Submitted by Dorine Pratt
Timothy Lee Pratt, of Shore Drive, Higganum, was born on April 17, 1942, in New Britain, to Ernest Earl Pratt of Pittsford, Vermont, and Marion Elizabeth Dorcer Pratt of Shoreham, Vermont. Timothy attended elementary school in the southeast area of New Britain while living on Eisenhower Drive. He was predeceased by two sisters, Denise and Nadine, and a brother, Wayne, and has five granddaughters. He is loved by many nieces and nephews and great-nieces and great-nephews.
When he was a teen, the family moved to Cromwell where Lee really enjoyed working for Wilcox Dairy Farm, originally on the hill where the Dairy Queen is today. In those years, he hunted and fished in Vermont and on the hill where Route 9 and Route 372 intersect. He belonged to the New Haven Rod and Gun Club until he died.
In his late teens, the family moved to West Hartford where he started working with an adult neighbor for the Elman Fuel Company, until he joined the Navy. He got out of Basic Training just in time to join 5,000 other sailors on what was then our only nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Enterprise, to face the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
The Enterprise cruised the Caribbean, the Mediterranean, and at one point was totally iced-in going through the English Channel in winter.
Lee was in the hospital when the Enterprise went to Vietnam, being stationed on other East Coast ships until his discharge in 1966. We courted by mail for more than three years.
On his discharge from the Navy, we married on September 10, 1966, and Lee went to Prince Technical School at night to work toward his journeyman steamfitter license with Oil Heat and Engineering of West Hartford. Our first son, Travis, was born during these years, followed by Lincoln. A few years later our nephew Dan joined them. Later, our family broadened by five granddaughters.
When we were first married, he developed an interest in motorcycling, eventually joining the Connecticut Retreads, riding until he died.
At times, he had his own tractor-trailer truck business and drove school buses for the town of Haddam before working for General Dynamics. He passed away from a rare form of cancer on February 10, 2020. His Celebration of Life service was postponed because of COVID. It will be held on Father’s Day (June 19, 2022) at Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Killingworth. Please join us at 10:00 a.m., and have finger food with us after in the church hall.
