News Release
Immediate release
Contact:
Anne Davis
152 Water St
Gardiner, ME 04345
582-3312
October 18, 2010
Gardiner, ME: Anne Davis, Director of Library and Information Services for the City of Gardiner, ecstatically announced that the Gardiner Library Association is the recipient of a $25,000 bequest from a longtime supporter of the library.
Isabel Harriman died last July at the age of 88-years-old. Ms. Harriman was a 1939 graduate of Gardiner High School, a 1943 graduate of Colby College and she received a master‘s degree in Education Program from Columbia University in 1953. She spent 40 years teaching in both Maine and Beverly, MA. Her appetite for reading made her an avid supporter of the Gardiner Public Library whose mission is to provide information, self-education and recreation for the enlightenment, entertainment, intellectual and cultural development of the Greater Gardiner community.
“I met Isabel after her retirement and when I first began working at the library”, reports Davis. “Her ability to read a dozen books or more over the course of 2 weeks always astounded me. She read books from all genres and subjects. She was always learning! She is a great role model for us all as she was a true lifelong learner and she absolutely understood the need for a strong public library that is free to everyone.”
The Gardiner Library Association is a non-profit 501 (c3) organization that is responsible for the care and maintenance of the library building and grounds. In a unique cooperation agreement, the Association maintains the facility and purchases about 1/3 of the library items while the City of Gardiner allocates the operating budget for the daily running of the municipal library. The towns of Litchfield, Pittston, Randolph and West Gardiner are partner towns in the library and pay a yearly fee so that all their residents can have unimpeded access to this regional library.
The Gardiner Library Association is in the Phase 3 project stage of renovating the interior space. The Children’s Room project was completed in 2008 and the main floor renovations finished in 2010. Phase 3 plans are to rehabilitate the Community Archives Room that houses the local and regional histories of the lower Kennebec Valley. The bequest will be used to defray the costs of these renovations. The library will also set up an endowed book fund to honor Ms. Harriman. For more information about the library, please call Anne Davis at 207-582-3312.
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