Nellie Zygiel has been in and out of the hospital for most of her life and was diagnosed with her third rare disease at the age of 10. Now 20, this Marion native wants to work at Boston Children Hospital and give emotional support to kids – remembering how therapy dogs and other supportive hospital staff helped her.

            Zygiel, a Fairhaven resident finishing up her sophomore year at UMass Amherst, is faced again with health hurdles and is looking for public support.

            “I was told I would need a kidney transplant and because of my age, most likely need multiple in my lifetime,” said Zygiel on her webpage, where she is seeking a donor for a kidney transplant. “Having doctors tell me ‘your body betrayed you’ and ‘to take time to grieve’ was not an easy thing to hear at 19. Naturally, this completely devastated me.”

            Ten years ago, Zygiel was diagnosed with vasculitis, her third rare and chronic illness. This left her kidneys permanently damaged. Her health turned the corner until she received bad news last year that she would need a transplant.

            During a recent interview, she said the donor list is filling up with people looking to help. She said that due to the Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act, medical professionals cannot reveal too much.

            “I’m trying to be very hopeful. I have my doubts because it is a scary process,” Zygiel said.

            Zygiel was placed on the National Donor List in January.

            The downside to this is that being on the list comes with a five- to seven-year wait, so most people end up going on dialysis while waiting. “Dialysis takes a complete toll on someone’s life,” Zygiel said on her web page. “It makes people weaker, tired and depressed. As a 20-year-old college student, that’s something I am desperately trying to avoid.”

            Right now, if Zygiel can get the transplant before dialysis, the future looks bright.

            She has a 3.9 grade-point average at UMass and is a member of the Commonwealth Honors College.

            She is majoring in psychology and education and hopes to one day be a child life specialist at Boston Children’s Hospital and “help them cope when they are in the hospital and going through those tough times.”

            “I have always wanted to do something with kids and help them out,” she said.

            Because she is now over 18, Zygiel is working with a new team of doctors at Beth Israel and is happy with her team. However, she keeps in contact with her former medical team at Boston Children’s Hospital.

            She said she remembers support specialists coming in with therapy dogs, cards and games, helping support her emotionally through those long hours in the hospital.

            For information about donating or on whether your blood type is compatible with Zygiel’s, log on to KidneyforNellie.org.

By Jeffrey D. Wagner

On May 4, six-year-old Sippican Elementary School first grader Owen Excellent cut the ribbon to unveil the “Little Free Diversity Library” planted in front of the Rochester Women’s Club building as an appreciative crowd applauded a move that took months to come to a successful conclusion.

            Speaking from the club building’s front steps before the ribbon-cutting, Alison Noyce, president of Tri-Town Against Racism (TTAR), the group that donated the little library to Rochester last year only to have it rejected by its original hosts, said she was moved by the large turnout facing her for this relocation ceremony. She thanked the Women’s Club for providing the space to allow people access to the Little Free Library without any controversy.

            “Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for this incredible space,” she said.

            New Bedford High School student Elliot Talley then spoke, emphasizing the importance of having books on the subject of diversity available to the general public.

            “Not only are these books beneficial to those who are marginalized,” he said. “But to those who aren’t, it serves as a lesson on the experiences of marginalized people so hopefully they can learn from it and try to understand some of their struggles. These diverse perspectives make people more compassionate.”

            At its first Rochester location, the Joseph A. Plumb Library, the little library drew more criticism than praise from residents proclaiming it was redundant to have it right outside a big public library and that some of its books should not be accessible to children.

            In September 2023, the library trustees gave the library back to TTAR, saying they were doing so based merely on the fact the town library controls its own grounds and staff and must accept gifts such as the Little Diverse Library only under agreed-to provisions. No such provisions were agreed to when a previous library director and trustees board approved the donation in January 2021, the trustees said.

            The Women’s Club reached out to TTAR that December, and TTAR jumped at the chance to relocate the little library to a more suitable site. The Rochester Women’s Club is a private organization that owns the building there and leases to the town the space used as the Town Hall Annex.

            After Excellence cut the ribbon and the glass door to the mailbox-sized, little library swung open, TTAR Vice President Rhonda Baptiste emerged from the Women’s Club building with her homemade “Happy Birthday Abraham” cake decorated with an edible barber’s pole and snare drum.

            TTAR officials explained the event was also to celebrate the April 29 birthday of a prior champion of compassionate diversity, Abraham Skidmore, a black Mattapoisett barber who decades ago started that town’s annual Halloween parade and donated his time and money to many charitable causes and people in need. They noted TTAR soon will dedicate the “Little Free Diversity Library” located at Mattapoisett’s Ned’s Point in Skidmore’s name.

            As attendees began sifting through the books the little library contains on race and gay rights, Old Rochester Regional High School senior, town resident and gay rights activist Alia Cusolito was excited to see it open.

