Here are some of the notable Mainers we lost in 2025

Sheldon Hartstone died Jan. 8 at age 90.

Hartstone was a longtime fixture of the Queen City’s business community, running Fairmount True Value Hardware. The business opened in 1950, making it one of the oldest continually running businesses in Bangor.

He once had an empire of commercial and residential properties across the city. But foreclosures brought that to an end in the early 1990s.

Still, Hartstone retained and ran the independent hardware store until the very end.

Herman Frankland died Feb. 2 at age 89.

The preacher, known also as “Buddy,” was a major figure of Maine’s Christian right into the 1980s.

Born in Eastport, Frankland felt called to preaching at a young age. In his 30s, he started Bangor Baptist Church in the 1960s and, just a few years later, Bangor Christian Schools.

Beyond the pulpit, Frankland is remembered for leading an unsuccessful campaign against the musical “Jesus Christ Superstar” when it came to the Bangor Auditorium and for being a vociferous opponent of gay rights.

Mary Jane Bush died Feb. 12 at age 76.

Bush, who grew up in Baltimore, was well-known for her work to improve the health of communities within Penobscot and Hancock counties.

When she was younger, Bush joined a Catholic convent, where she met a nun who would later become her wife, Sue Davis. The two eventually left the convent in the 1970s and moved to Maine.

Here Bush became executive director of Wellspring in Bangor before moving on to further her education and to volunteer for Bucksport Bay Healthy Community Coalition, where she eventually rose to serve as health planning director.

Don Houghton died on Feb. 28 at age 83.

Except for a 13-year stint at a nonprofit organization developing housing, Houghton worked in newspapers his entire career.

Formerly an editor and reporter at the Providence Journal, Louisville Courier-Journal in Kentucky and the Daily Hampshire Gazette in western Massachusetts as well as a stringer for the Wall Street Journal, Houghton bought the Bucksport Enterprise in 2001.

He ran the operation with his longtime partner, Sandy Holmes, who handled advertising, circulation, bookkeeping and some editorial chores.

He was a fixture of the business sector in the Queen City, spending 42 years in his family’s company — N.H. Bragg & Sons Co. — retiring as president in 1992.

Eames gave much of himself to Bangor, spending stints on the city’s Planning Board, as well as  leadership roles at the Bangor Jaycees; United Way; Eastern Maine Medical Center; Eastern Maine Healthcare, now Northern Light Health; Bangor Savings Bank; and Bangor Hydroelectric Co.

Rice was a fisherman who dedicated years of his life to serving the town of Gouldsboro, where he had held the position of selectman since 1996 and spent more than 40 years as harbormaster.

He followed his grandfather into fishing, catching sardines for the now-defunct Stinson Seafood cannery. Rice was actively involved in efforts to revive the cannery, though nothing took for long and time claimed the cannery as it does us all.

“It is clear he meant a lot to the town and the town meant a lot to him,” Gouldsboro Town Manager Josh McIntyre told the Bangor Daily News after Rice’s death. “Everybody is pretty sad.”

He eventually came to Maine, where he served as president of C.H. Sprague & Sons Co. and director of the Maine Office of Energy Resources.

Monks would play a key role in the abortive campaign in the late 1960s and 1970s to build an oil refinery in Machiasport, one of several major development projects that nearly changed Maine forever. The proposed 300,000-barrel-a-day refinery would have been the “largest of its type,” and included storage tanks with a capacity of 16 million barrels, making it “one of the largest oil storehouses in the nation,” according to a 1968 New England Regional Commission pamphlet.

Though born in Lincoln, it’s Bangor where Perry’s legacy will live on for generations.

He spent 42 years working as the Queen City’s forester. During his time, he created nurseries to help replace thousands of trees devastated by Dutch elm disease. Today many of the trees lining Bangor’s streets were planted thanks to Perry, and he was instrumental in reforesting parts of Essex Woods, Prentiss Woods and Bangor’s city forest, which bears his name.

This year, Bangor received a Tree City USA designation for the 20th straight year, which Bangor Public Work Director Aaron Huotari, in an interview with the BDN earlier this year, attributed to Perry’s hard work.

Andrea Gibson died July 14 at age 49.

Gibson, a Maine native who moved to Colorado in the 1990s, was a renowned poet and performance artist whose work explored gender identity, politics and their terminal cancer diagnosis.

Beyond the world of art, Gibson achieved fame on the basketball court. Growing up in Calais, Gibson played for the high school girls squad, helping lead the Blue Devils to a state championship in 1993, ending the season with a 22-0 record. That spurred a remarkable eight years for Calais basketball. Gibson also went on to spend two years as a captain for the Saint Joseph’s College women’s basketball team.

John Orrick died on Aug. 24 at age 65.

The photojournalist collapsed in the press box from a cardiac event during the Oxford 250 race at Oxford Plains Speedway.

Orrick died before he reached the hospital.

Orrick, who lived in Raymond, had spent 25 years working as a photojournalist, including the past two at CBS affiliate WGME 13, a media partner of the Bangor Daily News.

Elizabeth Russell died on Sept. 21 at age 65.

Russell, who was born in Lincoln, died just weeks after announcing her retirement as president of Eastern Maine Community College in Bangor, where she left an indelible mark on the campus.

She rose from a teacher to the top of the community college’s ranks during her three-decade career.

During her tenure, Russell brought in millions in federal funds, updated the college’s technology and brought an ambulance to support its emergency medical services program.

Karmo Sanders died Oct. 26 at age 74.

You might better know Sanders as Birdie Googins, or you might know her better as simply The Marden’s Lady, the character she played in commercials over many years for Marden’s.

But there was more to Sanders than convincing Mainers to act on a good deal when they see one. She devoted her life to the theater and arts.

During her life, Sanders performed in many productions in Maine, New Hampshire and Kentucky, according to her obituary. She also wrote many plays — some with her late husband, Jerry, who died in 2013 — including “Spellbound!” “Radical Radio,” “The Gold Rush Girls” and “Homer Bound.”

Don Christen died Nov. 18 at age 72.

Christen was an activist who devoted his life to overcoming cannabis prohibition. He started an annual demonstration outside the Somerset County Courthouse, where he would light up a joint in protest.

He also founded Maine Vocals, which continues to organize music festivals and was instrumental in the passage of a 1999 referendum legalizing the medical use of cannabis.

John Cashwell III died Nov. 23 at age 78.

While born in North Carolina, Cashwell is remembered for his dedication to his last chosen home of Bangor.

Before coming to Maine in the 1980s, Cashwell spent 20 years in the military, including two tours in Vietnam; flew commercial helicopters; and earned a forestry degree in Montana.

Cashwell spent a stint in Calais, where he served as mayor. And when he came to the Queen City, he maintained that civic engagement in his new home.

Charles Norman Shay died Dec. 3 at age 101.

Shay, a member of the Penobscot Nation, grew up on Indian Island but spent the last years of his life in France, not far from Normandy.

He joined the military and served as a combat medic during the D-Day invasion in June 1944. While on the beaches of Normandy, Shay saved the lives of countless soldiers, going into the water to pull wounded GIs to relative safety as bullets flew overhead.

“I guess I was prepared to give my life if I had to. Fortunately, I did not have to,” Shay told The Associated Press in 2024.