AMHERST — A world traveler who divides her time between homes in North Amherst and France, Barbara Puffer Garnier appreciates the formative role the North Amherst Library played in her childhood.
“My life started right here,” Garnier said during a ceremonial groundbreaking Wednesday morning for a construction project, beginning this summer, that will enlarge the 1,080-square-foot, 1893 building at 8 Montague Road.
The addition, to be built off the back of the building at a cost of $1.7 million, will feature a wheelchair lift, accessible public bathrooms and a meeting room to accommodate 40 to 45 people.
Garnier said her experience was not unlike that of other children from the neighborhood who attended the North Amherst School and found their love for books and literature by crossing the street to the tiny library.
“For kids who didn’t read so much, they got into reading at this library,” Garnier said.
“Bless this project with success and all who will be able to use it as children,” Garnier added.
On a sunny, warm morning, the event marked the start of the project, paid for entirely by an anonymous donor, and brought out numerous residents, as well as members of the Town Council and representatives from the Jones Library.
Town Manager Paul Bockelman began the proceedings by observing that the last projects involving new municipal construction were the police station in 1990 and the Jones Library expansion in the early 1990s.
“We haven’t done this for a few decades, which is build a new building,” Bockelman said, quickly noting that the town hopes to also undertake an expansion of the Jones Library and build a new elementary school, Department of Public Works headquarters and fire station.
Bockelman said the designs by Kuhn Riddle Architects, unanimously approved by the Town Council, will be turned into reality by Wright Builders. “This will be an iconic new addition to a building that fits in perfectly,” Bockelman said.
Among those attending the festive occasion were lifelong North Amherst resident Peter Kaslauskas, 99, and Garnier’s aunt Louise Puffer Pickering, 93, who back in the day would keep the doors open when the librarians, including Clara Billings, who retired at the end of 1966, and her successor, Shirley Anderson, who retired in summer 1988, left work early.
Though the person who has provided the money remains publicly unknown, the project wouldn’t have happened without that donor’s contribution.
“We truly want to thank the anonymous donor,” said council President Lynn Griesemer. “This is not just a gift to the town, it’s a gift for future generations of the town”
Griesemer, on a 13-member Town Council with 11 other women and one man, said she also wanted to recognize the three women who got the project started by advocating for improvements at Town Meeting.
Those she mentioned were Hilda Greenbaum and Merrylees “Molly” Turner, who were both present at the groundbreaking, and Pat Holland. Both Turner and Holland served as presidents of the Jones Library trustees, while Greenbaum’s late husband, Louis, was also on that elected board.
During the event, Nancy Jenks Hankinson reflected on her great-grandfather Charles Henry Haskins, who built the library 129 years ago from a jewel box building design from Roswell Field Putnam.
“I am thrilled that over 100 years later we’re finally getting something that is the same design as what he created way back when,” Hankinson said.
District 1 Councilor Cathy Schoen said she understands the value of the library to her constituents, noting her own two children used the library, as did her mother when she came to Amherst. “So we had a connection with the library that was phenomenal over time,” Schoen said.
Also speaking at the event was Cinda Jones, president of W.D. Cowls, who will be offering space for the library to operate from during the construction, and representatives of District One Neighborhood Association, which supported the project.
The deficiencies in the historic building have included the lone bathroom being in the basement at the bottom of a steep staircase, generally only for use by staff, with the public going to a former service station nearby or other shops.
North Amherst resident Jessica Mix-Barrington, though, recalled a time when her own daughter got stuck in that basement bathroom, which remains an amusing anecdote for her family and one that didn’t spoil their enjoyment of the building.
Still, she said, the anonymous donor’s gift is welcome.
“We owe this neighbor a deep debt of gratitude,” Mix-Barrington said.
Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.
