Mark D. Warner

CAPE ELIZABETH - Mark Warner, 74, beloved husband and father passed away peacefully on September 28th, 2025, at his home in Cape Elizabeth. He was born on October 5th, 1950, in Dover, Delaware to the late Mary Ellen (Brinkman) and Robert Warner.

Mark's active early life saw his family enjoying adventures in Rye, New York and Walpole, Massachusetts before eventually settling in the beautiful and idyllic village of Saxtons River, VT. Mark and his beloved sister and life-long friend, Mary Ellen "Snooksie" enjoyed growing up in Vermont immensely. Mark's many stories of that part of his life include a varied cast of dear local friends as well as their bulldog, Clarence.

For the first ten years of Mark's life the family spent summers on Little Diamond Island, just off the coast from Portland, Maine - creating memories, connections and especially friendships that would inform and greatly influence his life in the years ahead.

Mark proudly attended a local private boarding school, Vermont Academy as a "townie", graduating in 1969. During his time at V.A. he was part of the ski team and was often found on the weekends with friends trying stunts and tricks on the school's ski jump, of which his mom was not as overly enthusiastic. An early and lifelong passion, his parents encouraged his love for skiing by sending him on a school trip to Chamonix, France, where skiing was just one of the many mountainous pursuits he enjoyed - returning home with many stories he either couldn't quite remember or had to heavily edit.

Mark attended Castleton College (VT) and then joined the Coast Guard. First stationed in Woods Hole, MA and then Portland, ME, Mark served on buoy tenders and infamously on ships that served as radio signal providers for trans-Atlantic aircraft off the coast of Greenland. During these perilous trips, the waves were often unrelenting and in excess of 30ft high and Mark was one of the only sailors still on his feet unaffected, and very likely cracking jokes while helping his ailing mates.

In 1972, Mark became a father, not in the traditional way but by adopting the newborn son of his first wife, Eileen. By 1980, Eileen and Mark had gone their separate ways and Mark was a single father to Seth. A bold, inspiring and perhaps unusual thing for a young man in the early 80s to do, this is just one of the roles where Mark showed his extraordinary capacity for love not just in words, but especially by his actions.

While still in the Coast Guard, with his connections to and fondness for Little Diamond Island, Mark and his young family moved to Portland, Maine, to make a life there. After completing his tenure in the Coast Guard, Mark worked various jobs with the Postal Service and in mortgage lending, until one day walking by a construction zone on Free Street in Portland, he saw that the new civic arena under construction was hiring and the rest, as they say, is history.

Mark worked at The Cumberland County Civic Center for 47 years: from its first event (ZZ Top) in 1977 until January of 2024. Literally thousands upon thousands of events ranging from concerts, hockey, various circuses, boxing, wrestling, broomball, Ice Capades, basketball, monster trucks, punishing runs of Disney on Ice, rodeos, trade shows, home shows and his favorite: boat shows saw him involved in various roles as the building and the industry evolved and changed over the decades. Initially he was involved in the accounting side of things but quickly transitioned to becoming the Box Office Manager. During his many years in this role he saw the dawn of computer-based ticket sales as well as the beginning of the end of actual physical tickets and what he called the curse of dynamic pricing. Well known and loved as a leader and boss, many of his fellow employees were more like family than just friends. His easy way of handling the stress and frequent chaos of a busy box office was noted by many and not often achieved by others. Mark's competence, sense of calm and creative solutions caught the attention of many in the industry so much so that the management for the band Phish invited him to run and staff the ticketing division for their self-produced destination festivals including: The Great Went, Coventry, Big Cypress and Magnaball among others. This also led to Mark being recruited to do the same for the Mountain Jam and Bonnaroo Music Festivals and many other well regarded national and local institutions.

In the early 80's Mark met and married the love of his life, Ronnie and they created and grew a beautiful life together in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. They shared their life with many English Springer-Spaniels, made massive improvements to and expanded their home, owned and rode their Morgan horses Dani and Beau, and explored Casco Bay on their gorgeous Grady White boat. Mark also became a father figure to Ronnie's sons, Mark Beaudion, Bob Beaudion and Tim Beaudion, and he enjoyed being part of their lives as equal parts father, friend and mentor - something of which he was immensely proud.

Mark was a man of varied and impressive talents, many of them self-taught or learned simply by doing. In the early 80's he returned to Little Diamond Island with Seth and traded his burgeoning carpentry skills in exchange for being able to live on the Island for the summers while he found ways to keep some of the more dilapidated cottages standing for another 100+ years.

At his Cape Elizabeth home, he served as the designer, project manager and everything in between as he expanded the comfort and living space both beautifully and exponentially. Thereafter he was continually adding to the beauty and function of their house, hand building arbors, decks, crown moldings - basically, you name it and yes, he did it.

Later in the 90's he started to get the sense that Thomas Mosher furniture "was pretty simple" and began casually proving that to be true for him at least. Several of his family and friends consider themselves extremely fortunate to have a Mark Warner original piece of cherry or oak handcrafted furniture which he built in his basement workshop single handedly.

Mark's love for the water was obvious to all and vital to the flow of his everyday life. Unsurprisingly, he built several beautiful and extremely functional skiffs and lobstered recreationally off of the Cape Elizabeth shore, placing his traps in the often hazardous waters in front of Ram Island Lighthouse. He loved his time with his Grady White boats, owning at first a 17ft and then 19ft Tournament and then enjoying nearly a decade with his 25ft Freedom that could often be seen in the coves of inner Casco Bay with Mark Warner and Mark Beaudion "slaying the stripers".

Always having a close connection with his Canine friends, a summary of Mark's life would be incomplete without an honorable mention of the dogs that loved him so fervently: Clarence, Trukey, Glory, Smokey, Nicky, Grady, Bentley, Morgan, Bailey and Winston.

A devoted and fun "Grampy", Mark shared his love for life, penchant for making the mundane enjoyable, adventurous food choices and laughter with his grandchildren. Jennifer Beaudion, Jessica Beaudion, Jory Reistad, Kayla Warner, Seth D. Warner and Alex Warner all benefited greatly from the time, attention and love they received from Mark, will carry that legacy on with them through the course of their lives, and are much better for it.

Per Mark's wishes, there will be no formal service or celebration. Instead he wanted to first of all thank everyone for all of the good times, and for helping when the times were not so good. He also wanted to encourage everyone to remember to live life to the fullest extent that you can, and not just in "big" ways. Be present for those that you love and like, be honest and align yourself with your priorities while you can. Like many who are taken from us far too soon, Mark had more life in him than time gave him and much more capacity to love. He will be so greatly missed.