NEWPORT -- Gentle, loving, kind. And "someone with the sweetest smile."

That's how the late Perley Goodrich Sr. was remembered at a memorial service Thursday afternoon.

More than 50 family members and friends gathered at the Crosby and Neal Funeral Home to commemorate the life of Goodrich, 76, who police say was murdered the night of Oct. 26 at his home on Rutland Road.

Police say his son, Perley Goodrich Jr., killed him by shooting him in the back, and that he also severely beat his mother, Sandra. Goodrich Jr. has been charged with murder and is being held without bail.

Citing discussions with authorities, close family friend Maggie Kennedy said Thursday that guns missing from the Goodrich residence after Goodrich Jr. fled the scene had been recovered by police.

In addition, Kennedy disclosed that, on Thursday, Goodrich Jr. had left jail with authorities so he could show them where he had hidden the murder weapon.

Stephen McCausland, spokesman for the Department of Public Safety, said he could not confirm those reports.

Those who gathered at the funeral home remembered Goodrich Sr. as a devoted Christian man -- "our dear brother Perley" -- who loved the outdoors, fish fries, hunting, his family, his close friends and, most of all, God. He was a longtime member of the United Church of Christ in Newport.

"We believe he's safe in paradise," said Andy Owens of the Newport church. "Perley has believed.... Perley was faithful until the end."

Owens, who is from Alabama, said that when he first came to Newport, he recalls loving to listen to Goodrich preach at church.

Goodrich "had that beautiful, old-style Maine accent," Owens recalled.

Thursday's service included songs of worship and poems about Goodrich written by sister Mary L. Patterson and read by Owens.

Goodrich "treated us all like family," Patterson wrote. "He had so many good qualities. He gave of himself from the heart. You knew he cared right from the start."

There was also a remembrance from his "dearest friend," Terry Kennedy, who couldn't be there in person; it was read by Troy Adams of the Ellsworth Church of Christ.

Kennedy's remembrance recalled good times shared by the four close friends -- Perley and Sandra Goodrich and Terry and Maggie Kennedy -- and their trips across country and through Maine's north woods.

Around Thanksgiving 2002, Terry Kennedy recalled, the four visited friends in Texarkana, Texas, and continued onto the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., driving in an old Dodge van. It was the Perley's job to shut the sliding door hard as they got out and Sandra decided to leave her purse behind.

On their way to a country-music program, they met two "bums" who "smelled of liquor" and asked Perley Goodrich Sr. for a few dollars.

He declined. After coming back out to the van, they saw the van door wide open with clothes strewn everywhere and Sandra's purse on the door stoop, wide open, with a $10 bill sticking up.

"'Perley forgot to slide the door shut!'" Maggie Kennedy exclaimed.

Actually, they had been living out of the van for nine days, so they realized that's why the clothes were everywhere.

"The two bums had watched it the whole time but did not dare to touch it; they probably thought it was a setup," Maggie Kennedy recalled. "We have laughed many times over that."

Perley Goodrich Sr. also suffered the last several years, but he persevered, Maggie Kennedy said after the service. He had a bladder removed to stop the spread of cancer and also had heart ailments.

Terry Kennedy's remembrance recalled that, "four weeks ago we went to Sangerville on a hiking trail and Perley pushed his oxygen tank ahead of him and made his way downhill to the river, where he found a place to sit and he watched the sun go down and the moon come up."

"We thought we would have to carry him out to the van, but he insisted he could make it."

Following the service there was a gathering at the Palmyra Town Office.

A candlelight vigil is scheduled at 4 p.m. Sunday at the Newport waterfront on Sebasticook Lake.

Scott Monroe -- 861-9253

smonroe@centralmaine.com