Anne Girolmetti, 93, teacher, librarian

Anne Casagrande Girolmetti of 50 New Street, a retired Ridgefield librarian who started her career as a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse, died Thursday, Aug. 22, at Filosa Convalescent Home in Danbury. She was 93 years old and the widow of Aldo J. Girolmetti.
A Ridgefield native, Mrs. Girolmetti was born on Nov. 5, 1908, a daughter of the late Aldo and Emily Briggs Casagrande. She attended Ridgefield schools and was salutatorian of her graduating class in 1926 at Ridgefield High School, then called Hamilton High School.
Two years later, she graduated from Danbury Normal School, now WestConn, and went to work teaching at the West Mountain School — she was the first person of Italian descent to be a teacher in Ridgefield. Mrs. Girolmetti taught first through sixth grades in the one-room schoolhouse with “outside john.” On cold mornings a friend who lived nearby would fire up a pot-bellied stove so the school would be warm when the teacher and students arrived.
After the schoolhouse was closed in 1929, Mrs. Girolmetti taught at the Center School. But in 1933, in the depths of the Depression, she lost her job because of a town policy to hire only employees whose spouses were unemployed. Her husband, Aldo, was a carpenter and landscape gardener in town.
Mrs. Girolmetti later worked for Electro-Mechanical Research and at the Fashion Shop, a store on Main Street in the 1950s.
In 1958, she became a librarian at the Ridgefield Library where she headed the children’s department. She spent 17 years at the library, a period during which the town’s population more than doubled and the demands on the small village library greatly increased. When she started, the library’s children’s collection amounted to some 3,000 titles. By her retirement in 1975, it had more than 10,000.
“Students are less interested in fairy tales and classics now,” Mrs. Girolmetti said in 1975 of the changing trends she witnessed during her years with the library. “These have been replaced with folk tales, science, historical fiction and space books. The classics are still on school and library reading lists, but that’s about all.”
In 1934, Mrs. Girolmetti and several other Ridgefield women founded two organizations that, despite their informality, have lasted nearly 70 years. The WWW bridge club and the CCC sewing club have been meeting regularly ever since, though less often recently. Most of the members have been natives or at least long-time residents, and much of the gathering was devoted to conversation about local happenings. “At times,” Mrs. Girolmetti told an interviewer in 1992, “you couldn’t talk about anybody because everybody was related.”
The meanings of WWW and CCC have never been revealed and, some suspect, were long ago forgotten. A wag once called the WWW the “Wild, Woolly Women.”
In later years Mrs. Girolmetti became active in the Keeler Tavern Museum where she was a member of a group of old-timers who worked on identifying thousands of glass negative photographs by Joseph Hartmann from the early 20th Century. “She enjoyed that immensely,” said her daughter, Pat Ligos.
Mrs. Girolmetti also enjoyed games and puzzles, especially crosswords. “She loved doing any games that stimulated the mind,” Mrs. Ligos said.
For many years she was a poll worker at town elections and referendums.
“She was a quiet, gentle person who enjoyed her town and her friends,” Mrs. Ligos said.
Besides her daughter, Patricia, Mrs. Girolmetti is survived by a brother: Peter P. Casagrande of Summerfield, Fla.; four grandchildren: Kathleen Ligos of Ridgefield, James Ligos of San Francisco, Calif., Kevin Ligos of Norwalk, and Karen Ligos of Greenwich; and by several nieces and nephews.
Her husband died in 1996. Three brothers — Arthur Casagrande, Gene Casagrande and Lino Casagrande — also died before her.
A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated on Wednesday morning in St. Mary’s Church.
Burial was in St. Mary’s Cemetery.
Contributions in Mrs. Girolmetti’s memory may be made to the Meals on Wheels Program, 25 Gilbert Street, the Keeler Tavern Museum, 132 Main Street, both of Ridgefield 06877, or to the Filosa Convalescent Home Residents’ Recreational Fund, 13 Hakim Street, Danbury, CT 06810.
The Kane Funeral Home was in charge of arrangements.