Martha Sheppard

Martha Wight Sheppard

ORONO - Martha Wight Sheppard, 87, died May 5, 2025. She was born July 29, 1937 in Presque Isle, Maine, the daughter of Joseph Tarbell Wight and Nancy (Guptill) Wight.

She grew up in Winterport, the oldest of three siblings, spending part of a year on Deer Isle, attending school in a one-room schoolhouse, as her mother convalesced after an illness. She loved her many summers at Camp Natarswi, climbing Mt. Katahdin and canoeing the Allagash multiple times. Martha was intensely musical and a very good amateur pianist. She and her younger sister Nancy enjoyed singing duets of the latest popular songs and buying the sheet music from Viner's Music Store in Bangor. Martha also loved ballet from an early age and studied at the Thomas School of Dance in Bangor, headed by the dynamic Polly Thomas, a lifelong friend. She continued her Ballet studies with Alicia Langford when she moved to Boston in 1956. She was attending Simmons College when she met Edmund MacMillan "Ned" Sheppard at a church social and soon began their 59-year marriage. Following Boston, they moved to West Lafayette, Indiana and then on to Orono, Maine with their young family in 1962, when Ned joined the University of Maine faculty.

Martha worked for many years at Eastern Maine Medical Center as a post anesthesia care unit secretary. She was active in several local civic and social organizations including Shakespeare Club, Symphony Women, and University of Maine Thursday Club as well as volunteering for the Good Samaritan Agency and EMMC. She spent countless hours caring for aging family members and neighbors, always making time to help with food, errands or just to have a good conversation. Martha was an enthusiastic gardener and loved her peonies. She could be counted on to share them, believing everyone's day improved with a fresh flower or two. Her favorite place was her camp at Pleasant River Lake, built on countless blueberry muffins and Mrs. Way's chocolate cake. She loved to travel and following Ned's retirement in 1997, they ventured all over the world. Moving to Dirigo Pines in 2003, they spent many years there enjoying old and new friends.

She is survived by her sister, Nancy Wight, her son Stevenson Sheppard and his wife, Kathy Moriarty, son-in-law Richard Bevins, grandchildren Stevenson Whitaker and his wife, Leah Elsmore, Katherine Pennebaker and her husband Lee Pennebaker and their children Milo and Eden, Samuel Sheppard, Joseph Sheppard, step-granddaughter Sydney Bevins and her husband Benjamin Hilton and their son Felix, step-granddaughter Kaitlyn Moriarty and her partner John White and their children Rose, Fleur, and Della, and step-grandson Thomas Moriarty and his wife Danyelle. She was predeceased by her daughter, Elizabeth Katherine Sheppard in 2013, her husband, Edmund M. "Ned" Sheppard in 2016, and her brother, Garrett Wight in 2022.

The family would like to thank the wonderful Dirigo Pines staff and Gentiva Hospice helping her find a kind and dignified final peace.

Services: Dirigo Pines, June 7, 2025 at 11am, immediately followed by a reception at Dirigo Pines.

Internment: Private family internment at Riverside Cemetery in Orono following the reception.

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests considering a gift to the Bangor Symphony Orchestra or to the Orono Public Library.

Condolences to the family may be expressed at BrookingsSmith.com.