‘Voice of Riverhead Town Hall,’ Verna Campbell to retire

Verna Campbell, the woman whose lilting voice and radiant smile has been greeting callers and visitors to Riverhead Town Hall for 37 years, will be retiring at the end of this year.

It was not an easy decision for Campbell, 81.

“I love my job. It’s my life,” she said last week. “I love the people.”

There’s no doubt that the effervescent switchboard operator is a “people person” — the joy she gets out of greeting and assisting visitors is etched in the smile lines on her face.

“God had this job waiting for me,” Campbell said.

When she started working as the Riverhead Town Hall switchboard operator, the man who occupied the corner office, Allen Smith, was someone she babysat for when he was a toddler.

Campbell still vividly recalls her job interview with former council members Doc Menendez, George Young and Jessie Tomlinson. She had been employed by a tax search company and, as a single mom, was looking for job security and benefits. A coworker suggested she take a civil service exam. She chose switchboard operator, she said, because she likes talking to people.

“I was so thankful I was hired,” she said. “I knew without a doubt I was meant to be here.”

The town hall switchboard was much more complicated when she first started working there, she said.

“I was so frustrated, I cried when I went home,” she recalled. She learned the ropes and settled in. “But I’m so glad it was modernized,” she said.

In the nearly four decades since she took up her post, Campbell has worked in the administration of seven town supervisors. She can name each one and tell you what years they served in office. She can probably do the same for the council members too, if the phone stopped ringing long enough to give her time to think about it. She might even recall how they like their morning coffee.

“It makes me sad. It’s the end of an era,” Supervisor Sean Walter said. “You’re not going to have Verna’s lovely melodic voice answering the calls. “In all likelihood, you’re going to have some digital voice, like every place else.”

Campbell is definitely part of what makes Town Hall unique, agreed Councilman John Dunleavy.

“She always gives everyone a warm welcome to Town Hall,” Dunleavy said. “She’s a very upbeat person. She’s been through a lot of difficulty in her life, but has come through it all with a smile.”

Campbell credits her strong faith — instilled in her by her grandmother, she said — for helping her pull through and keep things in perspective. She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1985. Looking back, she doesn’t know what might have been had she not landed the town job eight years earlier.

“Each treatment cost $1,000,” Campbell said, recalling the 10 months of chemotherapy she endured following her surgery in March, 1985. “I would have had to sell the house,” Campbell said. The illness underscored the blessing of her job with benefits and made her even more grateful for it.

The house on Second Street means a lot to her. It belonged to her nana; she grew up there and has lived there all her life. She nearly lost it anyway 27 years later. An early morning fire swept through the first floor of the 1860 wood-frame dwelling. Campbell and her daughter, Bonnie Sue, who lived in the second-floor apartment at the time, escaped with only the clothes on their backs. They lost three cats in the blaze.

“I thank the dear Lord we survived,” Campbell said. “I’m so grateful for all the people who came to our aid,” she said.

After living in a mobile home on her property for more than a year while her house was rebuilt, Campbell moved back into the family home on her birthday in 2013.

Campbell says she is not sure what she plans to do in retirement, but is confident God will let her know. She’s involved in her church, loves to sing in the choir and enjoys reading the bible. She’ll probably do some volunteer work.

“One thing’s for sure,” she said with a laugh, “I will get up and get dressed every day and put on my makeup!”

Campbell will be sorely missed, said Councilman James Wooten. “I’ve known Verna my whole life,” he said. “She is the face and the voice of Riverhead Town Hall. It just won’t be the same without her.”