To the Editor:

Sunday, May 6 marked the last day of the Hospital Rummage Sale, an institution in Princeton that for 100 years, using volunteer labor, earned money for our local hospital by reselling goods of all kinds that residents brought to their door. The volunteers were the original recyclers. And what they sold helped people who needed a bargain.

When a hospital representative first told the volunteers of the rummage sale group that they would lose their storage space and thus have to go out of business, the news was sugar-coated with the promise of a recognition dinner and an article in Town Topics and other local newspapers. None of that happened.

My own view is that the powers that be at Princeton Hospital (I call it by its old familiar name) realized that calling attention to what they were doing could only bring the hospital embarrassment. Here they were destroying an organization that had brought money into the hospital and good will in the community for 100 years. And with one stroke, in coming years, through what will now be the destruction of unwanted but usable goods thrown into the trash, they have made a contribution to global warming as well.

I am not grateful.

Dawn Day

Meadowbrook Drive