From the Daily American eEdition
Kathy Shaffer’s goal to establish a lending library in her hometown has morphed into so much more.
The community now can share in the transformation that took place over more than 30 years by visiting The Tackle Box at 964 Barn Street, Hooversville.
Opened officially May 31, The Tackle Box is named to honor the life of the Shaffers’ late son, Tyler Lee Shaffer, who died shortly before he would have graduated from North Star High School. His birthday is on May 31.
Needless to say, Tyler loved to fish and his family always knew where he was because his opened tackle box was not too far away.
name, Shaffer said. Her family tackled the pain of the loss of Tyler — son, friend and brother — and creating something that was open and fun for them and for their community helped the healing, she said.
Shaffer is enjoying giving tours and pointing out items that adorn the endeavor’s walls and illuminate different themes and that tell their own stories. More often than not those stories involve a Shaffer. Many items in the community meeting place have been inspired by family and friends.
There is a photo of the Shaffer’s three children — Tyler, Elliott and Lucy — at that mischievous preteen age where a look can make an adult laugh aloud.
The photo is not far from where a group of people from the neighborhood helped take out a wall so that a tree from the kid’s grandparent’s farm could be brought in to make up the core of what is now a treehouse for young readers.
There also is a kitchen for cooking classes that include learning to can for adults, a playroom with mounds of LEGOS and other fun things for children, a coffee bar and tables just right for good conversations, a comfy sitting area with a fireplace and of course, floor to ceiling shelves rapidly being filled with books that anyone can borrow.
All the comforts of home and more.
There is a story that goes with each nook and cranny of what is rapidly becoming a community meeting place, something Shaffer envisioned from the beginning.
When one enters The Tackle Box one of the first things they see is the building’s former owner, Riverside, and its meat weighing scale … now a book return.
When Kathy and her husband, Jeff Shaffer, purchased the former Riverside store building it was to expand their business, Shaffer’s Bottled Gas. It didn’t take long for the couple to realized that the new building would also allow space for The Tackle Box. A recent visitor, 10-year-old Addison Zborovancik of Boswell enjoyed her first venture into the Tacklebox, and according to her it will be one of many.
“This is cool. Really,” she said. Addison’s grandmother, Missy Zborovancik, of Stoystown, was enjoying a tour. “I think what Kathy is doing is fabulous for the community and I just want my granddaughter to be part of it,” she said.
Shaffer takes delight out of pointing out how so much of what is now in The Tackle Box is connected to others in the community beyond her family, like the coffee bar built by a Hooversville man.
For Shaffer the most challenging part in the process was “making sure that everything blended together. It was important that it told a story.”
She wants the Tackle Box to “be new but old-fashion. I want it to be fun.”
She credits her husband, Jeff.
“I have a project. I have a dream. Jeff finds a way to make it happen,” she said.
As a long-time educator, Kathy Shaffer envisions quiet study time for kids and classes that take them on adventures in science and food-related journeys, and like life, all that The Tackle Box can offer is evolving.
For now, The Tackle Box will be open from 9a.m. to noon and Saturday by appointments. Tours of the community meeting place are available.
“We plan to have two nights a week for some family activities,” she said.
The center funded is funded donations and grants and has a Facebook page, but its website is still under construction, she said.
The Tackle Box just received a matching $2,500 grant from the Community Foundation for the Alleghenies that Shaffer plans to use for a children’s camp focusing on science to be held in July. Her niece, Liz Shaffer, who helps with a similar nonprofit as the community foundation in western Pennsylvania provided the matching funds through her organization. Those funds will be used to purchase microscopes and laptops for the camp, Shaffer said.
Marisa Lehman, donor services associate at the Community Foundation for the Alleghenies has helped create an Amazon wish list for The Tackle Box to provide for donated supplies needed for the different activities.
For those who want to contribute to The Tackle Box send donations to the Community Foundation for the Alleghenies, 216 Franklin St., Suite 400, Johnstown, PA 15901. Designate the donation for The Tackle Box (Tyler Shaffer) Fund.
For those who want to volunteer their time and expertise to the community endeavor contact Kathy Shaffer at kshaf62@gmail.com.
To learn more about The Tackle Box, pick up a July edition of Somerset Magazine.