LEWISTON — Upon moving to Lewiston in the 1980s, Judith Head was quick to notice the number of people volunteering or putting in effort to make people’s lives better.

“There’s just so many people that do so much,” she said. “Lewiston has such a generous and kind population, and so many people that step out and step up.”

While she will not admit it, Head is one of those people. She has been involved at the Lewiston Public Library pretty much since moving to town, and has been a member of the Friends of the Lewiston Public Library since the 1990s.

A former member of the library’s board of trustees, Head now serves on the eight-member board for the Friends of LPL, a nonprofit that promotes the work of the library at 200 Lisbon St. through financial support and additional programming not covered by the annual budget.

“I think the Friends, many of them like me, see the library as the center of the community,” Head said. “It’s the place where people of all sorts come together and it provides resources for everyone.”

Members of the Friends organization pay a range of annual dues, and the funds have supported many needs over the years — from facilities to resources and services.

According to the library website, the needs have included the library’s modernization; programs for children, teens and adults; speaker visits; and more.

Head said the Friends support both the spring and summer reading programs, and the group keeps a “book nook” inside the front entrance of the library, where used books can be purchased for 10 cents each.

During art walks in the summer months, the volunteers can be found in front of the library giving away books, which Head said is “a wonderful opportunity for us to meet people, and for people to meet us.”

The Friends also supports the ArtVan for children, bringing the program to the library twice a month.

Head said the group’s main focus recently has been the library’s ongoing capital campaign, which is looking to raise $1 million to renovate and expand the Children’s Room. She said the effort has raised $300,000 so far, and work can begin once the effort gets halfway to its goal.

Asked why she continues to be involved, Head said supporting children is “at the top of the heap for me.”

They deserve resources that will give them successful lives,” she said.

Plans for the renovated Children’s Room include creating a more welcoming area for families, with reading nooks, and technology that will encourage early literacy and access to child-friendly digital resources. Plans are also expected to include transitional spaces that can be used to accommodate school and family trips to the library, and incorporate nature and more natural light.

Head said a mural is planned that would span the Children’s Room and reflect Lewiston’s history and the Androscoggin River, complete with a canoe.

Anyone who donates to the capital campaign becomes a member of the Friends organization. Head said the group “loves having the energy of new people,” and is always looking for more members.

The organization is also working behind the scenes to help organize more events for the capital campaign, details of which are expected soon, she said.

Head said the Friends group is only part of a “vibrant” team of staff members, trustees and community members who are leading the campaign and consider the library extremely important to Lewiston.

Joseph Houston, the library’s director, said the Friends of the Lewiston Public Library is “a fundamentally important” part of the library’s fundraising, organizing and community outreach goals.

He said the Friends group has been an important supporter of library programming, partnerships and renovation projects across generations of Lewiston’s history.

“One of the best and most rewarding things you can do to support the library’s mission is to join the Friends of the Library and help them continue this vital work,” Houston said.

Now retired, Head moved to Lewiston in 1982 from Austin, Texas, and is the former associate dean of faculty at Bates College in Lewiston. She retired in 2014, but has been involved in the library for almost the entire time she has lived here.

“We’ve always had a top-notch staff,” she said of the library. “It’s a wonderful place to be.”

Know someone with a deep well of unlimited public spirit? Someone who gives his or her time to make the community better? Nominate the person for Kudos. Send his or her name and where the good deeds are done to reporter Andrew Rice at [email protected].