PHILLIPS – Robert J. Beal, Esq., of Phillips, left this world on May 31.

He was born at his family’s farm on the Mile Square in Avon. He was a life-long resident of Phillips and a 1947 graduate of Phillips High School. He attended Bowdoin College, where he graduated with honors in 1951.

A Russian speaker, he worked in the State Department in Washington, D.C., after college and served in the Army’s Counter-Intelligence Corps in Germany during the Korean War. He then returned to New England to study law at Boston College and then practiced law as a partner and owner of Noyes & Beal in Rangeley, and as a member of the Maine Bar, for more than 50 years.

He was an active and exemplary citizen, serving as a volunteer in many area organizations and providing countless hours of service to the community. He was a member of the Phillips Historical Society, providing valuable research assistance and loans of historic artifacts and equipment. He also served the Phillips Library Association, the Mile Square Cemetery Association and the Sandy River Railroad.

He was an avid, life-long learner, studying Maine and family history and collecting artifacts as wide-ranging as Revolutionary War firearms, a Chinese gong and a horse-drawn hearse – a perennial favorite in the Phillips Old Home Days parade. His humor, native wit and wide experience fueled a genius for anecdote, storytelling and hours of pleasure for family, friends and strangers alike.

He is survived and greatly missed by his brother, Frank S. Beal of Wilton; sister-in-law, Ruth B. Beal of Wilton; Frank and Ruth’s children, Kenneth L. Beal, Karen St. Peter, Keith F. Beal and Kevin J. Beal; and by the daughters of Robert’s long-time companion, the late Barbara Romines of Dryden – Carol R. Whittemore of Auburn and Nancy Walters of Dryden.