This fall, a family and some local volunteers came together to keep a roof over an elderly Dresden man’s head.
Doug Harrington and his wife, Beatrice, moved to Dresden in the late 1960s.
They lived together in the same house for more than 40 years, raising two children, until Beatrice Harrington moved to an assisted living home about a year ago. Doug Harrington, a retired truck driver, now lives alone.
“He gets along alright,” his son, Dwight Harrington said. “But he has emphysema and can’t really do big projects like this one any more.”
Dwight Harrington said he was at the house this fall and happened to look up.
“I just thought, ‘Jesus, the roof is gone.'”
The holes were big enough that there was a raccoon getting into them, Dwight Harrington said.
He contacted a long-time friend, Matt Dorsey, the owner of M & R Dorsey Builders, who agreed to take on the project.
“Matt was really the key player,” Dwight Harrington said. “He got everything going.”
“When I got out there, it was awful,” Dorsey said. “It had to get fixed before winter.” For almost a year, there were major leaks over the kitchen, bathroom and dining room.
M & R Dorsey Builders joined with Harrington’s children and grandchildren to replace 2000 square feet of roof earlier this fall. The front of the roof was replaced a few years ago, but the backside of the house had never had any serious repairs, Dorsey said.
There’s still some minor work that has to wait until spring, but all the serious problems were repaired before the snow.
“What they’ve done, they done a good job,” Doug Harrington said. “I knew they could do it – they all work for builders. I just hope it gets the heating bill down some.”
The materials for the project came from Poole Brothers Lumber. They donated almost $500 in shingles and other roofing materials, and the rest was sold to Doug Harrington at cost.
Dorsey and Matt Stelzer, the head of sales at Poole Brothers, have partnered on a number of volunteer builds in the past.
“We try to do a few of these projects each year,” Stelzer said. “Just to help people out, do something for the community.”
In the summer of 2007, one of Stelzer’s drivers, Harold Kennedy, was killed while making a delivery. Stelzer and Dorsey pulled together a crew and rebuilt the roof on his wife’s home.
“These sorts of projects just sort of fall into place,” Dorsey said. “I don’t mind helping people out. It’s sort of a karma thing I guess. Maybe someday I’ll need help.”