            “It’s important to have access to these types of books,” Cusolito said. “When I was growing up, these kinds of books were only available in my own home. My parents were very open to diverse ways of thinking. In school, it wasn’t the same story. We didn’t hear about people who were different. It’s important for people to have access to literature and experiences they may not have access to in their regular lives.”

            TTAR has planted two other similar little diversity libraries, in Mattapoisett at Ned’s Point and in Marion at Old Landing.

By Michael J. DeCicco

            “Oh yeah, I’m the type of guy that likes to roam around, I’m never in one place, I roam from town to town…”

            With the famous rock-and-roll song, “The Wanderer” playing in the background, Mattapoisett Museum Curator Connor Gaudet strolled down the center aisle of the museum to the podium. He began his presentation at the April 24 annual meeting of the Historical Society members. His topic: the Wanderer, the whaling bark that is the featured theme for the museum’s upcoming summer season.

            But the history Gaudet intends to share is less a history lesson of the beloved ship and more how it has been cherished through the decades. First, however, a very brief refresher of Wanderer’s history.

            In 2018, Seth Mendell, the highly respected historian for all things tri-town, gave a lecture on Wanderer’s history. Mendell wove a true story that included the air at the busy shipyard being scented with pine and tar, the sounds of saws at work and the ringing of nails penetrating wood that would be nearly deafening.

            The Wanderer began construction 1877 and was eased into the harbor the following year, April 16, 1878, on a flood tide. It was the last of two ships built in Mattapoisett, Gaudet stated.

            It was surprising to learn from Gaudet’s presentation that when the Wanderer was set afloat, the whaling industry was already two decades past its prime. “The distillation of petroleum to create kerosine had been discovered by Dr. Abraham Kessner in 1849. Oil was struck in Titusville, Pennsylvania, in 1859. The proliferation of ‘rock oil’ combined with a fast and easy method to create lamp fuel was a pretty good indication that the whaling industry’s fate was sealed. Indeed, whale oil reached a peak price in 1856, topping out at $1.77 per gallon.

            “By 1896, that same gallon would cost only 40 cents. By the turn of the century, only a few vessels were still plying the seas for whales, usually with underpaid, green crews from the Azores, Cape Verde or West Indies, who saw the trip as a chance to emigrate to the United States.”

            Gaudet continued, “When she was built in 1878, the world seemed to be starting a slow transition into a more modern age. It was the year Edison patented the phonograph, and Edward Muybridge produced a series of stop-motion photographs in order to prove that all four feet of a galloping horse are off the ground at the same time, thus accidentally creating the first known motion picture. By 1915, the New England whaling industry was in such decline that Miss Emily Bourne announced her plan to build and give to the City of New Bedford a museum dedicated to keeping and sharing the history of its whale fishery, lest it be forgotten and slip away into the past. Now, when someone builds a museum to preserve the legacy of the profession you are currently engaged in, it might be time to start looking for other work.”

            Yet, right up until the day the Wanderer’s last moments sitting in salt water came, people wanted it. Gaudet says that the last crew gets a bad rap for losing the ship. “At least four of the 12 men on board had crewed on the Wanderer before. I’m sure with more research we can find the other crew members on other previous voyages. My point is that the crew has gotten a bad rap for losing the ship. I suggest that it was not a ‘green crew’ that caused her to wreck but one of the worst storms the region had ever seen to date. The Great Gale of 1924 not only wrecked the Wanderer but inflicted enormous damage across Rhode Island and the South Coast of Massachusetts. It was commemorated later that year in a photo booklet documenting the destruction. It was comparable to the Hurricanes of (19)38 and ’54.”

            “On September 30, another storm caused her to finally break up on the rocks she had rested on for 35 days.”

            As the years went by, the Wanderer has enjoyed notoriety, and people have created souvenirs and a variety of Wanderer-branded items, including the museum, which had ball point pens made from wood salvaged from the ship.

            The summer exhibit will feature items created and branded “The Wanderer.” Gaudet has a favorite memento, but he’s not telling.

            “With all the changes that have taken place in this town over the last hundred years since we supposedly ‘lost’ the Wanderer, one of the biggest constants, when you think about it, has been the overwhelming presence of the Wanderer. On T-shirts, the town seal, stores’ names, Christmas ornaments, yearbooks, souvenir spoons and a million other tchotchkes, the Wanderer has transcended the ages, a town mascot for five-plus generations.

            “We love our summer people, don’t get me wrong. But we’re proud of our working-class history. We built things that lasted. We built things that still last – even a hundred years after they supposedly left us.”

            One piece of the Wanderer that remains is a mast, now hanging in the museum’s carriage house, where memories permeate the structure. “They call me the Wanderer, yeah the Wanderer, I roam around around around around…”