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Anna Mahon was a Division I athlete at the University of Vermont. She threw the hammer 160 feet in practice.

If her coach was watching though, she dropped to 140 feet.

In meets, she managed only 120.

Before her junior year, Anna addressed her performance anxiety with the help of a sports psychologist.

She went on to compete in the 2004 Olympics, in Athens.

Two decades later, that athletic background — and her understanding of how human beings act, learn and grow —  stands Dr. Mahon in good stead.

Dr. Anna Mahon

The former psychology and English major — and Olympian — is Westport’s new assistant superintendent of schools for teaching and learning. She replaces Dr. Anthony Buono, who retired.

Mahon is a versatile athlete. In addition to track (hurdles, long jump, shot put), she was a 4-year swimmer at Stamford High. At UVM, a coach saw her potential as a hammer thrower.

But what she calls “significant performance anxiety” dogged her — and not just on the field. “I was not a good test taker. I got nervous with assessments,” she says.

She sought out noted sports psychologist Dr. Alan Goldberg. Her confidence — and distances — surged. She missed qualifying for the 1996 Olympics (where women’s hammer throw was an exhibition sport) by one spot.

She then followed several family members into teaching, and earned a master’s in education at Boston University.

She was hired as a Darien High School English teacher. But she missed competing, so she also trained for up to 25 hours a week with the Southern Connecticut State University coach.

She continued to work on the mental aspect of her sport. As she grew as a teacher, she used her own personal growth to help students through their own stresses.

Mahon and her husband Sean — a former high jumper on SCSU’s national championship team — bought a home in Orange.

The commute was tough. He was beginning his caeer as a physical education and health teacher at Amity Regional High, just 4 miles away (he is now the department chair), so she began teaching there too.

John Brady — a former administrator in Westport — took over as suprintendent for Amity Regional School District #5.

“He also brought the Westport concept of the 3 A’s — academics, arts and athletics — to the district,” Mahon notes. “He had a very strong vision of excellence.”

His support of her travel for her sport ws important as well, she says. From 2004 to 2012 she coached men’s and women’s throwers at Yale University. Her athletes set national and school records.

Mahon was named associate principal in 2010, and principal in 2015. Another superintendent during that time was former Westport administrator Chip Dumais.

Mahon — who had earned a doctorate — had no intention of leaving Amity. But an assistant superintendent position opened up in Brookfield. The opportunity to work in a variety of areas — curriculum, human resources, special education and more — was appealing.

Which brings her to her next exciting professional challenge: Westport.

“Anthony (Buono) left this office in tip-top shape,” Mahon says. “The curriculum documents are all online. I’m here to support that work.”

And take it to the next level. She looks forward to working on Westport’s AI initiative.

Westport is “a state and national leader” in examing the impact of artificial intelligence on teaching and learning, she says. Six groups are working on various elements, under superintendent Thomas Scarice’s direction.

“We’re examining everything, from vision and ethics to the impact on students and teachers,” Mahon adds.

She is excited too by the work CJ Shamas, Ashley Moran and others are doing in the area of growth mindset for continuous development. Their work can be scaled out to the entire district.

“My experience at the highest level of competitive sports has instilled in me a profound understanding of discipline, resilience and perseverance,” she says.

Those qualities “are eseental for fostering a growth mindset within our school community.”

Mahon believes that those and many other past experiences align with the Westport Public Schools’ “clear vision of good leadership.”

Since she began on July 1, she has met with principals, program leaders and coordinators. She’s met elementary school families too, as they check in at libraries for summer reading.

“It’s nice to start in July. But now I’m ready for school to start,” Mahon says.

Dr. Anna Mahon, in her Town Hall office. Her daughter’s swim posters are on the wall. (Photo/Dan Woog)

It will be an active fall. But Mahon has always been on the go.

Last year, her family went to Paris for the Olympics They were in the Stade de France — the same venue where in 2003 she placed 7th at the World Championship. (She finished in the mid-20s, out of 50, at the Olympics the following year.)

Mahon no longer competes. But she’s an avid spectator for her daughter Grace, a University of New Hampshire swimmer, and football-playing son Lance. After a post-grad year at Choate Rosemary Hall, he’ll play at the State University of New York-Stony Brook.

They (and their 2 dogs) enjoy getting away to their second home in Vermont, for skiing and snowmobiling.

From those sports to her younger years, as a swimmer and hammer thrower, Dr. Anna Mahon has been an individual sport athlete.

