Don and Faye Konkle are fondly remembered for their extensive service to Lycoming County communities. PHIL HOLMES/Sun-Gazette

It is springtime and someone one else this year is cutting the grass at the General John Burrows Historical Society of Montoursville on Loyalsock Avenue. The same is true at the Church of Our Savior (Episcopal) located next door. Don Konkle voluntarily cut the lawns at both properties for several years. He died in early December, three months after the death of his beloved wife, Faye. The couple was married 62 years.

For many years, up until about 2015, he and other men voluntarily mowed the lawn and shoveled the walks at Montoursville Presbyterian Church, where he and Faye were very active members.

“They were the life of the church,” said Doris Schild, a friend, and a longtime member of Montoursville Presbyterian Church.

“You could not outwork Don, even as he was in his 80s,” said the Rev. David Smith, his pastor, at his funeral service last year. “He and Faye were a formidable team.”

At the service, Rider Konkle remembered his grandfather as “an incredible man; kind, compassionate, always helping someone. He worked hard for his family and never complained. He was an incredible role model. He touched thousands of lives.”

Gwen Bernstein, the former executive director of the United Churches of Lycoming County, said last week that “Don and Faye saw needs in the community and addressed them, and once they began to meet those needs, other people followed them.”

I have known the Konkle family for more than three decades, and I became closer to Don and Faye in the last several years of their lives. They showed a genuine interest not only in my life, my family and my work here at the Williamsport-Sun-Gazette, but they expressed that same sincere concern and compassion for countless others. I was just one of many people who was truly blessed to be in their “circle of friends.” I couldn’t write this column right after Don’s death. It was too painful. I’m attempting now, but tears still fill my eyes as I try to put this together.

At the service, the eldest grandson, Hunter Konkle, remembered his grandfather, known affectionately as “Paw Paw,” as one “who never held back when it came to helping people. We all saw the man in action. He never stopped giving.”

Whatever he did, Don Konkle shunned attention to himself, Hunter Konkle recalled. “He never wanted to be in the spotlight. He never wanted people to applaud him. For him, it was all about helping people while not being seen as he was doing it. Whether it was at his church, the firehouse or the historical society, he just wanted to serve.”

Bernstein said Don was “always the behind-the-scenes take-care-of-events guy. He knew everyone, and if you needed something, he knew how to get it or he knew who could help.”

One night in mid-November 2014, he could not avoid the applause that was directed to him. The United Churches of Lycoming County was holding their annual banquet at Montoursville Presbyterian Church. Don and Faye were of course working in the kitchen, cleaning up after the meal when the two were told to step out of the kitchen for a minute.

Don was then given the organization’s Ecumenical Service Award. He was honored for “extending the mission of our Churches through your leadership and support, making a more abundant life possible for everyone by living out the spirit of the greatest commandments: ‘To love the Lord your God with all your soul, and with all your mind and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as Jesus has loved you,'” the citation reads.

If Don was not home or at his church, chances are he was at the Montoursville firehouse on Broad Street, a place he really loved and that was very close to his heart. His and Faye’s legacy of service to others is very much alive there, where their three sons: Don Jr., Scott, and Craig, have served the community for several years as have the couple’s five grandsons.

“The fire department would not be what it is today if it wasn’t for people like ‘Senior,'” former borough Fire Chief Brett Welty said at the service. He always called Don “Senior” so as not to get him confused with Don Jr. “He was just one of those who made everything come together,” he said of Don, calling him “my friend, my mentor.”

Welty said Don Konkle, who was a 50-year member of the fire company, always supported the fire department. “He was always there, through thick and thin, through good times, bad times, hard times. I can’t emphasize enough the fact of how much he put into everything he did at the firehouse; how much he cared about the community, the guys at the firehouse.”

Don Jr., speaking to the large crowd at the service that mid-December morning, remembered his father as one who was “so inspiring. He never had a bad thing to say about anyone. He never had a bad day, and he worked in customer service (at the former Schnadig Corporation).”

Directing his remarks to the rows of Montoursville firefighters in front of him, all wearing their dark blue uniforms, Don Jr. said “My dad loved you all, and you know it.”

Don and Faye’s association with the Church of Our Savior started many years ago when the couple attended the church’s monthly Thursday luncheons. “They were regular attendees. If we needed more tables or chairs set up, Don jumped right in,” luncheon organizer Mary Ann Peck, a 57-year church member, said.

“Don did a lot of volunteer work at the historical society next door. If Don saw someone working inside our church, he would just walk in and help any way he could, be it moving furniture or lifting anything that might be too heavy for others,” Mrs. Peck said last week in an interview at her Montoursville home.

Up until the pandemic, Church of Our Savior, held weekly soup luncheons during Lent. Again, Don and Faye were on the frontlines there. Faye and a team of supporters waited on tables while Don cleared tables and washed dishes in the kitchen.

“Don took soup to a number of shut-ins as well,” Mrs. Peck said. “He was always mindful of others,” she added.

“Don was never still. He was always on the move,” her husband, Joe, said.

Mrs. Peck said the church had hoped to resume the luncheons during Lent this year, but that was not possible because without the invaluable help of Don and Faye, the church just could not get enough volunteers to hold them.

“Faye always was able to bring at least two, three or four other volunteers with her,” Mrs. Peck said.

Several blocks east at the Montoursville Presbyterian Church on Elm Street, Faye Konkle and her close friend and fellow church member, Judy Shimp, were the driving force behind a free monthly retirees community luncheon that was offered on Fridays between September and May for nearly 10 years beginning around 2008.

The luncheons – offering great food and fellowship – were very successful, drawing crowds of 100 or more most months.

“If it wasn’t for Faye and Judy, we would never have been able to hold those lunches,” Schild, who helped in the fellowship hall where the meal was served, said last week. Judy Shimp died six weeks before Faye.

When the luncheons were in full gear, the two women were backed by a faithful team of church volunteers who served the food and beverages month after month.

Don Konkle, of course, was right there, making sure each luncheon went off smoothly for Faye and Judy. Every month there was a handful of shut-ins unable to get to the event. No problem. About 30 minutes before the meal was served, Don rounded up another volunteer, grabbed as many takeouts that were needed and delivered them, hurrying back to the church to help serve the lunch.

So there it is; a very small snapshot of the Konkles’ life of service.

In recent years, Don started calling me “Reporter” whenever he saw me or when we talked on the telephone. Perhaps it’s fitting that I close this personal column with a memory that I have of my dear friend while I was covering a story. It was in the middle of a sunny afternoon on April 30, 2018 when a pickup truck loaded with hay bales, pulling a trailer also loaded with hay bales, burst into flames in the eastbound lanes of Interstate 180, just outside Montoursville. The truck driver safely pulled to the side of the road as billowing smoke covered the highway. No one was hurt. Montoursville firefighters raced to the scene and started an all-out-effort to douse the fire, which had ignited some brush in the median that divided the four-lane highway. This reporter also was there, taking pictures. There in the smoke, I spotted “Senior” in full turnout gear, directing water on the burning grass. That was Don, on the front lines, trying to stop a fire from spreading; not bad for an 80-year-old man.

Thank you Don and Faye. Your lives were quiet examples of service. You made a difference.

Philip A. Holmes is the police and fire reporter for the Williamsport Sun-Gazette and has covered that beat for more than 35 years.