Beth LaFountain vividly recalled one of the last conversations she had with her grandfather. Reflecting on the life he’d lived, Wally LaFountain told her, “Life is …” He then paused before continuing, “I don’t know; fill in the blank.”

“I told him, ‘You can put any word in there, and I think you’ve experienced it all,’” Beth LaFountain recalled saying. “He said to me, ‘Absolutely.’”

That’s the kind of life Wally LaFountain lived. LaFountain, a pillar in the Winslow sports community, died Friday. He was 99.

LaFountain coached the Winslow High School football team from 1958-68, founded the successful Maine-Nebraska Friendship Series wrestling exchange, and did so much for local youth sports.

A native of Woodstock, Vermont, and a Springfield College graduate after serving in World War II, LaFountain’s early football coaching career took him throughout the Northeast. After early stints in New Jersey and western New York, he ultimately arrived in Winslow.

Winslow was the Class B state champion in LaFountain’s first season in 1958. He won another in 1960.

Mike Siviski played for LaFountain from 1962-64 and later won seven state titles as Winslow High football coach from 1985-2019. Siviski, who succeeded Harold Violette (1969-84) as Winslow’s head coach, said LaFountain was a no-nonsense leader who emphasized character.

“He meant an awful lot for football at Winslow,” Siviski said. “I’d say (current coach) Wes (Littlefield) and I are probably the recipients of what Wally and Harold started. He’ll be sadly missed.”

LaFountain was also a prominent figure in Maine high school wrestling. Upon arriving at Winslow, he started the school’s varsity wrestling program. He was a longtime wrestling official, serving as president of the Maine Interscholastic Wrestling Officials Association for 16 years.

He founded the Maine-Nebraska wrestling exchange in 1985, along with Mick Pierce, a high school wrestling coach from Nebraska. LaFountain spent 10 years directing the program, which sends wrestlers from Maine to Nebraska or vice versa in alternating years and is one of the marquee events on the high school wrestling calendar.

“He was just a big lover of the sport,” said Skowhegan co-wrestling coach Tenney Noyes. “We’ve hosted (Maine-Nebraska) the past few years, and he always loved being there to meet all the boys. Even as he got up there in age these last few years, his daughter (Linda) would bring him out so he could be there.”

Bryan Cote, the current Maine-Nebraska director as well as coach of the Maine team, met LaFountain when he took over the program in 2022. Upon the team’s return from Nebraska that year, Cote and assistant coach James Blood presented LaFountain with a team shirt from the meet.

LaFountain’s impact on Maine high school wrestling is “unquantifiable,” Cote said. At the end of every Maine-Nebraska exchange, he tells wrestlers from both states not to take for granted a program that’s helped them build countless relationships and memories.

“We all tend to do good things in our lives, but very few people actually do something that leaves a legacy, and that’s exactly what Wally did,” Cote said. “That effect is going to be there for many years, even now that he’s gone. … The wrestling community and the state of Maine have lost not just a good figure, but a really good man.”

Throughout his life, LaFountain developed relationships that lasted his entire life. When he was inducted into the Maine Sports Hall of Fame in 2019, multiple players from the 1951 Bergenfield (New Jersey) High School football team — LaFountain’s first team as a coach — made the 6-hour trip to Portland for the ceremony.

Everyone had a LaFountain story, and in Siviski’s case, it involved hitchhiking to a local beach with his fellow offensive lineman, Larry Bourgoin. After making it to the beach successfully, the two were unable to find a ride back in time for practice. They would pay for it dearly the next day.

“I don’t know how many laps we had to run, but it was a lot,” Siviski said. “He was a no-nonsense guy — get to practice, be on time, be coachable and all of that — and when we weren’t there, we knew we were in deep trouble.”

On Saturday, a moment of silence was held for LaFountain ahead of the Winslow football team’s game against Freeport. The Black Raiders played a game that would have made LaFountain proud, defeating the Falcons 47-7 to improve to 3-0.

LaFountain held coaching spots at Winslow High well into his 80s. As the school’s freshman football coach in the early and mid-2000s, he coached Siviski’s sons, Scott and Stephen. He was also an assistant coach for the varsity baseball team until 2011.

Even after hanging up the whistle, LaFountain wasn’t far from the local sports scene. In addition to his annual presence at Maine-Nebraska, he was on hand when his granddaughter coached Winslow varsity baseball from 2022-23 — and, through and through, remained a coach.

“He’d always be there,” Beth LaFountain said. “He’d be sure to tell me that my right fielder was playing too deep every single time.”