BELFAST – With no fanfare and little public notice, Francis Marsano has ended a career that includes decades as a highly visible midcoast lawyer, three terms as a state legislator, and more than eight years as a Superior Court justice.

Or did he?

Earlier this month, Marsano, 65, resigned as a justice, but said he is going to take a couple months off to ponder his future.

And he does not rule out a return to politics.

At the same time, with his trademark boyish grin, Marsano betrays what joys life outside the public arena might hold for him: “The day after my last jury trial, I shot an even par,” said the longtime golfer, a first for a man who has a long list of professional firsts to his credit.

Marsano has always worn his love for Belfast on his sleeve, and the community responded to that affection.

Years ago, a columnist in one of the city’s weekly newspapers observed that, like celebrities Sting and Cher, Marsano had gained “first-name-only” stature in town. In street corner conversation, “I heard that Francis said …” needs no explanation.

Even when he ascended to Superior Court justice, Marsano was still accessible.

It was not uncommon to see him holding “court” in the local Shop ‘n Save, discussing issues of the day with someone in the produce section.

Hearing hours of sometimes gruesome, sometimes sad testimony can take its toll, he said. So Marsano always makes it a practice to attend high school sporting events, which he finds uplifting.

Sentencing a convicted criminal “never gets easier,” he confessed. At times, Marsano would hope that a sentencing would not fall on a Friday or Monday, because when they did, thinking about or rethinking the decision could ruin a weekend. “There are no unimportant matters that came into my hands. If you’ve got life, liberty and property on the line, there are no uninteresting cases, ” he said.

Marsano was born in Maine, and lived in Belfast until he was about 5, when his father had to move to Massachusetts for wartime work. But he carried a flame for Belfast, which he rekindled each summer in visits to his grandfather, a first-generation Italian immigrant who settled in the city.

“My grandfather came here to find a place where there were shoe factories and no Italians,” Marsano said. He wanted to find a harbor town where he could travel by ship to Boston to purchase fresh fruit, which he would sell to factory workers on their breaks.

His grandfather owned a shop on Lower Main Street, and later ran the Colonial Inn hotel in town.

“That’s one of the reasons I wanted to come back here,” Marsano said. “I remembered how free and open” life was in the small, coastal town.

His grandfather wanted Marsano to become a lawyer and would take him along to meet with Lorimer Eaton, a prominent Belfast lawyer at the time.

After college at Bowdoin and a 1961 law degree from the University of Michigan, Marsano practiced briefly in Belfast before he entered the Army.

Returning to Belfast in 1963, he was hired by Eaton and his partner, Dick Glass.

Marsano started defending all kinds of cases, including people who couldn’t afford to pay. And Maine’s legal environment was considerably different: Neither the prosecution nor the defense in that era had to disclose its witness lists before trial; children were preferred by the law over spouses in wills; and adultery and a charge called “lascivious cohabitation” were often brought against men. Some of his clients served nine months in jail for the latter charge, Marsano recalled.

“There was a lot of violent crime,” he said of the early 1960s in Waldo County. He added, “It isn’t as if we’ve improved a whole lot.”

As he became more active in community affairs, Marsano became active in Waldo County’s Republican committee. In 1976, he worked on Gerald Ford’s presidential campaign. It was through that effort that he met John McKernan, who was state chairman of the campaign.

When McKernan was preparing to run for governor, Marsano – who never before considered elective office – decided to run for the Legislature. He was elected to the state House in 1986 and served until 1992, when he stepped down to help with family obligations.

For two of his three terms, he served as the GOP’s assistant leader in the House. “I loved the Legislature.”

During those years, he burned the candle at both ends, traveling to Augusta in the day, then working late in the law office weeknights, and seeing clients at 6:30 a.m. or on Saturdays.

In 1993, he was appointed by then-Gov. McKernan as a justice in the state’s Superior Court. He was reappointed last year, but this summer decided to retire.

Though he plans to spend winters in Florida, he suggested he may try politics again, and that it would involve the city that has been the center of his life. “Belfast has been really good to me,” he said.