PITTSFIELD – Blake Bartlett and his wife, Sonia Call Bartlett, are closing the doors on a landmark Pittsfield business this winter. E.D. Call & Son Memorials has been cutting and carving granite monuments for four generations. For 141 years, the family business also has maintained Pittsfield’s cemeteries.

“The first contract was signed in 1922,” Bartlett said Monday. “It will be the end of 80 years of business.”

From hand-drawn and hand-chiseled writing and images, the monument business has evolved over the decades into a state-of-the-art process. Bartlett was the first person in Maine, he said, to put a nontraditional image on a gravestone. In 1973 he drew and chiseled a woods scene complete with a 12-point buck.

“It was for a man who was probably the most well-known poacher in the area,” Bartlett said with a laugh. Since then, most monument companies offer the individualized, custom facades. “But I was the first,” said Bartlett.

The business was founded in 1922 by Everett D. Call, Sonja Bartlett’s grandfather, and continued when her father, Aubrey, took over in 1941. At one time, the family also operated a funeral parlor in the former Inman home on Library Street.

Bartlett purchased the business from his father-in-law in 1971. At that time, Bartlett taught English and history at Maine Central Institute, ran the business and continued as town sexton. “It got to be too much,” he said, and in 1986, Bartlett gave up teaching.

With three grown children all having their own careers, Bartlett said the decision was made not to pass the family business on, but rather to end it.

He said he is selling the stock and equipment but not the business, which is located across the street from his home and next door to the Pittsfield Municipal Cemetery.

Gazing over at the 8,000 burial plots, Bartlett said at least 90 percent are graced with Call monuments, including a stone already carved for Bartlett and his wife. “We’ve enjoyed dealing with people in a time of unique and particular need,” he said.

But the aspect of Bartlett’s business that residents might not be as familiar with is his lifelong dedication to community service. Mayor Gary Jordan said Monday, “He is a prime example of the people who stay behind the scenes and quietly serve the town.”

From one end of Pittsfield to the other, Blake Bartlett has left his mark – from a granite bench in Manson Park dedicated to a devoted coach and firefighter, to a plaque beneath a newly planted hawthorn tree at Maine Central Institute honoring the victims of Sept. 11, to the benches and stones that are the veterans memorial on Pittsfield’s Main Street.

Bartlett has operated his business with community service and pride at its center. Many of the items in Pittsfield’s parks have been carved or donated by Bartlett. Most of them have been maintained by him for years.

Dwight Dogherty, who before this year served as Pittsfield’s town manager for 13 years, said, “Blake has always been a good citizen of the town. He has spent hours volunteering his services and has always been a resource.”

Bartlett has been a member of the Pittsfield Kiwanis, Boy Scouts, a member of the Sebasticook Valley Hospital board of trustees, an MCI trustee and a member of the SAD 53 board. Sonja Bartlett has been active in the Girl Scouts, Athenaeum Club, Arts Club and the SVH Auxiliary.

One of his final projects will be a memorial to members of the Pittsfield Garden Club, planned for installation in Mill Pond park.

“Sonja and I decided a long time ago that it was important for us to be givers, not takers,” said Bartlett. With typical modesty, Bartlett expressed his thanks to the community “for supporting us and our family before us.”