Agnes Marthe Griffen

Agnes Marthe Griffen August 25, 1935 – July 23, 2025 Agnes Marthe Griffen (Hall) (nee Hallanger) was born August 25, 1935, in Fort Dauphin, Madagascar, the 4th of 11 children born to Fredrick and Alvilde (Torvik) Hallanger, both from a long line of Norwegian Lutheran missionaries in that beautiful faraway land. Agnes shared childhood tales of collecting shells on the white sand beaches, climbing to the top of tall trees swaying in the warm wind, of mischief-making with the other missionary kids at their boarding school, her lifelong wry sense of humor always at play. She and her family traveled across the African continent on journeys home to the U.S. for furloughs, riding camels, seeing the pyramids, enduring long steamship passages that took them from the tropical land of their birth to the cool, green American Midwest. What a culture shock that must have been for the young Hallanger kids! At 15, when her parents returned to Madagascar with her younger siblings after a furlough, she was warmly welcomed into the home of her Uncle Oliver and his young family in Butte, Montana, where she graduated from high school. She went on to college at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington, graduating cum laude in 1957 with a Bachelor of Arts in English. She married her co-editor of the college literary magazine, Michael Griffen (d. 2008), with whom she had three children. She earned a Master of Library Science degree in 1965 and went on to an illustrious career as a Librarian and Administrative Librarian – first as a Children’s Librarian, then an Institutional Librarian, and then Deputy Librarian for Staff Development for the King County Library System in Seattle (where she met and married her second husband, John H.P. Hall, her coauthor on the first Library Journal article that brought her national attention in her field); then as Deputy Director of the Tucson-Pima County Public Library in Tucson Arizona; then as Director of the Montgomery County Public Libraries in Maryland; and eventually back to Tucson as Director until her retirement in 2003. She found great meaning and purpose in her work and became a respected leader in her field. She was especially proud of her work mentoring young women and championing women’s rise to leadership roles in every organization she led. She served on the American Library Association board in several roles over the years, helping to steward the field of library science through its massive transformation from card catalogues to the digital and ever-evolving libraries of today. In her 60’s, as one might expect of a consummate librarian, she returned to her spiritual roots by way of books and study, “in search of something missing in me,” she said – a quest we all share in our own ways. She found support and solace in her studies at St. Phillips Episcopal Church in Tucson, in a 3-year lay ministry course of study and in contemplative prayer groups, and continued her search at St. Paul’s in Bellingham in her later years. Always deeply and widely read in Philosophy, Religion, Spirituality, Science and Nature, Poetry and Literature, she delved deep with both heart and mind. “Research is the highest form of adoration” – words she lived by, from one of her favorite thinkers, Teilhard de Chardin. Agnes loved spending time in the natural world as well as the world of work, of books and ideas – gardening, hiking, camping and especially swimming. The family lore contains epic tales of her swims across bays, in oceans and lakes and rivers the world over, but she seemed to love simply jumping off docks and bobbing in lakes the most. She was so happy sitting alone on the beach on trips to Hood Canal with her husband John, her legs splayed out like a little girl, shucking and eating oysters in the rain, clumps of kelp and empty shells all round on the wet sand. She and John (d. 2015) returned to Bellingham in 2015 to spend their remaining years with family in the Northwest. Agnes passed away peacefully at 89, propped in her bed after a nice breakfast on July 23rd , watching the geese on a little lake outside her window at Lakeside Gardens Assisted Living Home, where she was lovingly cared for during her final months. Agnes was preceded in death by her parents, her husband John, by brothers Frederick and Erling, sisters Anna, Eunice, Phyllis, Elizabeth, Jane, and Solveig. She is remembered and survived by her sister Helen, brother Chris (Jan), her daughter Shaun (Kerry), sons Christopher and Adam, stepdaughter Leslie (Fred), stepson Don (Sheri), granddaughter Lydia, grandson Nicholas (Wendy), and great grandsons Tyler, Dylan, Thor, Rowyn and Link, as well as numerous cousins, nieces, nephews and friends. A memorial service to celebrate Agnes’s life will be held on Saturday, October 4, 2025 at 2:00 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Bellingham, WA. In lieu of flowers, memorial contributions may be made to the Bellingham Central Library Renovation Fund at the Whatcom Community Foundation, either online at Bellingham Central Library Renovation Fund or mailed to: Whatcom Community Foundation, 1500 Cornwall Ave, Ste 202, Bellingham, WA 98225. “Matter is spirit moving slow enough to be seen.” – Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Agnes Marthe Griffen

August 25, 1935 - July 23, 2025