The Impact of Your Gift An Update on Our Automatic Door Improvements

The six automatic doors that have been installed in Camphill Ghent continue to make a world of difference for our residents, thanks to the generosity of our Giving Tuesday campaign donors last November, as well as several wonderfully supportive local foundations. Each gift has contributed to greater independence for our community members, many of whom access our grounds and buildings along with their mobility aids.

“You can just tap that button and the door opens for you,” said Louise Frazier, who shares an apartment with her daughter Linda. “It’s a lot easer for people of my age, which is in my nineties.”

With the possibilities these six doors provide, we can more safely transition between spaces with ease, and visit each other more frequently without needing the assistance of another person.

Between materials and labor, the cost of replacing these doors was around $36,000. The value they continue to provide is boundless for our community members like Louise, who is one of many Camphill Ghent residents who chose our community because of our emphasis on socializing and gathering around the arts.

“I can use the door at the Culture Hall where we have a lot of our programs, or I go to Hilltop to visit friends, or we have poetry groups and things like this,” said

Louise, adding that she plans her routes every day around how accessible spaces are for her and her mobility aid. “I’m in and out of [Hilltop] a couple of times a day, so it’s much better if I don’t have to maneuver with my walker. It allows me to go to events because I can do it more easily.”

The Hudson River Bank and Trust (HRBT) Foundation was one of four foundations that contributed to our impactful upgrades. Tony Jones, a member of the HRBT Board of Directors, said the Foundation is “committed to helping improve the health, security and satisfaction of the people in Columbia County through projects large and small that leverage the strengths of our local non-profit organizations and communities.” He added that, “making it easier to open doors is an ideal image of what that is about.”

The Hover Foundation, Stewart’s Shops Foundation, and the Camphill Foundation also contributed very generously to our doors. And our Giving Tuesday donors made the singular highest impact in our campaign, contributing a sum of $27,308 total.

Because fundraising composes 43 percent of our annual operating budget, the donations and grants Camphill Ghent receives make a tremendous difference for our programing, infrastructure, and health. We thank our donors for helping us to make these important improvements for the wonderful elders who make their home in Camphill Ghent.

Jeff Bentley is Camphill Ghent’s Piano Man Behind the Scenes.

Jeff Bentley is a piano technician entrusted with the care of some of the region’s most well-known Steinway pianos. He cares for the pianos at Williams College and Bennington College, and he cares for all of the pianos at MASS MoCa. We at Camphill Ghent are fortunate to have Jeff caring for the Steinway in our Cultural Hall.

Jeff is a learned craftsman who enjoys his work. He knows his pianos for many years—their potential, the amount they’ve been played in between visits, and more. He’s been with our piano for 10 years.

“The purpose of this project is to improve the touch of the piano; to make it play as well as it possibly can,” Jeff said, dropping a small amount of fluid from a squeeze bottle onto some pins that had acquired some verdigris buildup over time. “When a concert pianist comes and plays, the piano will react the maximum for touch, tone, dynamic control. So you can play Chopin loud and soft and that kind of thing.”

Thirty years ago, Jeff attended the North Bennet Street School in the north end of Boston—one of the oldest master craft schools in the nation. It was initially established to teach the trades to immigrants, and Jeff says that enrolling in the 1994 fall semester changed his life.

“They teach bookbinding—four year book binding— and preservation, carpentry, jewelry making, violin making, they have one of the best furniture making programs, locksmithing, and a two-year piano technology program,” he said. “If I was independently wealthy, I’d take all the courses.”

While in Ghent, Jeff works by himself when the Culture Hall is empty and the doors are closed. It’s quite a different scene when we gather as a community to hear our piano being played so beautifully by professional musicians during our concert series.

Jeff says ours is a Steinway Model A, which is a 6-feet-4-inch piano, and that pianos are measured in length from the very front of the piano to the very back of the piano. Concert grands can measure 9 feet down to 7 feet.

“And this is just under a concert grand. Six foot four,” he said. “But it’s a great piano because you start getting that bass string length and that’s what’s important for tone and sound. You wouldn’t want a much bigger piano in here because it’s a small room.”

At the time of his interview, Jeff had recently been working on the pianos for the Manchester Music Festival in Vermont, which was celebrating its 50th season. He enjoyed working with Emerson String Quartet founding violinist Philip Setzer, who is also the music festival’s artistic director. Jeff said meeting new people is one of his favorite parts of the career he’s created in this area—including in Camphill Ghent.

“It’s a very interesting place. They’re wonderful people to work for,” Jeff said about our community. “I’m very lucky to be in this field and meet people like that here at Camphill.”