Klee Chambers Dobra died peacefully on March 13, with his daughters at his bedside. He was 80.

He was born in July of 1937 in Providence, R.I., to Harold and Alma (MacKinnon) Dobra. He attended the Moses Brown School in Providence and had especially fond memories of his years at Tabor Academy in Marion. He studied business at Babson Institute and Boston University.

He enrolled in the U.S. Coast Guard in 1960. He found himself playing the trombone in the Coast Guard Band, marching with them in John F. Kennedy’s inaugural parade. Upon his discharge, he moved to the Florida Keys, where he met Anne Elizabeth Bradbury of Cape Porpoise, Maine. They married in September of 1962 in Marathon, Fla., where Klee had the time of his life racing MGA sports cars, learning to fly airplanes, and playing with boats, his favorite thing in the world.

Klee spent 33 years in the commercial broadcasting industry in sales, sales management, general management, and radio group management. Over the years, his family crisscrossed the country as he grew from account manager to vice president/general manager at various AM and FM stations in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Dallas, Boston, Winston-Salem, New Orleans, and Vail.

Through all this moving, the one constant in his life was Edgartown. He spent his boyhood summers at his grandparents’ camp at Haystack Hollow and eventually his parents’ home on Morse street. As an adult he brought his own family back year after year, and they moved to the Island year-round in 1976 while he worked in Boston. During their decade there, Klee was instrumental in helping establish WMVY, Martha’s Vineyard’s radio station, and bringing franchised cable television to the island.

Two of his favorite spots in the entire world are a mere quarter mile apart – the Edgartown Yacht Club and the Edgartown Reading Room. At the yacht club, Klee served for several years as the race committee chairman, ran race week and regatta, and coordinated the annual cruise. At the Reading Room, he passed many an afternoon playing backgammon with friends and watching the beauty of Edgartown Harbor, and enjoyed planning the annual dinner each March.

Eventually Klee and Anne returned to Northern Virginia and then Williamsburg, Va. In retirement, he ran a small home-based business, Sea-Graphic Designs, catering to fellow boat lovers. They ultimately relocated to Pennsylvania to be near family. Klee’s passions through life were cruising the New England coast, participating in amateur radio contests, flying small aircraft and racing sports cars (on the computer in his later years!), listening to obscure 1930s jazz musicians, and playing his guitar, trombone, banjo, and ukulele. He was also extremely interested in genealogy and considered the research and writing of his book, William Taylor: An Early Colonial Settler, His Descendants and Their Mayflower Connections, and its inclusion at the Library of Congress, to be among his greatest accomplishments.

Klee is survived by three daughters, Sheree Freda an her husband Andrew of Deerfield, Melinda Coath and her husband Philip of Collegeville, Pa., and Holly Larson of Steamboat Springs, Colo.; six grandchildren, William and James Freda of Deerfield, and Hannah, Emma, Lily, and Abby Coath of Collegeville, Pa.; and a sister, Pattye Field, of Savannah, Ga. He was predeceased by his beloved Annie in August 2017.

A memorial service and celebration of life for both Klee and Anne is being planned for June 2 at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Edgartown. Interment in Edgartown will be private.

In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made to the American Heart Association or the American Kidney Fund.