This past spring/summer, The Tilton Fund Inc, the fundraising arm of the Tilton Library in Deerfield, which is undergoing a $12.3 million expansion project, undertook a fundraising project, “Shoe Us The Love.”
Over the past four months we gathered 100 bags (each bag with 25 matched pairs of shoes) for a total of 2,500 shoes from our local communities. People cleaned out their closets of new/gently used shoes/sneakers. This project will raise $1,000 for the library, but more importantly will provide new/gently worn shoes through Funds2org. This organization then provides shoes to communities in need worldwide.
Our success is due totally to community partnerships who provided collection sites for students, employees, library patrons and neighbors who chose to drop off and donate their sneakers, shoes and boots. Thank you to Greenfield Savings Bank, Frontier High School, Deerfield Elementary School, Pelican, Bement School, Eaglebrook School, Deerfield Academy, Stoneleigh Burnham School, and Northfield Mount Hermon School for being collection sites.
Our thanks to our library trustees/directors who took on this project and helped to make it a true success. Shoes off to Grant Bialek, Tom Johnson, Rob Baker, Jason Sherman, who drove to local collection sites and picked up shoes and delivered to our storage area.
We are very appreciative of the management and staff at Pella Products Inc. Greenfield for allowing us to store our bagged shoes prior to pick up. Our final thank you to Dennis O’Rourke, who was our steward in pulling all of the details together and staying on top of the ever-changing landscape of gathering shoes and making this a very successful community campaign.
We are so fortunate to live in a community where community does make a huge difference.
Nancy Maynard, chair, The Tilton Fund Inc.
South Deerfield