With National Volunteer Week this week, Wiscasset Town Manager Dennis Simmons’ April 16 reading of Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ letter honoring Katharine Martin-Savage’s posthumous receipt of the “Spirit of America” award was timely. The award honors volunteerism, which Martin-Savage epitomized. 

The one-time Central Intelligence Agency employee and longtime Wiscasset resident, who worked for Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department and served on the selectboard and budget committee, volunteered on a slew of causes including Wiscasset Female Charitable Society, the Cooper-DiPerri Scholarship Fund, Wiscasset Area Chamber of Commerce and Friends of Wiscasset Public Library, for which she hosted the “Bands for Books” fundraiser at her Seafield Farm. 

She did not stop there. Wiscasset Newspaper often spotted Martin-Savage at other fundraisers. When she was shopping at First Congregational Church’s Oktoberfest in 2015, Martin-Savage told me she had a lot of friends at the church and “I like to support anything local.”

She sure did.

Pages 4, 5 and 6 of Section II of this week’s print edition honor area volunteers through stories and the thanks of local governments and organizations. Around here, as this all shows, people like to help one another and their towns. The entities get the help, the volunteers get the satisfaction and the interaction, and we all benefit. 

Thank you, volunteers.

Who would like to join them? With the special pages as inspiration, and maybe from your look at the organizations’ ads of thanks, find something you care about and offer to help.