There was only one person Jonathan Ledoux could turn to the night his father was rushed to the hospital. It was one of the staffers at Lakes Region Community Services who had worked with Ledoux for several years, Kevin Archibald. And on that night in 2011, Ledoux wound up on Archibald’s doorstep.
“Jonathan was with us for a week and then his dad ended up passing. The state came to us and said we’re going to take him right now and put him back in state custody,” said Archibald of Ledoux. “I looked at my wife and I said, ‘There’s no way we can do this. He knows nobody and he’s going to be scared to death.’ So we pretty much pondered over two or three days and came up with a decision to take him in.”
Ledoux is a 38-year-old with Down syndrome. Archibald serves as an assistant coach for the Winnisquam Regional High School volleyball team and also works with the baseball program and middle school sports teams. The two have become a family pair in the Tilton area, and Ledoux has turned into a local celebrity.
“All the guys on the baseball team know him because he helps out with the varsity team. Kevin was a middle school basketball coach last year so all the middle school boys know him. It’s not even just the girls, it’s a pretty good sized population in the school that know exactly who Jonathan is and what he does,” Winnisquam volleyball Coach Mike Livernois said.
Archibald added: “He can walk throughout campus on either side of the buildings and pretty much everyone knows exactly who he is.”
It took some time, however, for Ledoux to adapt to the school environment.
“When we first got him he was pretty much non-verbal and 100 pounds overweight than what he is right now,” Archibald said. “He pretty much didn’t interact at all. The first year I got him involved with volleyball and with baseball through Winnisquam, he literally wouldn’t unglue himself from the bench.”
Gradually Ledoux settled in and became more comfortable with the students, coaches, players and teachers he saw every day. And Archibald saw a changed a person.
“He’s very much involved compared to when we got him seven years ago,” Archibald said. “Nobody could even talk to him and he wouldn’t make eye contact. Now, he can hold conversations with the girls, they understand what he’s talking about. So as far as growth wise, it’s been one hell of a growth spurt for this guy.”
Ledoux has become a fixture on the sidelines for the Bears, and there’s a special connection with the volleyball team.
Ledoux spoke with the Monitor with the help of Archibald and expressed that volleyball is his clear-cut favorite sport. He also detailed his responsibilities, which include everything from assisting with pregame activities to leading team cheers.
“He’ll stretch with them, he’ll serve, he’ll shag balls during drills and help feed me balls during drills. He leads team cheers and he’ll stand in the doorway when they run on the court and high-five them all,” Livernois said. “He’s become a fixture … and he’s really become a special part of the team. It’s been an amazing journey to watch him just blossom as a person.”
When the season changes, you’ll likely find Ledoux down by the baseball field giving Fred Caruso one of his secret handshakes or horsing around with the guys in the dugout.
“(Ledoux) started coming around with us and it’s been like three or four years now,” said Caruso, the Winnisquam High baseball coach. “The guys love him, they absolutely love him. They love having him around and he’s like a coach. We treat him as a coach and he’s an integral part of what we do.
“They definitely bond with him,” Caruso added. “We’ve had players come back and the first one they seek out is (Ledoux) … He just kind of exudes that personality and you want to be around him.”
That’s the most rewarding part for Archibald and the rest of the school community. Many student athletes at Winnisquam have known Ledoux since they were freshman. Their time with Ledoux has been an education in interacting with the mentally disabled.
“It opens their eyes on how to communicate and how to act around someone with disabilities,” Archibald said. “A lot of people when they first see him, they think, ‘I’ve got to walk on egg shells around him.’ And once they are with me long enough, they realize that’s not the case. I treat him like a man. I don’t treat him like he has disabilities. I treat him as a person … so it’s good for the student body because they have a different perspective.”
That perspective was one of the main reasons Winnisquam instituted its own Unified volleyball team in 2013, according to Livernois.
With himself, Archibald and Ledoux on the coaching staff, the program immediately took off after its first year. The Bears have won the last four NHIAA Unified volleyball championships, including a 2-0 win over Dover this postseason.
“That’s one of the reasons why (former athletic director) Zach Medlock came to me,” Livernois said. “He said, “Some of your kids understand how to deal with kids who are different because they’ve already learned how to deal and accept Jonathan, so you’re the perfect team to start this out with.’ And I think he was right because it worked out really well for us to start unified volleyball and part of that was Jonathan had broken the stereotype.”
(Jay McAree can be reached at 369-3371, jmcaree@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @JayMcAree.)