Center Meeting House

This is from the Newbury September Newsletter

"NEEDED: Food, sundries, winter clothes, blankets

Family Services is seeking help from the community. Gail Bostic, Family Services Director, reports that since August she has been inundated with Newbury residents looking to use the food pantry maintained by the South Newbury Union Church. The increase in demand had the pantry supplies getting dangerously low. Donations have been coming in, but with winter – and holidays – coming, more are needed."

Center Meeting House will again collect food for our neighbors during our annual Thanksgiving Celebration (see Upcoming Events in the bar on the right side of this page.)  Perhaps we all can take food in to Gail sooner.

Today is a day for reflection and remembrance of the terrible loss that we experienced as a nation and as a people.  Here in Newbury, we all seem to know someone who was directly or indirectly involved, especially in the twin towers.  A friend of ours has a son who was scheduled to be in the towers that day and who changed plans at the last minute.

Dennis Pavlicek tells me that on that sad day that he opened up the Center Meeting House and rang the bell as a solemn remembrance of those who had lost their lives or otherwise had their lives changed forever.

We remember all who suffered eight years ago today and those who still suffer to this day.

As promised, things started to happen on September 8, 2009, at the Center Meeting House site as men and materials began to arrive.  The scaffolding seen in the photo around the tower is required for the workers to walk on during the restoration/renovation.

The next step in the process is the evaluation of the structure. This is followed by a challenging part of the process which is the abatement associated with lead paint disposal as dismantling of the old clapboarding begins. Note: as of September 16 you will notice that clapbpoards have been removed from the tower.

Bill Weiler, Chairman of the Architecture & Restoration Committee, announced that work on the Center Meeting House Bell Tower would commence on September 8, 2009, right after Labor Day.  Bill cautioned that we shouldn’t expect to see the tower swinging from a crane for a few weeks as restoration will take time to be completed or even become obvious.  While the work will get started almost immediately there won’t be a lot of the excitement that we all love so much for a while.  For those who loved seeing the building raised to install the new foundation or the new trusses being swung into place things will remain tame for a few weeks.