Alumni Award News

On a rainy spring day Celeste (Nadeau) Baranyi ’84 proudly holds her maroon and gold pom-poms from the 80s. Minutes after giving a throwback Thornton cheer, Celeste grabs a microphone and resumes her role as morning radio show host for 102.9 WBLM, Maine’s Rock Station. She’s on location at the Pepperell campus to promote businesses and festivals in Saco and Biddeford. 

“We had to scrunch the pom-poms,” she explains while pointing to the tassels, which were manufactured straight. In addition to her duties on the sidelines of sporting events at Thornton, Celeste was a sorority girl for Sub Debs and sang tenor in jazz choir. She first entered the radio world at WHYR—her mom had been offered a job from the station, but she recommended Celeste take the position instead. So for three years Celeste learned how to hand splice and tape on reel-to-reels, while developing her public persona. She even covered the iconic Rick Dees Weekly Top 40. After a brief stint at a station in Waterville, she landed her position at WBLM and has remained a show host for the past 26 years.

A resident of South Portland, Celeste lives with her husband Mark, an engineer at IDEXX, and their two daughters: Sabelle, 9, and Anneliese, 5. She’s a proud aunt of Caleb Bailey ’17. In reflecting on her former school days she says, “I wish I had known I would be this happy when I was a teenager.”