NORTHAMPTON — Janet Moulding, director of the Forbes Library for the past 12 years, announced Wednesday that she plans to retire at year’s end.
Moulding took over as director in 2004 and has helped shepherd the library through a period of significant structural improvements and interior renovations, with the aim of making it accessible to everyone, according to trustees. She previously served as the library’s assistant director for four years.
“You only have to visit the library to appreciate her legacy,” Russell Carrier, trustees chairman, said in a statement. “Janet will be missed by all who have worked with her. The Trustees feel a deep loss, but wish her a long and healthy retirement.”
Carrier said Moulding has given Forbes Library “a decade of dynamic and forward looking leadership” and provided trustees with “strong direction and wise counsel.”
Moulding, 68, said she had been thinking about retiring for a while and plans to pursue other endeavors, such as taking in more theater, riding her horse, reading more books and volunteering at Forbes.
“There’s a lot of other things to do,” Moulding said Wednesday.
She said her decision has nothing to do with the current legal wrangling between Northampton Mayor David J. Narkewicz and library trustees over financial and governance issues at Forbes, which are the subject of a case pending in Hampshire Probate and Family Court.
“I absolutely love the staff, I love Forbes, the trustees are great and the patrons are fabulous,” Moulding said.
Asked what she will miss the most when she departs, Moulding said, “It’s the building and staff that make this place so special, it’s just this sense of place. It thrills me every time I walk in here. I say ‘Wow, I get to spend time in this place?’”
Trustees have established a search committee to find a replacement, with trustee Marjorie Hess serving as its chairwoman. Others on the search committee are Carrier, staff members Molly Moss and Dylan Gaffney, and Friends of Forbes Library members Martha McCormick and Serena Smith.
“We’ll miss her,” Hess said of Moulding. “She provides such excellent leadership. She cares about the patrons, she cares about the staff, she cares about the building, she cares about the collections.”
During Moulding’s tenure, the library underwent an extensive multi-year masonry repointing project that cost more than $1 million and saw renovations to its Anna Gertrude Brewster Children’s and Doland Reference rooms. More recently, the library’s often out-of-service handicap lift was replaced with a Victorianesque-style elevator, a $400,000-plus project completed late last year.
“I’ve enjoyed working with Janet and her team at the library,” Narkewicz said. “She obviously has been a strong advocate at the library. In the 10 years I’ve been in city government, I’ve known and appreciated her work as director.”
Moulding’s first professional position in library services was as director of Gaylord Library in South Hadley, and she was named the first library director of the Renaissance Center at the University of Massachusetts. She holds master’s degrees in library science from the State University of New York at Albany and in early modern English literature from UMass, as well as a bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University.
Moulding is also a member of the American Library Association, the Massachusetts Library Association, the New England Library Association and the Western Mass Library Advocates.
Dan Crowley can be reached at dcrowley@gazettenet.com.