Robert Choate Shepherd

Robert Choate Shepherd, 81, of Brunswick, Maine, and Prouts Neck in Scarborough, Maine, died July 11 in Maine Medical Center in Portland.

After graduating from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Shepherd was a journalist for the Guy Gannett Communications’ newspapers in Portland, which then included the Portland Press Herald, the Evening Express and their sister Sunday newspaper, the Sunday Telegram.

From 1964 to 1971, he was press secretary in Washington, D.C., for U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie, a Maine Democrat, before returning to Maine.

He then served in Maine Gov. Ken Curtis’ administration.

He spent 12 years, the last three as chairman, on the Brunswick Town Council.

Shepherd leaves his wife, Joan; a son, Jonathan; three daughters, Rebecca, Anne and Catherine; 11 grandchildren.

The obituaries were written, at least in part, from published reports by Bulletin correspondent Nimra Aziz, an undergraduate student in the Northeastern University School of Journalism.