But a colleague who has worked with her since July 1 uses a team sport analogy to describe her impact on the Westport Public Schools.

He calls her “a grand slam.”

(“06880” frequently covers the education beat: schools, achievements, trends, staff and students. If you enjoy these stories, please click here to support our work. Thank you!)

In a school filled with high achievers, Luca Caniato stood out.

Before graduating in June, he played violin in the orchestra; served 3 years as president of the Italian Club; founded the Photography Club and Aquatic Habitat Alliance; was elected to 4 Honor Societies; played varsity soccer, and was one of 2 seniors chosen by his classmates to turn the tassel at graduation.

Luca Caniato and Alex Hackett get ready for the finale, at Staples’ June graduation. (Photo/Ryan Allen)

It sounds like Luca had no time for anything else.

But the teenager — who heads soon to the University of Colorado, where he’ll be one of just 50 new students in the elite Leeds Scholars Program — has one more passion. It challenges him, calms him, and feeds his soul.

And — because he is on the go, even when relaxing — it’s been both a summer job, and a way to give back to others.

Luca Caniato (Photo/Melissa Alves)

Luca is an avid, and very accomplished, fisherman.

It started in 8th grade, when Bedford Middle School language arts teacher Steve Rexford taught Luca’s friends Josh Ginsburg and Preston Siroka how to tie flies and cast rods.

Intrigued by the “cool, unique” sport, Luca joined them. He got a fly rod and waders.

When Rexford met him at a Pennsylvania river — both families were vacationing nearby — Luca caught a 4-inch bass.

“I was hooked,” he says (pun fully intended).

Fishing is “so different from anything else. How you choose the right fly, tie it, cast a rod, engage the fish, land it — the whole approach is magical.”

Luca has fished with some very big fish: 3-time world champion fly fisherman and former French national captain Bertran Jacquemin, and Yannick Rivière, another world champion.

His mentor is Antoine Bissieux, 2025 Orvis Guide of the Year.

Luca fishes in Connecticut’s Farmington River — and far beyond, in Wyoming and Idaho.

Two summers ago — using money saved from painting and mowing lawns — he spent 2 weeks in Montana with former soccer teammate Ryan Thomas, who worked in a fly fishing shop. It was a great experience, including fishing off a boat at 3 a.m.

“Trout don’t live in ugly places,” Luca notes.

Luca Caniato, in the Italian Alps. (Photo/Luigi Mautino)

Other scenic spots are more local: the Saugatuck River at Ford Road, Compo Beach and Long Island Sound.

This winter, Fairfield students Matt Menozzi, Ryan Leavay and John McCloskey — who ran a fishing camp there — reached out to Luca. They wanted to start a Westport branch. Would he be interested?

Do fish swim?!

The Faifield camp supplied all the rods and equipment, and taught youngsters to fish in a safe, fun environment.

Luca marketed the camp through flyers, videos and social media.

It was fully booked. Through last week, 60 kids ages 7-14 (10 or so each week) fished with Luca and his counselors — his friends Josh and Preston, who first got him into fishing — at Burying Hill Beach, Old Mill, and their favorite spot, Compo.

Josh Ginsburg, and a happy camper. 

They met weekday mornings, from 9 to noon. Some were already experienced; they’d take a rod, and run off. Others had to learn how to cast, lure a porgy and more.

“They may not be as big as a striper or bluefish,” Luca notes. “But when they catch even a porgy or sea robin, kids go crazy.”

He and the counselors make sure to celebrate every achievement, no matter how small.

One day, with the tide particularly low, few fish were biting.

Suddenly — at 11:40, as they all got ready to pack up — the boys started hooking fish.

Luca texted the parents to pick them up there, so they could keep angling to the end. “That was so much fun,” he says. “It was awesome!”

Casting on the Compo jetty.

(Yes, all the campers this year were male. Luca hopes girls will join next year, but notes, “guys are generally more interested in fishing.”)

Already a patient fisherman, Luca says that running the camp has helped him realize the time it takes to learn a new skills.

He adds, “Everyone learns differently. But fishing is hands-on. We have to do a lot of demonstrations.”

He’ll be back at the beach next year, introducing another group of boys (and girls?) to one of his many passions.

Just as he got hooked on the sport 4 years ago, Luca Caniato will reel the next generation of fishermen in.

