Patriots give $1,500 to Allagash library

ALLAGASH – The public library once again has acquired funds to assist in the continuation of Faye Hafford’s dream to provide services for the town’s 250 year-round residents and tourists.

Hafford’s name was placed into the competition for the New England Patriots Community MVP Award. She was selected as a finalist, and the Kraft family and the Patriots charitable foundation donated $1,500 to the library in Hafford’s name.

Hafford, 81, did not know about the nomination provided to the Patriots organization by Louis Pelletier III until she received a letter from Rena Clark, vice president of community affairs and corporate philanthropy.

The award was one of 20 made by the Kraft family and the Patriots, and the only one in Maine this year.

Along with the $1,500 donation to the library, Hafford received a wooden football trophy from the Patriots organization.

“We’ve done well with the library in the last year,” she said Monday. “This money will be used to give the library a face-lift.

“We needed new paint, shelving and other things we could not afford to do,” she said. “This will certainly help.

“I am happy with the donation, and I am pretty proud of my little football,” she said.”

Last year the library nearly had to close its doors because Hafford and her volunteers could not afford to heat the facility, which needed a new furnace.

Since then, the Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation brought Christmas a bit early to Allagash and Hafford with a $25,000 grant for the furnace and some heating oil.

The King Foundation heard of the plight of the small two-room library that was opened in the former Allagash Consolidated School seven years ago by Hafford and some helpers.

It wasn’t the first time the King Foundation assisted the small library. The foundation came to Hafford’s assistance seven years ago, along with credit card giant MBNA and others, when she opened the library.

Hafford also received more than $4,000 in other donations after the library’s plight was made public. Donations have come in from all over the country. She also received signed copies of books for the library.

The two-room library was started by Hafford and friends with books leftover after the closing of the Allagash Consolidated School seven years ago. The small library, started with children’s books, now has grown to thousands of books, audio books, CDs, DVDs and computers.

Hafford has even brought in comfortable living room chairs and couches people have donated to make the 24-by-22-foot room and a small computer room more comfortable for users of the facility.

The library serves the small northern Maine town of less than 275 people. Hafford said there were only about 30 schoolchildren left in town, but older people like to read as well.

The library is open Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sunday afternoons.

People in the town don’t just use the library. They also use the former school gym for weddings, funerals and all kinds of gatherings in the small community at the intersection of the Allagash and St. John rivers.

Hafford said on Monday she is working on a new book – she already has written 14 – titled “You Can Come Home Again.”

She hopes to have pieces of it written by former residents who wish to return to their hometown, and by Madawaska residents, many of whom have built cabins or year-round homes in northern Maine’s most northwesterly organized town.

She hopes to have the book ready in the fall in time for Christmas sales.