This book is waaaay overdue...

Recently I met a very nice woman who works part-time at a local library branch. In one of my numerous talks with her, we talked about our respective grandparents, and I started to wax nostalgically about how my maternal grandfather (hereby known as "Gramps" for the duration of this piece, and pictured at left, appropriately reading one of his beloved Western paperbacks) spawned my natural love of books and reading. He also got me my first library card.

At that point in time, the Tamaqua Public Library was almost directly across the street from my grandfather's stationery store and print shop. It was in a downtown storefront, a building that looked much more suitable for being a women's dress shop. Gramps trotted me over there (careful to cross a the corner and not in the middle of the street) and introduced me to the head librarian and got me my very own library card. (If I remember correctly it was pink.) It was in that unassuming building that I discovered a whole new world. They had all these books! And you could take them home for free! Well, there was a sticking point...you had to bring them back, and they were real careful about that whole card thing, stamping this and that with a loud thud and a bit of a flourish.

My first book was Danny and the Dinosaur. When I mentioned this to my new friend, she promptly retorted "by Syd Hoff!" (I mean, how could you NOT like a woman who knew that incredibly esoteric piece of trivia?) I think it took me all of 10 minutes to read Danny and the Dinosaur, and I wanted to march right back over across the street and get me a new book, but Gramps put the kibosh on that. Like a lot of things in my old hometown, my grandfather--George L. Meredith, to be precise about it--had his fingers in it. I think at the time he was the library board treasurer or secretary. I looked it up online but I couldn't find any mention of him in the history portion of their incredibly pompous website (seriously...lose the Latin links on the side. I realize they're rollovers that reveal the English equivalents, but a library should be about the free and easy exchange of information, not a quest for translation). I'm not certain if this is because I'm wrong (which very well may be the case) or if it's excising his name from the official history since his son--my uncle--was a bit...well, let's just say "liberal" with library funds at one point after my grandfather passed away (this is probably the part in the history where it mentions a shortfall in 1981). It was a topic that broke my mother's heart, since she looked at my grandfather's involvement with the library as a particularly proud part of his life. But that's family linen, perhaps not best washed here in public.

I haunted that library for many years. In the summers especially, I brought home an incredible amount of books. When the library moved to its current location I was in my teens, and I remember a summer where I discovered the Time/Life series This Fabulous Decade, which I devoured, and Walter Kerr's excellent book on silent film comedians, The Silent Clowns, through which I discovered Buster Keaton. I loved those books (and own them today).

Somewhere along the line I got out of the habit of going to the library. I prefer, these days, to own books, but lately I'm starting to wonder why. There's very few I'll read again and again. With the coming of the iPad, I see another change coming for me, one that involves downloading and e-reading. But I'll always fondly remember my library card and my visits there as a kid, and how it opened up a whole new world for me, all thanks to Gramps...one of many things I have him to thank for.

Comments

[Donald Thomasco]

Yes indeed, those Tamaqua library cards were pink. Your grandfather's store was one of my favorite haunts growing up (along with Moser's...all those Monster magazines). I think I actually bought a French pocket dictionary( probably the only one in Tamaqua) when I was 10 at your grandfather's store. I used to wander in there just looking at whatever was there when I had nothing to do..which was often. He never bugged me about buying something. I hope you are well.

[Kim]

Gary, I'm so with you on this! I had my 1st library card from the Panorama City library. I can still remember the smell of the library and all those books. One summer I read a ton of books and they gave me a special certificate, that I think is still around in all my stuff. As I checked out, they took my library card and the card from inside the book, and put them together under a camera type thing, I was mesmerized by how they clicked and whirred it all together to take a photo of everything all together. Ok, I was easily amused...Thanks Gary...