Kerry, Bush volunteers going the extra miles

A veteran of many Massachusetts campaigns, Weymouth's Linda Broadford had a few things to learn about Ohio politics when she and a busload of other John Kerry volunteers landed in Columbus recently for a weekend of campaigning.

Her first and most important lesson: Don't knock on any doors on a Saturday afternoon when the Ohio State football game is on.

Observing such local customs, Broadford found Ohioans receptive to the Kerry message. ''In the area we went to, the response was good. They were mostly low-income people. Their concern was jobs," said Broadford, who is vice chairwoman of the Weymouth Democratic Town Committee.

Cynthia Stead, a Republican State Committee member from Dennis, has been going to Maine on weekends to stump for President Bush. On her most recent trip, she and her husband and students from the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth campaigned in an ethnic urban neighborhood in Lewiston.

''I thought they would be old-line Democrats, but they wanted Bush," she said. ''They are very sensitive to the terrorism issue because of the Canadian border."

Although the safe Kerry state of Massachusetts is off the radar of the presidential candidates this year, activists from the Bay State are playing important roles in the presidential campaigns. Many have headed north to the battleground states of Maine and New Hampshire, while smaller numbers have ventured to Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida and elsewhere.

The Kerry campaign has mobilized many people from Massachusetts, including state legislators and local officials. Kerry's Travelers, as they are called, have gone on bus trips throughout the Northeast to boost the Massachusetts senator.

Fewer GOP activists from Massachusetts are campaigning for Bush. There are not as many Republican officials and party loyalists in this heavily Democratic state, and those who are here are occupied trying to boost the GOP's fortunes in the state Legislature.

Several local activists from the suburbs south of Boston are playing important roles in the Kerry campaign.

P.J. O'Sullivan, a political consultant from Quincy, is heading the get-out-the vote effort in Maine. Among his key aides are William Duffy, chairman of the Walpole Democratic Town Committee, and Joseph A. Connolly, a Weymouth town councilor and Norfolk County treasurer.

Peter Eleey, an attorney and former state governor's councilor from Quincy, is heading up Kerry's efforts in Pasco County in central Florida. James Cantwell, a Democratic state committeeman from Weymouth, is coordinating a phone bank in Marshfield that is making calls to Florida and New Hampshire.

Cantwell has been to New Hampshire four times in recent months. The last time he was there, 600 volunteers, many of them from Massachusetts, showed up.

''They ran out of literature. They just sent people out holding signs," Cantwell said.

Maine, with its four electoral votes, is important to the two presidential campaigns. The state does not have a winner-take-all system. The winner of the statewide vote gets two electoral votes, and the winner of each of the state's two congressional votes gets one electoral vote.

While Kerry has had a slim lead in most statewide Maine polls, the northern congressional district is considered a tossup.

The Massachusetts Republican Party has a ''Mass. to Maine" program, which sends campaign buses north on weekends.

Stead and other Massachusetts activists enlisted to picket a recent John Edwards appearance in Lewiston, where they held signs and chanted.

''We got bad after awhile. We started chanting, 'Chicks for Cheney,' " she said.

Democratic Mayors John T. Yunits Jr. of Brockton and William J. Phelan of Quincy were among a group of Massachusetts officials who went to campaign for Kerry recently in suburban Philadelphia.

The mayors went door-to-door and also visited a senior center.

''People were impressed that we came all the way down from Massachusetts and that we knew John personally," Yunits said. Kerry hosts annual get-togethers for Massachusetts mayors in January in Washington, D.C., and in the spring at his home on Beacon Hill. Yunits said many of the people he met while campaigning at a senior center were from the city of Philadelphia, which, like Brockton, has a great boxing tradition. Philadelphia was home to heavyweight champ Sonny Liston, as well as the mythical Rocky Balboa. When Yunits mentioned he was from Brockton, there was an instant connection.

''We met a lot of people who knew about Rocky Marciano and Marvin Hagler," said Yunits, referring to Brockton's two boxing champions.

Robert Preer can be reached at preer@globe.com.