MEXICO — One of Rumford’s native sons who trained World War II soldiers in hand-to-hand combat, ministered to the elderly and shut-ins, and once held nearly a half-ton in weight of soldiers and a barbell on his shoulders, passed away on Friday at the age of 93.

An avid body builder, Alphonse G. Mercier of 5 Summit St., was described Saturday evening as “a man’s man” by world, national and state weightlifting champion Dick Austin of Rumford.

“He was ahead of his time at the time,” said Austin, 78. “He was a great lifter. He was very, very strong, very knowledgeable, and he shared his knowledge with all of us. He didn’t keep it a secret.”

Mercier taught Austin about bodybuilding and weightlifting after meeting the teenager on the beach at Roxbury Pond one day.

“He was lifting guys up in the air over his head with one hand, and that so impressed me that I walked right over to him and asked him if he would do it to me, and he did, and that was it,” Austin said.

Through the years, they kept in touch.

“He gave me the foresight and proper attitude to continue on my pathways to eventually become a world champion,” Austin said.

“He always kept me on a positive note and determined to be the best. I learned a lot from him because I had nobody else to get information from back in those days, the Forties.”

Mercier was much more than a specimen of physical fitness who once held 996 pounds (four soldiers and a barbell) atop his shoulders in the early 1940s, his daughter Anne Young of Mexico said Saturday evening.

“He used to be on the cover of Life magazine during the Forties when he was in the (Charles) Atlas program,” she said. “He was very in tune with both his physical body and his spiritual body.”

Before moving in with his daughter and her husband Robert in 2006 after the death of his wife of 57 years, Gertrude Blier Mercier, the couple lived on York Street in Rumford.

“He used to do somersaults off the roof of his house, and the story behind it is, that’s what he did when he asked my mother to marry him and she said yes,” Young said.

Robert Young recalled one anecdote about his father-in-law’s mindset back when Mercier was a staff sergeant or drill sergeant at Fort Wetherill, R.I.

“He built himself a rowboat on the base and rowed it 6 miles across Pawtucket Sound and back those 6 miles,” Robert Young said. “He was quite a man.”

Anne Young said her dad built a surfboard to paddle around Howard Pond in Hanover where Mercier and his wife had a camp that he also built, in addition to his house.

“He also took a bicycle frame and got some pontoons on it and put a paddle wheel in back and he would pedal it like a paddle boat all around the pond,” she said.

“I used to call him ‘Mr. MacGyver man’, because there was nothing disposable about my father. He fixed everything,” Anne Young said. “I’m very fortunate to have had him.”

Mercier also loved archery and enjoyed fishing and hunting but never killed any animals. Robert Young said he just liked the sport of finding the animals.

He was also extremely religious, loved everyone and never had a bad word to say about anyone, Anne Young said.

“Al was a straight shooter,” Austin said. “He didn’t curse; he didn’t swear. He was a positive-attitude-type person. Alphonse Mercier was a great, great guy.”

Employed 45 years with Carey Oil Co., Mercier became Mr. Santa Claus for 10 years during the 1980s, and spent decades visiting the elderly, shut-ins and those hospitalized or in nursing homes.

For more than 30 years, he organized and was master of ceremonies at the St. John’s Parish St. Patrick’s Day variety show.

He played guitar and piano, cut a record with his band “The Three Skins,” was a communicant of Parish of the Holy Savior, served as a Eucharistic minister for many years and sang in the choir.

“It was God first, then family, and then community,” Anne Young said. “He was an all-around man interested in wanting to make life better in his community.”

As tears began to flow, she added, “I’m going to have a big void for a long time, because we were very close, me being an only child.”

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Visiting hours for Alphonse G. Mercier will be held from 2 to 4 and 6 to 8 p.m. Sunday at S. G. Thibault Funeral Home, 250 Penobscot St., in Rumford. A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated at 11 a.m. Monday at Parish of the Holy Savior.

Robert and Anne Young of Mexico hold a large display of photographs of her father, Alphonse G. Mercier, who died Friday morning at the age of 93 at Rumford Hospital after a brief illness.

In a display of physical fitness prowess, Army Staff Sgt. Alphonse G. Mercier, center, of Rumford, holds on his shoulders 996 pounds at Fort Wetherill, Rhode Island during the 1940s.

Alphonse G. Mercier

Alphonse G. Mercier had a habit of doing somersaults off the roof of his parents house on York Street in his younger years, something he began doing after proposing to Gertrude Blier and hearing her say, ‘Yes,” Mercier’s daughter Anne Young said on Saturday evening.