Bone marrow drive to benefit two area residents

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People in our circulation area have the opportunity to help two local people and possibly others throughout the country by participating in one of two bone marrow drives this week.

The first drive is 3 to 6:30 p.m. Friday, Nov. 2, at Hermon High School.

This drive is needed to locate a donor match for Darlene Bell of Hermon.

The second drive, back by popular demand, is 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 4, at the Oakfield Community Center off Interstate 95.

This drive could benefit 24-year-old Brooks Skinner of Merrill, who needs a bone marrow transplant for a rare blood disease.

Maine Leukemia Foundation volunteer Chairman Paul Greenier of Monmouth is coordinating both drives.

Following his daughter’s diagnosis of leukemia in 1994, Greenier formed the nonprofit MLF and became the state recruiter for the National Marrow Donor Program.

Since 1994, more than 11,000 people have been screened in Maine, he said.

“We have drives from Caribou to Kittery,” Greenier said.

“With our current funding, we are able to do the drives for a $25 donation,” he explained, “but those funds are expected to run out in December and, after that, we go back up into the $70 range, so this is a very good time for people to be tested.”

Potential donors must be between the ages of 18 and 60. A medical screening is offered “to ensure the heath of the donor,” Greenier said.

Friday’s drive is being organized by family and friends of Bell, a 39-year-old mother of four who lives with her husband, Jim, and family in Hermon.

According to Bell’s sister, Lori Thayer, the bone marrow drive is needed because Bell has been found to have “a very rare tissue to match and no match is available nationally at this time.”

When he was 16, Skinner was diagnosed with paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria, or PNH, a disease of the bone marrow that causes rapid and excessive destruction of red blood cells.

A first drive for Skinner, the week following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, drew 350 people.

“We were expecting only 200 people and we didn’t have enough collection supplies, so we promised to return,” Greenier explained.

Skinner’s chances for survival, according to his mother-in-law and Oakfield Town Manager Candy Roy, depend on finding a bone marrow or stem cell match.

“It’s his only hope,” she said of this very rare disease that attacks all his vital organs and causes blood clotting.

Greenier is always available to arrange bone marrow drives for those in need. All it takes is a phone call or letter.

You can call him at 933-2116 or write the Maine Leukemia Foundation, P.O. Box 56, No. Monmouth 04265.

The public is invited to attend a bluegrass concert at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 3, at Hauck Auditorium on the University of Maine campus in Orono.

Tickets are $10 for adults and $8 for students.

The concert is sponsored by the Maine Center for Integrated Rehab and all proceeds benefit the Brain Injury Association of Maine.

Performing groups are Evergreen, the Katahdin Valley Boys, Chairback Gap, Sweetgrass and Spam and Sugar.

The annual fall festival of Redeemer Lutheran Church begins with beverage and muffins served from 8 to 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 3, at the church, 540 Essex St. in Bangor.

After that snack, you can enjoy some shopping before taking a lunch break with homemade soup and bread from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

The festival offers baked good booths, a country store with flowers, plants, preserves and candies, a craft booth and a white elephant booth.

A handcrafted child’s desk will be raffled and half of all proceeds will benefit local nonprofit organizations.

William Grosser of Liberty, writing on behalf of the Waldo County Masons, thanks all who helped with that organization’s recent benefit supper for Waldo County Hospice Volunteers.

The honored individuals “are very special and have probably touched many of us throughout the years, either through family, friends or neighbors,” Grosser wrote.

He extends his thanks, as well, to Sgt. Bruce Blood and those assigned to the Maine National Guard Armory in Belfast for their help.

With the Masons preparing the meal, the Order of the Eastern Star and Hospice volunteers serving it, and representatives of the Waldo County Sheriff’s Department parking vehicles and providing security, “it was truly a team effort and all should be commended,” Grosser wrote.

He extends special thanks to Marge Butler “for her donation of the framed picture of Belfast,” which was raffled to benefit Waldo County Hospice.

Cynthia Carter wrote me that the Charlotte Volunteer Fire Department Auxiliary’s craft fair, set for 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 3, at the Charlotte Elementary School gym on Route 214, “is the Fire Department’s biggest fund-raiser.”

Lunches and a bake sale will be provided throughout the day, and you can purchase items such as quilts, mittens, teddy bears, dolls, dried flowers, crafts and ornaments.

You can also participate in raffles and the local historical society will be selling copies of the town history and photographs from area towns.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402;

990-8288.