A new garden sanctuary recently was dedicated at the Westport Center for Senior Activities in memory of Irma and Joseph Schachter, donors to the senior center and other local organizations. Classes are now conducted outdoors with new furnishings provided as part of the project.
Wendy Petty, left, director of the Westport Center for Senior Activities, and Elaine Daignault, human services director, try out new furniture on the senior center porch.

By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — A strip of neglected land behind the Westport Center for Senior Activities has been transformed into a small garden sanctuary, with flowers, a bird bath and chairs for visitors to enjoy the site’s natural beauty.

The sanctuary last week was dedicated in tribute to the late Irma and Joe Schachter, donors and longtime supporters of the center and other local nonprofit organizations.

The sanctuary extends green space outside the center from a garden tended by members of the garden club along a pathway with flowers and other plants to attract pollinators such as humming birds, butterflies and bees. 

The project also included installation of two flagstone pathways for walkers to enjoy the new green space and to connect to the senior center’s fitness facilities, said Wendy Petty, director of the senior center.

New furniture was also purchased for the patio adjacent to the new sanctuary, including comfortable Adirondack-style chairs that fit in with the natural landscape, and an umbrella and wooden tables and chairs for outdoor classes and events.

At the dedication ceremony on Sept. 17, Molly Alger, a board member of the Friends of the Senior Center, spoke of the Schachters’ love of Westport and their generosity not only to the senior center, but also to other area organizations, including the Westport Library, Norwalk Hospital, their synagogue and other nonprofits.

Molly Alger, a board member of the Friends of the Senior Center, spoke at the recent dedication ceremony, with remembrances of benefactors Irma and Joe Schachter.

When Irma Schachter died in May 2023 at the age of 95, she left “an enormous bequest” to the senior center, Alger said. “These funds not only paid for the garden improvements we dedicate today, but for many, many other improvements and enhancements to the center,” she said.

Irma Klein Schachter, a graduate of the Harvard-Radcliffe Business School, was a leader in the retail fashion business at a time when female leadership was not common, according to her obituary. Among the companies she worked for were Abraham & Strauss, Bloomingdale’s and Lord & Taylor where she was a vice president, managing several stores in New England.

Her husband, Joseph Schachter, who died at age 97 a month after his wife, was an advertising executive in New York, and an avid boater and founder of the Minuteman Yacht Club, according to his obituary. He was also concerned about the environment, and was part of the successful campaign to keep the United Illuminated Co. from building a nuclear power plant on Cockenoe Island off Compo Beach in the 1960s.

“The Schachters were very well known as philanthropists,” said Elaine Daignault, director of  the town’s Department of Human Services. “They were a fun-loving couple, too.”

The dedication honoring the Schachters was scheduled to coincide with National Senior Center Month, she said.

“I know she [Irma Schachter] would be grinning ear to ear to see us dedicating this space to her and to Joe in recognition of their generous and continuing financial support of the center,” Alger said. 

“Thanks, Irma and Joe!” 

Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman and has taught journalism at New York and Southern Connecticut State universities.