People who know and care for Lida Burns of Patten are working hard to help find a bone marrow match for the young woman with acute leukemia.

“She is in remission now,” reports fellow church member Brian McNally of Sherman, “but she needs a bone marrow transplant.”

Unfortunately for the 25-year-old married mother of a 4-year-old daughter, there is no family member who is a match.

McNally said that, as he’s learned more about bone marrow matches, he was very surprised to learn “only 30 percent of individuals in need of one will match up with a relative.”

Which is one of the many reasons bone marrow drives are so necessary, and why people in that area are holding one.

“We will have an initial screening from 2 to 7 p.m. Monday, June 30, at Greater Houlton Christian Academy,” McNally said.

“What’s primarily involved,” he said, “is that individuals wishing to initiate the process will go through a health history and have a pinprick of their finger with five drops of blood taken. If you are a person who can go to the next level, then you will go on from there.”

The cost for bone marrow testing is $65 per person, but paying that fee is not necessary, McNally emphasized.

People don’t have to pay a cent to be tested.

“We’ve been doing various things, like bottle drives, to help defray that cost.”

However, he added, anyone who wants to donate the fee “can do it right there.

“We have had 10 people call saying they will pay the fee, but it’s important for people to know they don’t have to pay it. It’s just important to be willing to be tested.”

The drive, he added, serves more than one purpose.

“It’s to find donors,” he said, “and to raise some money to defray the costs.

“But it also is not limited to this lady, because people may find they match up with someone else” who needs a transplant.

Tax-deductible checks to help pay for the testing can be made payable to the Maine Leukemia Foundation and mailed to Calvary Baptist Church, P.O. Box 239, Sherman Station 04777. Please write “Lida Burns” on the memo line.

If you have questions about helping the Burns family, call McNally at 365-7134.

If you need more information about marrow transplants or becoming a volunteer marrow donor, call the National Marrow Donor Program at (800) MARROW-2.

Former President Jimmy Carter administration spokesman Hodding Carter III is the keynote speaker for the Maine Philanthropy Center’s eighth annual meeting from 3 to 5 p.m. Monday, June 30, at MBNA Point Lookout in Northport.

Hodding Carter III is president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

A four-time Emmy Award-winner for his work in public television and public affairs documentaries, the longtime Camden-Rockport-area summer visitor now owns a home on Islesboro.

Anyone interested in attending the meeting can call Michelle Fontaine at the Maine Philanthropy Center, 780-5039. Advance registration is required since space is limited.

Additional meeting information can be obtained at www.megrants.org.

Brewer Hometown Band conductor Jan Cox reports the band is “ready to begin our Summer Outdoor Concert Series,” and the first concert is 7 p.m. Thursday, June 26, in the parking lot at the Brewer Auditorium between State and Wilson streets.

“If the weather doesn’t please us,” she wrote, “we will go inside.”

Cox added that “the band continues to grow in numbers as well as in performance level,” and that Thursday’s concert “will give us a dress rehearsal for the annual R.B. Hall Day.”

The band will perform for R.B. Hall Day at 11:20 a.m. Saturday, June 28, at Lincolnville Center, “if area people are venturing out for the festival,” she wrote.

Our community lost two of its most pleasant members this week with the deaths of Norman “Norm” Carlisle, 88, and Evan (Van) Pelkey, 75, both of Bangor.

Whomever you ask, I am sure, would describe both men in similar terms. But what comes to mind for me is that, of each, I would say, “He was such a very nice man.”

They were gentlemen who made people feel welcome, warm and comfortable in their presence, and men who made you smile. We will miss them both.

To “Polly” Carlisle and her family, and to “Scotty” Pelkey and her family, I extend my sincerest condolences.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402; 990-8288.