Normally, Kids Day is North Attleboro's most festive weekend of the year.

Not this year. One man was missing, one special man.

For a long time now, police Capt. Daniel Coyle had worked the Kids Day traffic detail on Elm Street near the main entrance to Mason Field, where thousands of visitors streamed in for the four-day festival put on by the town's firefighters.

But this was much more than a traffic detail, much more than a routine safety precaution to enable visitors to cross a busy street.

This was where Danny Coyle was at his best. This was where he shined. Most cops might stop traffic and direct pedestrians with no more than a mere nod or a quick, "Have a good day."

But Danny, dressed in his handsome blue uniform with gold braid, would go out of his way to greet every festival-goer. He'd slap fives with the little kids. He'd ask the teens how school was going, making sure they were maintaining good grades. He'd chat with the moms and dads, asking about work and relatives.

He knew most of them by name, having lived in North Attleboro all his life. He loved his hometown and the people in it.

His annual routine was a wonderful expression of how the police department - the entire town, really - cared about its citizens.

That's why Coyle's death last Thursday at age 51 put a damper on Kids Day and cast a pall over the entire town. The tragic news was all anyone in North Attleboro could talk about.

We are often too shy, too forgetful or too busy to thank the special people in our lives for their contributions. But my guess is that, after hearing of his death at such an early age, nearly everyone in North Attleboro - especially kids and young adults - wished they had thanked Danny Coyle for caring so much about them and their town.

They would say thanks for starting the town's DARE program and making it, well, special. Danny believed strongly that he could make his town better by teaching kids right from wrong and by keeping them from abusing drugs and alcohol and, most of all, by making them feel good about themselves.

Danny's DARE program was much more than anti-drug slogans. It was a chance for kids to build a foundation for their adult lives by instilling faith in themselves and teaching them to make good decisions.

Back in the mid-1990s, Danny launched a week-long DARE camp that my sons, now in their early 20s, still remember fondly. I don't recall them returning from any event as happy and as self-confident after a week under Danny Coyle's care.

Like the rest of the town, my sons were shaken by Danny's death. They talked about how Danny still remembered them 15 years after they attended camp, despite their changed appearances. Danny not only remembered them but was sincerely interested in what they were doing now. That's fantastic, Danny would say after the update. It was another expression of how the police department - the entire town, really - cared about them.

The people of North Attleboro would want to thank Danny Coyle for so many other things.

Thanks for making us proud to be citizens of North Attleboro, and of America, by carrying the Olympic torch down Route 1, right past the mall, back in 1996.

Thanks for your professionalism, class and outstanding service in your 28 years on the police department, rising to No. 2 on the force.

Danny Coyle did not have the wit or the swagger of his father, John Coyle Jr., the former police chief. But Danny had a quiet charm, a soft-spoken sincerity that made him instantly likeable. It's tough to be a cop in a relatively small town for nearly three decades without making enemies, but I doubt Danny Coyle had any.

Most of all, thanks, Danny, thanks for sharing that charm with us for too short a time, for making everyone you touched feel special.

Rest in peace.

MIKE KIRBY is editor of The Sun Chronicle. He can be reached at 508-236-0344 or at mkirby@thesunchronicle.com.