped create in 2013 as part of the city's celebration of the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation.
The event will go on as planned beginning at 1:15 p.m. on Jan. 15 with opening words and a march through downtown to the usually packed-house indoor program at Evans Memorial AME Zion Church at 2 McKinley Ave. Events continue Friday, Jan. 19 with a luncheon and youth awards ceremony at Norwich Free Academy at 12:30 p.m. This year's theme is "The Power of Peace."
David Horst, current chairman of the Norwich Area Interfaith Association, will give the invocation at the Jan. 19 luncheon and said he will honor Perry with his remarks.
Horst, pastor of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation, said he felt blessed to have had a "marvelous visit" with Perry about a month ago, talking about their ministries and chiding each other. Horst is a Harvard Divinity School graduate, and Perry graduated from Yale Divinity School.
Perry had served as president of the association's predecessor group, the Norwich Area Clergy Association. The group organized public vigils, community response events to tragedies and met occasionally with political leaders to express concerns about major issues, such as gun violence. The association currently is working to find a location for a winter overnight warming center.
Perry became known for helping people in need, friends and family said. Jayne Perry said their home at times became an emergency respite for someone who couldn't get into a rehabilitation facility immediately or needed a place to stay overnight. Sometimes, she said, they stayed for a week.
Hayes, a member of Perry's Greeneville Congregational Church, said people who weren't churchgoers still would come to the church to talk with the pastor after service. If they needed a few dollars for a meal or some help with rent, he often obliged, she said.
He would hop on his motorcycle to meet people where they were, whether it was in a neighboring town or in Norwich, Hayes said.
A few years ago, Perry came to Hayes, a longtime youth and education advocate, with an offer to build new computers for students in need. He launched Building Computers for Humanity, vowing to ensure that students in low-income families did not fall behind in school and could keep up with their friends with computer games.
"When he grew up, they couldn't afford things," Hayes said. "Everything they had was second hand, used. He taught himself about computers, used videos to learn how to put computers together. He wanted kids to have new, high-speed computers, not cheap, used ones."
Perry grew up in Norwalk and attended Wagner College on Staten Island, N.Y., where he met Jayne. They married in 1977 and have three children, Janine, Greg Perry, elected in November to his second term on the Norwich Board of Education, and Jade Perry. Perry graduated from Yale in 1980 and learned there was a yearlong training program in clinical pastoral education.
The family moved to Norwich, and Perry worked as chaplain at Norwich Hospital until it closed in 1994. He then moved to Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown. There was no opening for a chaplain there, so Perry worked to develop the employee assistance program for the state Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services. He retired several years ago.
Although trained as a Baptist minister, Perry was offered the position at Greeneville Congregational Church about 20 years ago, Jayne Perry said.
She said since Friday, the family has received enormous support from the greater Norwich community, with friends and restaurants bringing meals and offering assistance. Churches throughout the city have offered to host a service for Perry.
"We live in a wonderful community," Jayne Perry said. "We are seeing an outpouring like you wouldn't believe."
