Two Maine humorists sat on a porch, talking about a show they just gave at the library on Chebeague Island.

Gary Crocker was asking his friend Robert Skoglund – known to Mainers as “The humble Farmer” – about the rather mild laughter that Skoglund’s stories seemed to elicit. He didn’t get one raucous belly laugh the whole night.

“He thought that was great. He didn’t want those kind of laughs. He said the difference between a comedian and a humorist is that a comedian makes you laugh, and it’s over,” said Crocker, 76, remembering that show some years ago. “But a humorist makes you laugh and makes you think about what he said and maybe even change some things you’re doing in your life. He said, ‘Believe me, those people are probably laughing right now, thinking about what I said.’ ”

Skoglund died Saturday at the age of 88 at his home in St. George, after nearly 50 years of entertaining people around the state with his understated Maine musings and humor. He was best known for his music and storytelling radio show “The humble Farmer,” which ran on Maine Public radio for 29 years, until 2007. He wrote a weekly column for many newspapers, including for the Portland Press Herald over the last decade. He also made local access TV shows and podcasts, published two books and performed all around Maine and the country.

On Monday, he was still making people chuckle because of an obituary video that he made about a month ago and that Crocker posted online after Skoglund’s death. Skoglund had called Crocker on the phone and said, “I want you to film my demise,” then explained he didn’t actually want his death filmed; he just wanted to be filmed talking about it.

The minute-and-a-half video begins with Skoglund sitting in a chair, a breathing tube across his face, speaking into the camera: “Hi there, I’m Robert Skoglund, the humble Farmer, and I just died.” He then puts a makeshift kerchief on his head, picks up a phone and uses a high-pitched voice to talk to someone on the other end of the line, in his strong Maine accent.

“Hi there, Sophie, did you hear that the humble Farmer just died? It’s just as well. Anyone who looked like he did weren’t hardly fit to be seen out on the street,” Skoglund said. “No cremation. I heard they’re gonna smoke him. Yeah, he always was a ham. No, no, t’weren’t cancer that killed him, t’was public opinion.”

Fans and friends praised Skoglund on Monday as an authentic example of Maine wit and wisdom, in all its understated and self-mocking glory. He was born and raised in St. George, a fishing and farming town on a peninsula south of Thomaston, had a master’s degree in linguistics from the University of Rochester in New York, and started telling and writing stories for public consumption in the 1970s.

He was teaching school in Maine when he started doing his weekly show, “The humble Farmer,” on Maine Public Radio in 1978. Skoglund said he didn’t want the “h” in humble capitalized when referring to him or his radio show, because it was “more humble” without it.

The popular radio show combined Skoglund’s passion for jazz from the 1920s, ’30s and ’40s with his stories, thoughts and commentary. It was his blending of wit and politics that eventually got his show canceled by Maine Public Radio managers, who said he was violating the network’s standards for political neutrality.

Skoglund’s conflict with management began in 2003, during the Iraq War and the presidency of George W. Bush. Not referring to Bush by name, Skoglund talked on air about “flag-wavin’ folks” showing their support for a “weasely faced war monger from way down South who didn’t even get most of the popular vote.” His show was canceled in 2007 after he read a letter on air critical of a government spending cap in Maryland similar to one being voted on in Maine.

“I will always remember how he took a stand then, and I admired him for that,” said John Brooking, 58, a longtime fan from Westbrook. “And I’ll always remember how welcoming he was to people.”

Brooking, along with his wife and two young children, were among the many fans of Skoglund’s radio show who took him up on his offer to come by anytime for a spaghetti supper. Though he was in demand as a speaker and entertainer around the country, he seemed to always find time to squeeze in more time with Mainers.

John Harris, a longtime volunteer at the Owls Head Transportation Museum, remembers seeing Skoglund at an antique car event in Rockland and asking him, spur of the moment, if he’d speak at the event’s banquet that evening. He told Harris he had done a recent engagement for $1,800, but Harris said he couldn’t give him more that $50. Skoglund replied, “I’ll be there.”

Skoglund’s radio shows and his columns were largely about people and everyday life. He referred often to his wife as “Marsha, the almost perfect woman,” in a way that was endearing but also relatable. Who among us is perfect?

He wrote his last column for the Press Herald in June, and it was about Marsha and other strong women, mostly.

Skoglund’s Maine sensibility came through to both native Mainers and people who came to adopt the state as their own, said Nick Mills, a longtime radio journalist who worked in Boston and New York but who grew up in Thomaston.

While some performers from away have become famous for doing Maine humor – notably Marshall Dodge and Bob Bryan with their “Bert and I” recordings in the late 1950s and early 1960s – Skoglund was the genuine article.

“He had that dry Maine wit and gentle sense of humor; he embodied it,” said Mills, 82, of Rockland. “He made people smile and chuckle, he didn’t get side-splitting laughs. But he was so much fun to listen to.”