As a reporter in Augusta, Maine, for United Press International when nearly all her colleagues were men, Evelyn Keene was often called in the middle of the night to report on fires, robberies, and even murders.
“Her years of training as a reporter made her totally unafraid of rejection because she was used to asking difficult questions at difficult times to people who didn’t want to speak to her,” said her son, Michael of Wellesley. “She got the stories for years.”
Moving to Greater Boston, she turned her attention to the suburbs as a Globe correspondent for nearly a decade, covering news in Newton, Waltham, Watertown, and Wellesley.
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Mrs. Keene, who also helped run her husband’s promotions company and wrote for the Boston Jewish Times, died of a stroke Nov. 6 in her Chicago home, to which she moved last year. She was 92 and had lived in Newton and Brookline.
She began covering the western suburbs during the late 1960s, and in 1973 wrote about the Metropolitan District Commission’s efforts to revive the Charles River and expand a canoeing program. “Maybe you can’t drink the water of the Charles River or even swim in it — but you can go near it in a canoe,” she observed.
The next year, the Charles River Recreation Council, a citizens group, honored her for “reporting the environmental concerns all of us share in rehabilitating the Charles River.”
The family took boat trips in their 31-foot cabin cruiser through Boston Harbor to Cape Cod, and she wrote about a five-day round-trip voyage from Braintree to Hyannis. At one point, she wrote in the ship’s log “with trembling hands: ‘Since when do they call this fun? I’m so afraid, afraid of the unknown, of not being able to see where we are going.’ ”
Traveling with her husband and son, she wrote, “there also was the pleasure of the wind warm in our faces, salt spray like a touch of cooling perfume, and seas so smooth we were at peace with the world.”
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Evelyn Brown was born in Chelsea and grew up in Roxbury, the only daughter among five children. She was 11 when her father died of pneumonia.
She graduated high school at age 15. Three brothers joined the family furniture business, but she dreamed of being a European correspondent.
For two years, Mrs. Keene attended Boston Clerical School to learn stenography. She also held several jobs, including for the Army Quartermaster Corps during World War II and at A.E. Halperin Co. She saved enough money to attend Boston University, where she majored in journalism and graduated in three years. In 1947, she began working as a reporter for UPI.
A friend introduced her to Alfred Keene, who owned Keene Promotions. Marrying in 1953, they moved to Newton and lived there until he died in 1982. When her husband was diagnosed with polio in 1955, Mrs. Keene helped him manage the business, which produces promotional products. The couple helped establish Temple Beth Elohim in Wellesley and held season tickets to the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Mrs. Keene wrote about her experiences as a reporter for the newsletter of her senior community in Brookline.
“I don’t believe that any reporter, or journalist, can honestly say he or she is objective. Not when it hits you straight in the eye, where it hurts the most,” she wrote in 2010, detailing the feelings she experienced reporting about the murder of a woman who was the daughter of a couple she knew.
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During the 1970s, while her husband was sick, she worked for the dress department at Saks Fifth Avenue in Boston.
Meanwhile, she continued to pursue writing by contributing to publications such as the Boston Jewish Times.
A few years after her husband died, Mrs. Keene moved to Center Communities of Brookline, where she lived for about 25 years until moving to Chicago. She assisted her son, who is now president and chief executive of Keene Promotions, until she lost her sight in 2004.
A memorial service has been held for Mrs. Keene, who in addition to her son leaves two daughters, Judith Keene Greenspan of Shaker Heights, Ohio, and Leila of Chicago; and five grandchildren.
Late in life, Mrs. Keene reminisced about her early reporting days, which included drinking in bars with male reporters.
“If you didn’t go with them, you weren’t going to get the scoop, so she would frequently have to be in these situations where it probably was extremely uncommon for women,” said her grandson, Aaron Greenspan, who lived with her in Brookline for almost a year.
“She definitely never backed away from a challenge on account of her gender or account of anything, really,” he added. “She knew what she wanted.”