Early Life and Education
Richard Edmund Neal was born February 14, 1949, in Worcester, Massachusetts, the oldest of three children. He and his two younger sisters were raised in Springfield by their mother, a housewife, and their father, a custodian at MassMutual. Neal's maternal grandparents were from Northern Ireland and his paternal grandparents were from Ireland. Neal's mother died of a heart attack when he was 13, and he was attending Springfield Technical High School when his father, an alcoholic, died. Neal and his two younger sisters moved in with their grandmother and later their aunt, forced to rely on Social Security checks as they grew up.
After graduating high school, Neal attended Holyoke Community College in Holyoke and then American International College in Springfield, with the assistance of survivor's benefits. He graduated in 1972 with a B.A. in political science. He then attended the University of Hartford's Barney School of Business and Public Administration, graduating in 1976 with an M.A. in public administration. Early in his career, Neal taught taught history at the Roman Catholic Cathedral High School.
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