(To learn more, email lucagcaniato@icloud.com, or click here. You can follow Luca’s fishing and photography adventures on Instagram: @lgcflicks.)

(“06880” regularly highlights the achievements of Westport’s great young people. If you enjoy stories like these, please click here to support our work. Thank you!)

(All photos/Luca Caniato unless otherwise noted)

The New York Mets are known for 2 things:

Their miraculous 1969 season, when an astonishing late-season surge culminated in a World Series championship, and …

The 7 seasons before it, when they never finished higher than 9th out of 10 teams — particularly their atrocious, miserable, sometimes comic, certainly memorable debut year of 1962.

More than 6 decades later, baseball fans still remember it.

Including Mark Galley. Even though he had not yet been born.

Galley’s sports pedigree is strong. His father Dick was a 3-sport athlete in Staples High School’s Class of 1959, setting several baseball records.

Mark was in Staples’ Class of 1983, but graduated from Loomis Chaffee. He was a Trinity College quarterback, and captained the ski team.

Galley began his professional TV and film production career in Los Angeles.Back in Westport, he was a DJ on 95.9 The Fox, then in the 1990s joined Modem Media — the world’s first interactive agency, headquartered on Saugatuck Avenue.

He led the creative department, building early websites and interctive experiences for brands like Heineken, Delta Airlines, Sony and John Hancock.

Mark Galley

After winning multiple awards, Galley started his own agency, Spitfire Interactive, on Main Street. He pioneered in-store and menu boards for Subway. Other clients included GE, NASCAR, Energizer and Kraft.

Ten years later he moved on to become chief marketing and creative officer at LifeCare. Most recently, with American Dream in East Rutherford, New Jersey, Galley promoted 450 brands, attractions and restaurants.

Meanwhile, all along — for more than 25 years — he worked on a Mets project.

The idea began when he read Jimmy Breslin’s book, “Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game?”

A quick look at that initial year of “ineptitude, mediocrity, and abject failure,” it also captured the importance of the team to New York, 4 years after the Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers abandoned the city for the West Coast.

At the heart of the story — and the man who gave Breslin’s book its title — was manager Casey Stengel.

The only man in history to have played or coached all 4 New York teams — those 3, plus the Yankees — Stengel was a larger-than-life character.

Just as he’d done with players, fans, sportswriters and everyone else 60 years earlier, Stengel — who was fired by the Yanks in 1960, age 70, for being “too old,” and died 15 years later, at 85– captivated Galley.

Stengel was an important part of the screenplay that Galley began writing in the early 2000s. Another key piece was the behind-the-scenes maneuvering by baseball owners to keep only 1 team (the Yankees) in New York — and then, when that failed, to manipulate the expansion Mets’ draft so completely that their squad of castoffs, misfits and never-will-bes would be the laughingstock of baseball.

The rival owners succeeded. Throughout the entire season, the Mets nevers won on a Thursday. They had 2 pitchers with the same name (Bob Miller). Their mascot, “Mr. Met,” got beaned and beat up.

They were eliminated from playoff contention on August 7 — the earliest date in baseball history. Their season ended on a triple play.

New York welcomed the Mets in 1962. The city had no idea what lay ahead.

Surely, Galley thought, this is a tale worth telling.

For over 2 decades, he reearched and wrote. He envisioned a TV show — “Amazin'” — of 18 episodes, each 45 minutes long. His script ran 930 pages. He already has 140 songs picked out, for the series.

Five years ago, Galley got an agent. They shopped it around. Producers and directors liked it.

But, they all said: We need to see a book first.

So — like a baseball player who is told to learn a new position, or try a new stance — Galley went back to work.

He cut the screenplay by more than half, to “just” 400 pages. In April, “How the Worst was Won” was published.

It’s turned some heads. Colin Cosell — Howard’s grandson, and the Mets’ PA announcer at Citi Field (with Westporter Marysol Castro) — is a fan.

Galley was interviewed by Michael Carlon, for his “Uncorking a Story” podcast.

A few producers have come sniffing around.

A lot still has to happen for Mark Galley’s book to become a TV series.

Then again, a lot had to happen for the 1962 Mets to morph — a mere 7 years later — into world champions.

Amazin’!

(To order “How the Worst was Won,” click here. To learn more about the book, click here.)

(“06880” is where Westport meets the world. And when that world includes the 1962 Mets — well, that’s how we roll. But we can’t do it without readers’ support. Please click here to help. Thank you!)