SOUTH PARIS – Anthony A. “Al” Fountain, 86, of Norway, formerly of Medford and Lynn, Mass., died June 15. He spent several years at the South Paris Maine Veterans’ Home where he died from complications stemming from Alzheimer’s disease.

He was born in 1918 in Lynn, Mass., to Sarah Jane (McFadden) and Oliver Shead Fountain. His father was born in Eastport. The Fountains were among its original settlers. His mother was born in New Brunswick.

He was the beloved husband of Matilda (D’Alessandro) Fountain, with whom he shared 63 years of marriage.

He turned his work on carousels and Ferris wheels as a young man growing up during the Depression, into a lifelong passion and area of expertise. So extensive was his knowledge of music played on carousel organs, he was contacted by a curator at the Smithsonian Institute at one point and asked to identify songs on an early 20th century piano roll.

He was a member of the Music Box Society and the National Carousel Organ Association of America. His article, “Memories of a Wheel Man,” detailed his early experiences running Ferris wheels. An avid collector of early music machines, his collection included several music boxes, phonographs, records, piano rolls, and other instruments and types of early 20th-century carousel organ music.

He joined the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Depression. He served in the U.S. Navy during World War II aboard the destroyer the USS Fiske, which was deployed in the North Atlantic. During his military service, he received training at the Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston. He re-enlisted in the Navy during the Korean War.

He was employed by the Rapid Transit Corp., in Brighton, Mass. After retirement from the Rapid Transit Corp., he worked briefly for the Polaroid Corp., in Waltham, Mass.

Married in 1942, he lived in Medford, Mass., from 1942 until his retirement in 1985. He retired to Norway.

He was the loving father of Christine Beckett and her husband, Fred, of Malden, Mass., Peter Fountain and his wife, Judy, of Winthrop, Mass., Jane Fountain Serio and her husband, Michael, of Sturbridge, Mass., Susan Fountain of Lynn, Mass., Frank Fountain and his wife, Jan, of Norway, and Maria Cascio and her husband, Ed, of Revere, Mass.; he was the brother of the late John Fountain, Matthew Fountain, James Fountain, Katherine Fountain and Helen Barton. He is also survived by 11 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

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