For more than 150 years, Oliver Wolcott Library has been the intellectual center of our town, providing connection and enlightenment for all residents, from toddlers to seniors. When you include OWL in your estate plans, you help ensure this crucial legacy for future generations, keeping our library and our community vibrant.
What is Planned Giving?
Planned giving is a way to think ahead and make plans for a charitable gift after your lifetime.
There are many alternatives for helping OWL and every gift, no matter the size, makes a meaningful impact. You can include the Library in your will or trust, designate the Library as a beneficiary of your financial or retirement accounts, or establish a charitable gift annuity with guaranteed payments for life. Additionally, various types of trusts can be used to achieve your goals. Importantly, such gifts are flexible and can be revised or revoked at any time. Planned giving also permits certain advantageous tax benefits to the donor.
To read more about the ways that you can provide a gift to OWL after your lifetime, click here.
The Oliver Wolcott Society
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The Oliver Wolcott Society is an honorary society to acknowledge and celebrate the generosity of individuals who have named Oliver Wolcott Library in their will or trust, or have designated it as a beneficiary of an investment account or insurance policy.
OWL formed the OW Society to express its gratitude to members by inviting them to special Library events and by listing their names in donor publications, to acknowledge their vision and generosity.
You may become a member of the Oliver Wolcott Society by simply notifying us that you have included OWL in your estate plans. You may notify us by:
Email: Contact Ann Marie White, Library Director at awhite at owlibrary.org
Mail: Oliver Wolcott Library, PO Box 187, Litchfield, CT 06759
Phone: 860-567-8030.
We appreciate knowing of your plans for a legacy gift, and also respect that some friends of OWL may chose to remain anonymous, it is your personal choice.
Remembering OWL is an enduring statement of your belief in the importance of learning to our community. A gift after your lifetime will ensure OWL can grow and thrive, and continue to provide, free of charge, so many valuable and important services.
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Planned Giving Testimonials: Why I am an Oliver Wolcott Society Member
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Nancy Ross
Nearly 25 years ago, my son had autism. It was a lonely existence for our family. Autism was not understood and not in the mainstream vernacular. As a toddler, my son was often ostracized as others simply didn’t understand him. But there was one book that inspired me to push on: Let Me Hear Your Voice, by Catherine Maurice, about a mom who reversed her son’s autism with Applied Behavioral Therapy. I proceeded with this book as my guide. As my son very slowly showed he could repeat phrases, I searched for ways to provide meaning to words. BOOKS. Books provide words and pictures that provide meaning. We ventured to OWL for picture books; what I found was books and refuge. The OWL staff welcomed us. Richard Scary books were our foundation. Scholastic readers became our favorites. OWL became our first safe place beyond structured tutors, school, and Yale. Day by day, reading unlocked my son’s brain. For the child unable to communicate, reading opened his world. OWL was our gateway. Today, as a millennial, my son remains a prolific reader, independent and living in Washington DC. When I assumed the role of Trustee, I knew in my heart that I wanted to leave a legacy for OWL. It was at OWL that my son unlocked the power of reading; reading was his portal to independence.
As a charter member of The Oliver Wolcott Society, I am leaving a bequest to OWL to help sustain and extend those values and experiences that sustained me and Jason. It is also why I encourage others, as they are able, to do the same. Please join me in providing a gift in your estate plans, in any amount, in support of OWL’s legacy for all children in our community.
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Jamie Gagarin
Jamie Gagarin had an indelible impact on the Oliver Wolcott Library. In the mid-1960’s Mrs. Gagarin was instrumental in the plan to relocate OWL from the corner of West and South streets (currently the site of the Litchfield Historical Society) to its current home in the Oliver Wolcott Jr. home on South Street. She served as president of the Board of Trustees and was a long-time, loyal OWL volunteer, often seen at the circulation desk, greeting and assisting patrons. As a result of a legacy gift by Jamie Gagarin, improvements were made to the previous Community Room, and the new Gallery space was dedicated in Mrs. Gagarin’s honor in 2015.
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