In 1975, the organization expanded to include an alternative high school for adolescents, located in the former firehouse building on North State Street, where the program is still situated today. The program offered basic reading, writing and math and a clerical office training program as well as a part-time daycare so students who were also parents could attend classes. At the time, 42% of Merrimack County’s adult population had not finished high school, according to the 1970 census. Second Start was started by educators Ruth Hooke and Nancy Callahan in the basement of the First Congregational Church in response to a need for adult education. “I really did take it year-to-year,” Snodgrass said. Then, when Second Start’s executive director left unexpectedly a few months into the job, the board asked 25-year-old Snodgrass if he would consider serving as interim executive director. He had counseling experience from teaching adolescents in a drug rehab facility in the South Bronx through the Volunteers in Service to America (VISTA) program. While Snodgrass first started at the school as a counselor, he had training as a social studies teacher, and had studied administration at Antioch New England Graduate School. “But it’s been a big piece of my life and I’ve taken it year-to-year and I’ve finally decided it’s time to phase out.” “I never thought I would be here this long,” said Snodgrass, now 72. This year, Snodgrass is retiring from Second Start after being executive director of the alternative education organization for 47 years, where he cultivated program offerings to teach underserved populations and advocated for adult education programming across New Hampshire. “I said, ‘I’m never going to get this job,’ ” Snodgrass said. “Fate was with me, because they were running about 45 minutes late.” Snodgrass, who was 25 years old at the time, was on his way to Concord to interview for a counselor job at a new alternative school called Project Second Start, but right before exit 2 on Interstate 89 his ’68 Volkswagen Beetle got a flat tire, 15 minutes before the interview was scheduled to begin. If Jim Snodgrass didn’t have a spare tire one morning in 1974, alternative education in the Concord area could look very different.
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