Former Skowhegan Fire Chief Winton Thomas Keene Jr. memorialized at service

SKOWHEGAN — Former Skowhegan fire Chief Winton Thomas Keene Jr. had a reputation around the state as a leader in the fire service and a man who ran a tight ship.

Former Skowhegan Fire Chief Tom Keene died last year from a bout with COVID-19. A memorial service in his honor was held Saturday in Skowhegan. Morning Sentinel file

He expected nothing but the best from his firefighters and was known to utter a harsh word now and then, but they knew he cared deeply about them and their families.

Those were some of the qualities about Keene that emerged in a memorial service held Saturday at Skowhegan State Fairgrounds that drew about 300 firefighters, friends and family members from all around central Maine and beyond to the grandstand there.

Keene, who had served as fire chief from 1992 to 2001 and 2008 to 2014, died at age 66 Nov. 23 last year with COVID-19, one of the first central Mainers to have contracted the disease. He had struggled for years with diabetes and in recent years suffered amputation of both legs.

Keene was celebrated Saturday with a full firefighter’s sendoff that included a parade of fire trucks that rounded the racetrack at the fairgrounds with red lights flashing and dozens of firefighters saluting in tribute. A bagpiper performed and trumpeter played Taps.

The ceremony was solemn and the stories, heartfelt, but they were not without humor.

“Tom was a man who loved the fire service, sports, the Dallas Cowboys — I’m not sure why — his community, and most of all, his family,” Skowhegan fire Chief Shawn Howard told the crowd.

Howard recalled getting his first job as a firefighter at 19 under Keene and feeling as if Keene set impossible standards. Howard said that, as a young firefighter, he didn’t always understand or appreciate what Keene was to him, but it became clear with time.

After Howard became chief in 2014, he would call Keene for advice or just to talk and Keene would call him after fires, always curious about what was going on in town.

“He loved to hear the details — every bit of it,” Howard said.

Keene was a family man who loved his wife, Sheryl, his children and grandchildren, the Rev. Mark Tanner of the Federated Church said.

Tanner was friends with Keene and said he was a fighter who believed that where there is a will, there is a way. Tanner told a story about Keene’s son, Adam, who one day arrived to see his father snow blowing the driveway from his wheelchair.

“Wouldn’t that be Tom, trying to figure out how he could snow blow in a wheelchair?” Tanner said.

He also recalled when Keene proposed to Sheryl by hiding an engagement ring inside a silver ornament on the Christmas tree.

“Little things like that — thoughts and gestures — that made Tom who he was,” Tanner said.

Firefighting was in Keene’s blood from the time he was a child. His father, Winton Keene Sr., was fire chief in Norridgewock for 35 years, according to Tanner.

“As a child, Tom would jump on the back of a fire truck and hitch a ride to a scene, just to watch,” Tanner said, reading aloud from his obituary.

In 1972, Keene graduated from Skowhegan Area High School where he played football and enjoyed three consecutive football seasons, making the Class C State Championship. After receiving a vocational degree in automotive repair, he worked for his father’s garage in Norridgewock and for the Norridgewock Police Department. He also was an emergency medical technician and firefighter and in 1976, starting working full time at Skowhegan Fire Department.

The Skowhegan Fire Department honors former fire chief Tom Keene during a memorial service Saturday at the Skowhegan Fairgrounds. Michael G. Seamans/Morning Sentinel

Former Skowhegan Area High School teacher Mike Walker remembered seeing Keene at school fire drills many years ago but they did not become friends until after their sons were together in fifth grade. He and Keene became coaches and loved working with youth. Keene, he said, was an integral part of the community and he bled orange and black, Skowhegan’s colors.

“We loved Tom,” Walker said, his voice breaking. “We’ll always miss him, and what he would want for everyone is to celebrate life as we are today, and live life to the fullest.”

Sheryl Keene’s son, Garrett Nichols, said Keene came into his life when he (Nichols) was 6 and they became a happy, blended family. Keene raised her children as his own, always being there for all their needs and events, according to Nichols.

“My mother, Sheryl, and Tom, proved this could be done with ease,” Nichols said. “They promised each other to treat all of the children the same.”

Nichols sang a heartfelt rendition of “The Dance,” written by Tony Arata, prompting tears from many in the audience.

The Skowhegan-Madison Elks Lodge, of which Keene was a member, paid a tribute of “affection and honor,” striking a chime 11 times as an hour of remembrance and recollection.

Before the ceremony ended, Howard presented a folded American flag to Sheryl Keene.

Keene’s ashes are to be buried Sunday, according to Tanner.