![]() ![]() The fishermen waiting in their car for gasoline noticed a light was on inside McNally’s Texaco, but no one came to greet them outside at the pump. The sky was just warming with hints of dawn the air was quiet save for the buzz of the ice cooler and Coca Cola vending machine sitting in the dim glow of the gas station lights. and the sun wouldn’t rise for another hour or so. The pumps weren’t self-service like most of them are in Maine today, so the man and his friends waited for the attendant to come out. He and his friends had just fueled themselves up with an early morning meal at Shorette’s Diner and now they needed a little fuel for their vehicle, too. 3 hours later, the scene would be different.įisherman in town with some buddies from Rhode Island pulled into the Texaco station. ![]() ![]() There was nothing amiss or worrisome, just a man doing his job. Robert was there, attending to his duties. Residents called it a lonely, quiet stretch of road just off I-95, and when Robert McKee clocked in for his shift on June 20th, he’d be the only person working at the lonely, quiet service station overnight.Ī Maine State Trooper, also on the overnight shift, stopped into the filling station around 1 a.m. The area certainly wasn’t built up like it is now. In fact, the Texaco was the only all-night gas station between Bangor and Waterville, with just under 60 miles of dark Interstate connecting the two cities. In 1975, McNally’s Texaco station, where the Irving Oil now sits in Newport, was open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Neither Robert nor residents of the Sebasticook Valley area knew that the mid-1970s would become a dark time for their community. It was a quiet yet fulfilling life in smalltown Maine. He was active in the SAD 53 Teachers Association, the Maine State Teachers Association, and was the faculty advisor of the science club. Robert went above and beyond as a teacher. ![]() Mike McNally, owner of the gas station where Robert worked, told Bruce Hertz of the Bangor Daily News that Robert was the kind of person you would like to have as a father or a son.įollowing his time in Germany, Robert stayed in the Army Reserves, but returned to his hometown in Aroostook county and earned his teaching degree from the University of Maine at Presque Isle. He had two children with Dorte, a young son and a daughter. Robert McKee, by all accounts, was a family man. Army in 1966 to 1968, and that extra cash from his service station attendant job meant he could afford to send Dorte back to Germany to visit her family. He’d met his wife Dorte while stationed in Germany as first lieutenant for the U.S. He was a sixth grade teacher at the Vickery School in Pittsfield, but when the kiddos were on summer vacation and his classroom was closed up until the fall, 35-year old Robert McKee picked up a full-time summer gig at McNally’s Texaco Station in Newport. In the next two episodes of Dark Downeast, you’ll hear what happened that June of 1975 and about the two humans lost to still-unsolved violent crimes. The same month and year in the same small Maine town. I’d never picked up on it before – the cases of Robert McKee and Ellen Choate are not linked, at least not confirmed to be linked despite speculation, but they’re connected by time and place. They’re all familiar to me at this point, I know their photos by heart and even the years and dates stick with me now, but I notice something new each time I check the list, too. I spend a lot of time reviewing the details of Maine’s Unsolved Homicide list, scrolling the names and seeing the faces of those whose cases still wait for their conclusion. Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |