'Caring, Involved Loving, Adventurous:' Remembering NH Couple Who Died On 9/11

DOVER, NH — Michael Shearer worked with the same company as an electrical engineer for more than 40 years. His wife Kathleen was a talented artist, whose vocation was recreating antique porcelain dolls.

The Shearers were on United Airlines Flight 175 on September 11, 2001, the plane that hijackers steered into the South Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. Kathleen was 61. Mike was 63.

Twenty years after their deaths and the deaths of so many loved ones, Mike and Kathleen are remembered as loving people who enjoyed listening to Celine Dion, hosting Sunday morning gatherings with friends, and working in the yard -- Mike on the lawn, Kathleen in the flowerbeds.

Most of all, they enjoyed spending time with each other and with their daughters, Mary Nicholson and Karrie Castro. Mike and Kathleen involved themselves in everything the girls did, from school to sports.

"To have your parents involved in everything that you did was a treat, really," Mary told Patch.

Mary says her parents were caring, involved, and adventurous people who loved each other very much. Mike and Kathleen met on a blind date and were married 39 years.

“They held hands all the time,” Mary said. “They really cared for each other, they respected each other. They would make fun at each other, they’d laugh at each other, and they’d laugh with each other.”

The family had moved around for Mike’s job, Mary says, before settling in New Hampshire when Mary was 8. The girls grew up in Londonderry, and their parents lived in Portsmouth for a time.

Anywhere the family lived, Mike and Kathleen were familiar faces in the neighborhood and around the schools Mary and Karrie attended. They even won an award from the high school track program for everything they had done for the team.

“We went to a Catholic school (in North Dakota), and the principal, Sister Sheila -- she had my parents basically wrapped around her finger,” Mary said. “They did everything there. Wherever we went, they were totally involved in the school and totally involved in whatever we did.”

Mike and Kathleen moved to Dover, into their “dream home” on the river, in the spring of 2001. He had retired at that point, and built an art studio for his wife. Kathleen’s artistic touch was evident in everything she did, Mary says, “whether it was food, art, painting, dolls, (or) decorating.”

Kathleen had fought colon cancer, going the homeopathic route instead of choosing to undergo chemotherapy. She had gotten a clean bill of health not long before she died.

“She was very determined, very spiritual," Mary said.

Mike’s technical mind is something Mary sees in her own daughter, now 19.

“My daughter is very mathematical. She’d come home and say, ‘I love this stuff,’ and I would look at my husband and say, ‘oh my God, that’s my dad.’”

Their commitment to family and steady presence in their children’s lives is something Mary said she carries with her, and emulates in her own life as a parent.

“They were really involved in every aspect of their life, whether it was their artwork or their job or their commitment to each other, to their kids,” Mary said. “They were at every single game.

“That’s what I grew up with and that’s what I did for my daughter. It made such a huge difference.”

Patch remembers the 10 New Hampshire residents who died on 9/11:

Thelma Cuccinello, 72, of Wilmot. Carol Flyzik, 40, of Plaistow. David Kovalcin, 42, of Hudson. Carl Max Hammond, 37, of Derry. Robert LeBlanc, 70, of Lee. Louis "Neil" Mariani of Derry. Tom McGuinness, 42, of Portsmouth. Kathleen and Michael Shearer, 61 and 63, respectively, of Dover. Douglas Stone, 54, of Dover