ABBOT — Douglas Charles Carpenter was found deceased in Abbot, Maine on January 27, 2025.

Douglas (Chuck) was the second son of Stanley (Wild Bill) Carpenter and Constance Ellis Carpenter.

He grew up in the Greenville area and lived in Piscataquis County for twenty-five years.

Out of choice, Chuck did not have a traditional education. He preferred to teach himself the ways of the world. He stayed in school long enough to learn reading, writing and arithmetic. He was an avid reader and became a jack of all trades.

Chuck suffered a tragic accident in his teens and lost his left hand and most of his left leg. He retrained the muscles in his leg and learned to walk again. He wore a hook on his left arm. If a little kid asked him what happened to his hand, he always told them that a
bear bit it off.

As a young man up North, he tried his hand at farming but soon went back to the woods that he loved. He was an expert cutter and could land a tree wherever he wanted it. At first, he cut for Young and then went to The Great Northern in the early seventies as a cutter and operator.

In 1980 he loaded three chain saws in his pickup and headed down the road. He was headed South where it was warmer. Looking for a place to pitch his tent for the night, he landed at Lobster Buoy Campsite in South Thomaston. The next morning, he saw the woman that owned the campsite trying to get the place ready to open. She was working alone, so he set out to help her.

A few months later the daughter, Eleanore, came home and that was the the beginning of Doug Carpenter. Eleanore had two teenage children, Eve and Ben, and Doug became a stepfather. He was always Doug – not Chuck – when he lived on the coast.

Doug’s daughter Anna was born in 1981. He designed and built a two-story home for her and her mother.

At first, he tried his hand at lobstering. He fitted out a small fiberglass hull with hauling gear. But there wasn’t enough money in lobstering at the time so he bought a truck and hauled a flatbed trailer. His most remarkable load was a little yellow submarine that George Kittridge built. The CB radios were all singing “We all live in a yellow submarine”.

Sometimes his friend Scott’s dog “Cricklewood Green” trucked with him. They made a couple of trips to Texas together.

When Doug had had enough of the road, he gave up the long hauls and took over maintenance of Lobster Buoy Campsite. He bundled and sold campfire wood from Boothbay Harbor to Searsport.

During that time, Doug built his camp in Abbot. He spent one winter with his father at the Twenty-mile camp fur-trapping. The fur was
good that year and they did well. For that winter Doug was Chuck again and he enjoyed the long winter in the camp with his father.

In the nineties, Doug moved to New Hampshire. He bought a used Freightliner and bought a farm. He got married again and divorced
again. He was named Trucker of the Year in New Hampshire when he got a fellow trucker to the hospital after she had a heart attack at the wheel.

Then he moved back to the coast. Doug never could put down roots.

Douglas is survived by his daughter Anna Carpenter McEnulty of South Thomaston; his grandchildren Avienda, Lyra and Dhovlen; his father, Stanley Carpenter and his companion Violet Noyes of Abbot; his brother, William (Pete) Carpenter and his wife Candace of Lincolnville; his step-daughter, Eva Murray and her husband Paul of Matinicus Island and their children Eric and Emily, who called him Grampy Doug; and several aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews.

Doug Carpenter is also survived by his close friends, Eleanore Carpenter, Scott Appleby and Margaret and Ronnie Anderson of South
Thomaston and Lewie Orff of Rockland.

Chuck Carpenter is also survived by his two close friends, Kyle Littlefield and Joe Dion of Abbot.

No services are planned at this time.  In remembrance of Doug’s life, take a long and loving walk in the woods with a good friend. And offer to help in any way you can. Doug would have.

Thank you to Larys Funeral Home in Dover-Foxcroft for their caring service.