BANGOR – Amid Wednesday’s scorching heat, sweaty hands dug up the first shovels of dirt in a project to build a new, 300,000-gallon pool in Hayford Park.

Funded primarily by a $1.4 million donation from authors Stephen and Tabitha King, the 7,000-square-foot pool should be completed by next spring, according to Bangor Parks and Recreation Director Frank Comeau.

Along with a four-lane lap pool and handicap-accessible ramp, the center will feature two waterslides and a child’s play area, nearly doubling the size of the current pool on Union Street.

“I know a lot of our young citizens are waiting for this to come along,” Mayor Nichi Farnham said Wednesday.

A stroll by the popular pool last spring prompted the Kings’ idea for a new facility, according to their friend and attorney, Warren Silver of Bangor.

“Stephen looked at that pool and said, ‘That pool’s on its last legs,'” Silver said.

Budget restraints forced designers to decrease the size of the originally planned 11,000-square-foot pool, but the Kings donated an additional $250,000 to the project in May to avoid further compromises.

“[The Kings] believe in this project, and they want a nice facility we can all be proud of,” Silver said.

The city will fund the remaining $385,000 needed to complete the project.

At the Kings’ request, the pool is being named in memory of Beth Pancoe, a Bangor High School graduate and former neighbor of theirs on West Broadway who died from leukemia in 1999. Michael Pancoe, Beth’s father, said his daughter would have enjoyed the new pool, as she used to play at the Creative Playground in Hayford Park and was a member of the BHS swimming and diving team.

Although the typically private family was at first wary of attaching its name to a public facility, Pancoe said the Kings’ offer was too generous to refuse.

“The choice of my daughter as the recipient of the name is truly a magnanimous thing,” he said.

While the Kings’ donation was admirable, such generosity is common for the couple, according to Bangor City Councilor Gerry Palmer.

“This is a tremendous gift by the King family to this city,” he said. “Everywhere you look you see the fingerprints of Stephen and Tabitha King.”

The complex will be located down the hill from the existing pool, just beyond the left-field fence of Mansfield Stadium, which also was funded by a donation from the Kings.

The playground will close today with the start of construction and will reopen in two weeks, according to Brian Bowman, co-owner of Bowman Brothers of Newport, the general contractors for the project.

The work should be completed in the fall, and the pool will be open by spring 2004, he said. The existing pool will be removed and replaced with a picnic area. The gravel path that runs through the space will be rerouted near the baseball field, he said.