Sam Webber told stories.

As Hallowell city historian and as a teacher, father and husband, Webber put everything into context. Each old house, each side street, each great-great-great grandfather, each headstone, each long-forgotten quarry site — they all have their own history, their own story.

And in Hallowell, Webber knew them all.

“You’d just press a button and you’d get one,” Catharine Webber, his wife of 61 years, said.

Webber died Monday morning at Togus VA Medical Center in Augusta after a brief illness. He was 89.

Sumner “Sam” Allen Webber was born in Rutland, Vermont, on June 27, 1936. He was the only child of his parents, Marvelle and Emeroy Webber. He is survived by his daughter Sarah; his son Sumner Jr.; and his wife.

By the time Webber was 3, his family moved to Hallowell, settling in a historic Second Street house, where he lived for the rest of his childhood.

Webber grew up thoroughly a Hallowellian. From a stone wall perch downtown that Catharine said likely no longer exists, he watched businesses open and close, families move in and out, parades float by and mayors come and go. And he soaked it all in.

Webber watched as about 400 Hallowell residents joined the armed services and laid their lives on the line when the United States entered World War II in 1941. Far too young to sign up himself, Catharine said he’d play “war” with his friends in Vaughan Woods, learning the wind of the streams and rolls of the hills.

His memory of those days never failed him, Catharine said — which made him a legendary local historian.

“He loved to tell those stories about when he was little,” Catharine said. “He loved to give you history or some information about the various houses or the businesses. He could walk along Water Street and say, ‘This was such and such, and this was something else.'”

After graduating from Middlebury College in Vermont and serving in the U.S. Army, Webber took education classes at the University of Maine, where he met Catharine.

Soon, he began teaching at Hall-Dale High School. His lessons were firm, Catharine said, and he was respected by his students. Many former students commented on Facebook posts announcing his death, recounting their time in his classroom and the subtle glimmer in his eye.

Webber taught history and much more at Hall-Dale for 33 years, covering his classroom with trinkets and self-made decorations.

Webber then served as Hallowell’s city historian — a position created specifically for him in 1997 — for nearly three decades. He helped residents and officials with historical documents and questions about their Hallowell ancestors, and even built floats for city parades.

Larry Davis, the president of Row House, the city’s historical preservation society, said he often pointed questions directly to Webber instead of answering them himself, including recently when friends of his moved into a house on Second Street.

“The husband is saying, ‘Larry, what can you tell me about this house?’ And I said, ‘I’ll tell you what: I’m going to give you Sam Webber’s number, and you can call him. He can tell you more about that house than you’ll ever want to know,'” Davis said.

Bob McIntire, chairman of Historic Hallowell, often worked with Webber, too, on local historical projects, like the Museum in the Streets plaques posted around town, which present vignettes of Hallowell as it was hundreds of years ago.

McIntire said Webber was a joy to work with — a kind soul who was as engaging as he was knowledgable. Webber especially valued relationships with his former students.

“You’d go around, and people of all ages would come up and talk to him as a friend and say how much he meant to them as a teacher,” McIntire said. “He would say that kind of thing would never get old — meeting his students and having those relationships.”

Webber retired from the city historian role last spring after 28 years. During a July meeting, City Council members presented him with a plaque, and Rep. Dan Shagoury, a friend of Webber, read a proclamation honoring his service on behalf of the Maine House of Representatives.

Webber also served as a city councilor and held leadership positions at the Old Fort Western Museum, the Arnold Trail Historical Society, the Maine State Archives Advisory Board, the Hubbard Free Library and Row House. In 1996, he was named the Old Hallowell Day Citizen of the Year.

Webber also held well-attended tours of the Hallowell cemetery. He’d wear a bowtie and a suit jacket and a top hat owned by a local funeral director — one of the only times he’d dress up, Catharine said — while telling stories about famous people buried there.

He will join those ranks when he is buried in the Hallowell cemetery in the spring.

A meticulous man, Webber spent years perfecting his own homemade maple syrup, tapped from sugar maples near his home — first in Whitefield, and then off Vaughan Road in Hallowell. Often, friends would stop by and ask for the syrup. On occasion, Catharine said, he’d even let them pay for it.

Webber was also an under-appreciated artist, Catharine said. He’d spend hours painting recreations of photographs he’d taken, and many of the walls in their home were covered in his artwork. A watercolor of a Parisian scene, reminiscent of a trip Webber took with his parents to Europe after his college graduation, hangs in their Manchester townhome.

Sometimes, Webber would get a twinkle in his eye, Catharine said. He was never much of a joke-teller, but he had a fantastic sense of humor, which he used on his children and grandchildren.

Catharine came home from grocery shopping in Augusta one day early in their marriage and noticed something was different about their refrigerator. Webber had entertained their toddler, Sarah, by drawing her favorite story of a duck in magic marker all over the door.

There the duck drawings stayed, until the fridge gave in years later.