Due to maintenance, some services may be interrupted at these times:

  • Saturday, April 20, 6 p.m.-midnight: library website will be unavailable
  • Sunday, April 21, 7-10 a.m.: library catalog, user accounts, e-media will be unavailable

docent tours

The east lawn and the eastern exterior of Central Library
Guest Blogger, March 29, 2024

Sometimes it feels as though public libraries—free, government-supported, circulating libraries—have always been part of American life, but public libraries were rare before the last quarter of the nineteenth century.


close up of card catalog
Central Docents, March 04, 2020

While it's true that information on the 2.8 million items in the Central Library is on computer servers that take up a tiny space compared to the hundreds of drawers of catalog cards once used, one can still view some of our collections the old-fashioned way, complete with Dewey decimal number, title, auth


Boxing of damaged books
Central Docents, September 30, 2019

I have always loved books. When I was five, I pleaded with my mother for books...Little Golden Books, about lambs and engines and whatever...and she helped me learn to read them. In junior high and high school, I was a library helper.


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