AUGUSTA — Frank Warren may be both the best person, and the worst person, to share a secret with.

Last night, Warren discussed people’s secrets with hundreds of people at Augusta Civic Center.

He talked about the young woman who sent a photo of a bedroom door with holes punched in it by her mother, who was trying to get through the door to punch her some more.

There was the young man who couldn’t be found because he was getting his girlfriend an engagement ring.

And someone in Bangor’s life was saved by roller derby.

Warren may talk about people’s secrets in public, but that doesn’t keep thousands from mailing him postcards with their secrets.

Warren is creator of www.postsecret.com, a site that posts secrets sent anonymously on handmade postcards. It’s viewed by more than 1 million people every week, making it the largest advertisement-free blog in the world, according to press materials from Warren.

Warren said he received the postcard from the young mailer showing the door with the holes punched in it shortly after he started posting secrets. After the secret went on his blog, he began to get more photos of doors with holes in them. One writer said the photos didn’t depress him, but made him feel like he was not alone.

Warren showed several postcards with secrets he said have changed lives.

They included a man who sent him a postcard that said, “Saturday, when you wondered where I was, well, I was getting your ring.”

His girlfriend, a regular viewer of the website, saw the postcard sent by her boyfriend on the Sunday it was posted and asked, “Is that our cat?”

When she turned, the man was on one knee with the ring.

Later, the man sent Warren a photograph of a woman’s hand with a ring on it, with the same cat in the background.

The event included a chance for attendees to step up to a microphone and share a secret.

The secrets are posted to the www.postsecret.com site weekly, with new posts on Sundays.

The latest batch, posted Sunday, included one that says: “Bangor Roller Derby saved my life.”

It is written on a photograph of a group of women, the same photograph the Bangor roller derby team uses as the cover photo for its Facebook page.

Below the postcard, Warren posted an email message that said, “Roller derby proved that I really don’t belong anywhere. Even misfits form cliques.”

Warren got started in 2004 when, he said, he was a small-business owner and suburban husband and father. For an art project, he printed out 3,000 self-addressed, blank postcards and asked strangers to write down a secret they had never told anyone before and mail it to his Maryland home.

Warren said he first asked people to participate by going up to them and saying, “Hi, my name is Frank and I collect secrets.”

Now he gets hundreds every day.

Warren, who’s been featured on several national TV shows, said people’s reasons for sharing their secrets are as varied as the secrets they share. People who read his site tell him they eventually see a secret posted there by a stranger on a postcard that strikes them very deeply and emotionally.

Warren’s efforts have also raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the National Suicide Prevention Hotline, according to press materials. Collection buckets were set up around the civic center for Monday’s event, sponsored by the UMA Student Government Association, so attendees could make donations to suicide prevention causes.

Keith Edwards — 621-5647

kedwards@centralmaine.com

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