Gilford community, the lake were the draws for Joe Howard

GILFORD — Joe Howard’s boyhood was spent in a small town on the Massachusetts border, where his parents ran a small machine shop.

“I grew up knowing the business,” he said. And when he became an adult, he decided to open his own shop in Gilford, which he had come to know because his parents kept a boat at Silver Sands Marina.

“Gilford’s got great schools, the lake, I’m a family guy,” Howard said.

He was 24, hadn’t even met Jessika, now his wife, but he was already looking forward to fatherhood. And where better than Gilford?

That was in 2005. Howard Precision, Inc., which makes plastic and stainless steel fittings, outgrew its first Gilford shop and, since 2012, has been in operation on Hounsell Avenue.

Howard, 35, met Jessika on a blind double-date. They now have two boys, ages 6 and 7.

He’s glad he isn’t raising them where he grew up. There, he said, the community saw education as something to get over with so kids could get married and join the construction field.

“I didn’t want that for my kids,” he said, which is what drew him to Gilford. “The biggest thing for me was that the schools were rated so well. And the lake, to me, there was nothing better.”

Since he’s become a dad, Howard spends so little time on the lake that he has sold his boat. Instead, he spends his time as one of the many parents who volunteer to help their community.

It was the schools and the lake that brought him to Gilford. It has been the strength of the community that will keep him here. He’s met a wealth of people, each accomplished in their own way, that he can learn from, he said. He is doing some teaching of his own as a tennis and baseball coach, which has given him a new appreciation of his home town.

“Over the past year, I have been completely overwhelmed by the support of the parents and the community of the sports programs.” He knows many families who spend their weekends volunteering. “It’s all for the kids.… I can’t imagine going to another community.”