Ruth Ann Montgomery Book Fund

Ruth Ann Montgomery Book Fund

When Ruth Ann Montgomery left EFPL to become head of the Arrowhead Library System, the Friends of the Library started a fund in her name to honor her long service to our library.  The money was placed into a section of the Evansville Fund, which in turn is part of the Community Foundation of Southern Wisconsin.  Once money is invested with CFSW, it cannot be withdrawn.  However, once the principal sum has reached  $10,000, a portion of the income from the fund is be returned annually from CFSW to our library.  This is an indefinite investment that will pay an income forever.

CFSW had been growing steadily until the recent economic downturn, when its investments lost ground.  But two recent generous gifts from Friends of the Library have brought our Ruth Ann Montgomery Fund over the $10K mark, and CFSW will begin granting the library an annual stipend starting next summer. 

A committee consisting of the Library Director, the Treasurer of the Friends, and Ruth Ann herself can either spend the stipend or retain a portion of it to further increase the principal in the RAM fund.  The Friends' Board welcomes suggestions from the entire Friends' membership on how our stipend may be used, but the final decision rests with the committee.

Further donations to the Ruth Ann Montgomery Fund are welcome at any time.  Contact the Library Director for further details.

New Computer Projector

New Computer Projector

Kathi Kemp, Director of the Eager Free Public Library, received a Christmas gift for Evansville's library from The Friends of the EFPL.  The Friends organization gave our library a new computer projector.  It will be used by speakers at library programs to illustrate their presentations from a laptop computer. 

The Friends bought the projector with funds raised in 2009 from the Ice Cream Social, the Used Book Sale, collecting Piggly Wiggly receipts and membership dues.  In these difficult economic times,  the Friends' support of library programs and services is even more critical than usual.

More "Books Every Library Should Have"

More "Books Every Library Should Have"

A list of ten books that Robert Frost thought should be in every public library (that I presented here a couple of weeks ago)  was originally published in a 1936 book.  That volume, titled "Books We Like", is actually a compilation of ten-book lists by sixty-two of the "keenest readers in the Commonwealth", one of them Frost, published by the Massachusetts Library Association in that year.  The editor of the volume specified that the Bible and the works of Shakespeare were to be omitted from all readers' lists. 

There is surprisingly little duplication among these 62 lists of "top-ten" books.  There are a total of 486 books among 620 possible selections.  Some authors are represented by more than one book.  503 authors are recommended.  Some of the recommendations are dated, of course, particularly biography and contemporary affairs.  There's a perhaps expected emphasis on dead white Englishmen and Americans.

The Odyssey by Homer was recommended by the most readers - but only 14 of them out of 62!  In order of "popularity" by this measure, here are the most recommended books that every library should have.

1.  Homer -- The Odyssey
2.  Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- Essays
3.  Boswell, James -- Life of Samuel Johnson
4.  Adams, James -- The Epic of America
5.  Dante --  The Divine Comedy
6.  Dickens, Charles -- The Pickwick Papers
7.  Franklin, Benjamin -- Autobiography
8.  Galsworthy, John -- The Forsythe Saga
9.  Hawthorne, Nathaniel -- The Scarlet Letter
10. Dickens, Charles -- David Copperfield
11. Thackery, William M. -- Vanity Fair
12. Adams, Henry -- The Education of Henry Adams
13. Carroll, Lewis -- Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
14. Cervantes, Miguel -- Don Quixote
15. Twain, Mark - Adventures of Tom Sawyer
16. Dumas, Alexandre -- The Three Musketeers
17. Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- Poems
18. Gibbon, Edward -- Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
19. Homer -- The Illiad
20. Kipling, Rudyard -- The Jungle Book

An interesting list.  What books would be on YOUR  top-ten list that every library should have?

Donate your Books to the Library!

Donate your Books to the Library!

The Friends of the Eager Free Public Library gladly accept donations of gently used books, magazines, DVD's, audio CD's, VHS tapes, etc., for both adults and children.  Donations are accepted all year; if you want to get a tax deduction for 2009, please donate now.

 Please observe the following donation guidelines:
• Books should be in good readable condition, with covers intact and no torn pages.  No Readers Digest Condensed Books, encyclopedias or textbooks more than three years old. No orphan volumes of multi-volume book sets.
 • Old magazines that are of special interest (e.g., gardening, woodworking, cooking, architecture) are great.  However, dated magazines (e.g., Time, Newsweek) or ubiquitous magazines (e.g., Good Housekeeping, Prevention) are not good sellers. No National Geographics.
• We accept videos, DVDs, books-on-tape, books-on-CD, audio cassettes, and audio CDs.    Homemade video and audio tapes are not accepted.

 The Friends sell donated items to raise money for library programs and to purchase "extra's" for the library.  Our stock of donated items is located in the basement hallway of the Library building.  Whenever the library is open, your can browse the shelves and bring your purchases to a librarian to pay for them.

Robert Frost's List of 10 Books for Every Public Library

Robert Frost's List of 10 Books for Every Public Library

The NYT list of best new books posted earlier got me to thinking about other "top 10" book lists.  Here's one I found that the poet Robert Frost published in 1936.  How many have you read in some form???  Most are available at EFPL, and the few we don't have can be found in the collections of other libraries in the Arrowhead Library System consortium.   You can order them right off the EFPL website, if you like.

1.The Odyssey / Homer
2.Robinson Crusoe / Daniel Defoe
3.Walden / Thoreau
4.Tales / Poe
5.Oxford book of English verse / Quiller-Couch, editor
6.Modern American and British poetry / Untermeyer
7.Last of the Mohicans / Cooper
8.Prisoner of Zenda / Hope
9.Jungle book (first) / Kipling.
10.Essays, poems / Emerson  

Best New Books

Best New Books

The New York Times will be posting a list of the Best Books of 2009 in next week's Sunday Edition. Here is a link to that list:

www.nytimes.com/gift-guide/holiday-2009/10-best-gift-guide-sub/list.html?em

In a sidebar are some other "Best Book" lists. Have fun

Welcome!

Welcome!

Friends of the Eager Free Public Library now has a blog presence. Our next public event will be our first ever winter book sale. It will be held in the library's basement meeting room the weekend of January 23rd.

A special preview sale exclusively for members of the Friends will be held from 5-8 pm on Friday January 22nd. If you want first crack at the books, but are not yet a Friend, you can become a member at the door that evening.

The book sale will be open to the general public on Saturday January 23 during normal library hours.