BETHEL — Matt Bevin, a Gould Academy graduate who spends time in the Bethel area and owns a vacation home here, recently announced his intent to challenge U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky in the Republican primary in 2014.

McConnell is the minority leader in the Senate.

On his campaign website, Bevin describes himself as a “conservative Republican,” and media reports describe him as challenging McConnell from the right.

Bevin grew up as one of eight children in Shelburne, N.H.

After graduating from Gould, Bevin went to Washington and Lee University in Virginia on an ROTC scholarship, then served in the U.S. Army, where he attained the rank of captain, according to his campaign website.

He worked in the financial industry for many years, settling in Kentucky with his family in 1999.

In 2011, he took over Bevin Bros., a bell manufacturing company in Connecticut, which had been in the Bevin family since 1832.

The company makes bells for the Salvation Army and Macy’s Santas, among others.

In recent years, Bevin has donated bells for Bethel’s annual Jingle Bell Run, which takes place on Main Street with the arrival of Santa Claus and the lighting of the Christmas tree on the Common.

Bevin also placed a life-size statue of a pale green horse on the porch of his Wiley Block building at the top of Main Street.

Titled “Hope in the Garden,” the horse was one of more than 130 created in 2009 and displayed around Louisville, Ky., as part of a civic pride fundraising project.

He also donated an ARTirondack chair he purchased at a Mahoosuc Arts Council fundraising auction to the Bethel Historical Society. The chair featured a collage of historical pictures depicting Bethel.

Bevin and his wife, Glenna, live in Louisville with their nine children, four of whom they adopted from Ethiopia.