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Local Student Raises Money to Improve Quality of Life at Nursing Home

Eighth-Grade Student Morgane Butler Raises Funds to Purchase a New Salon Chair for Residents at Fairview Nursing Home in Groton

Eighth-grade student Morgane Butler hopes to raise approximately $1,500 for a new salon chair at the Fairview Nursing Home by July.

“It’s an ambitious project to take on. We’re grateful for her enthusiasm,” says David Brown, Director of Development at Fairview. 

With the help of her classmates and her mother’s coworkers at Pfizer, Butler is collecting cans and bottles that she can recycle for cash to donate to Fairview. Butler is also organizing a dress down day at St. Bernard’s to raise money for the cause.

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An Old, Broken Chair

Every day, Fairview hairdresser Sandie Ellington Weissgarber styles the hair of about six to eight residents in her salon chair. Many of her clients suffer from Alzheimer’s or dementia.

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She recognizes the important role the salon plays in the lives of the nursing home residents.

“The smell of the permanent wave lotion, the look of the old-fashioned curlers . . . it brings back their memories of good times, and it makes them come alive again for the short time that they’re here,” she says.

Weissgarber has meticulously seen to the needs of her clients for the past 30 years, giving hugs freely and offering candy from a dish outside her door.

Over the past few years, though, her salon chair has deteriorated, making it more difficult for her to perform her job, and less comfortable for her clients.

“This thing is so old. It’s been here for almost 40 years,” says Weissgarber, as she pumps endlessly on the hydraulic lift to no avail. “I can’t even adjust it much anymore.”

The chair’s outdated design also makes it impossible for her to wash the hair of certain clients who are unable to fit in it, or who are wheelchair bound.

Recognizing the Need For A New Chair

When Marielle Delnomdedieu, an Associate Director of Neuroscience at Pfizer, toured the facility while performing some pro bono work at Fairview Nursing Home she noticed the broken chair.

When Delnomdedieu told her daughter, Butler, about Weissgarber’s work and the salon chair that evening over dinner, Butler decided to get involved.

“My mom told me about Sandie - how she gives hugs to everyone who comes into the salon and how happy she makes the residents, and when I heard about the old salon chair they use, I realized I wanted to help them get a new one,” says Butler.

Butler and her mother began planning ways to help, and came up with the idea to collect cans and bottles at Butler’s school and Delnomdedieu’s workplace.

“The response has been good so far,” says Butler.

She has raised nearly $200 since the beginning of the project in early April, and is undaunted by the $1,300 left to raise for the new chair, which will feature a large, comfortable seat, brand new hydraulics, and even a detachable sink that will allow Weissgarber to assist clients who previously couldn’t fit in the old chair due to size or wheelchair restrictions.

“We chose a chair that was a compromise between a feminine salon chair and a big barber chair that could accommodate people of all sizes,” says Butler.

Weissgarber is ecstatic about Butler’s efforts to raise funds for a new chair.

“I’m thrilled about what Morgane and her mother are doing. It's going to make a big difference in my life as well as the lives of the residents,” she says.

If you would like to assist Morgane Butler with fundraising for a new salon chair at Fairview Nursing Home, donations can be given sent to the following address:

Morgane’s Fundraiser

Attn: David Brown, Fairview

235 Lestertown Rd

Groton, Ct 06340

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