I had to chuckle at the story in the Bangor Daily News on July 28 about low pay being “one popular explanation why more that 50 state legislative candidates dropped out of their races after the June primary.”

I am from New Hampshire where the legislators still get only $100 a year and mileage for their services. My father, Otto Oleson, was a representative and then a state senator for 30 years, while holding down a job as a turbine operator in a paper mill. He taught his children that where there is a will there is a way. He was dedicated to public service; he felt it was a privilege and an honor and the $100 was irrelevant.

Gerald Oleson

Bangor