CDPL Celebrates 20 Years at Current Location

Twenty-five years ago, a library patron asked me if public libraries were going away now that computers and the Internet were available to everyone who could afford a computer. I’ve been asked that question every few years since then.

Twenty years ago, the citizens of Crawfordsville didn’t think so. They believed in public libraries so much that they built a new, larger building across the street for theirs, and it opened on September 19, 2005. The library board then decided to operate the Carnegie building as the home to a new museum: The Carnegie Museum of Montgomery County.

Friday marks the 20-year anniversary of the opening of the new Crawfordsville District Public Library (CDPL) building. We also celebrate the final payment on the bonds for the building. That’s right – your library building is paid off! To mark this momentous occasion, we are offering a free cookie made specially for CDPL by Cope’s Cravings to library patrons on September 19 (while supplies last).

Be sure to also visit the second floor of the library, which has a display commemorating the construction, dedication, and opening of the new building. A section of the display is dedicated to the Carnegie building across the street and older items that used to be integral to the running of a library. This display will be available into December.

The “new” building and library staff still offer many of the same services that were offered 20 years ago: circulating collections of books and other items, storytimes and other educational and entertaining programs, a quiet space to read, access to public internet-accessible computers, assistance with your questions, and local history research. We also offer newer services, including technology classes and drop-in hours, loans of hotspots and Chromebooks, and wireless printing.

Over the past 20 years, the library building has received an average of 123,114 visits a year, and library users have borrowed an average of 154,991 items each year.

Along with our circulating collections, other services have been used heavily. In the past 20 years, library staff members have offered approximately 10,820 programs with over 226,000 attendees; answered over 500,600 questions; and assisted with 551,360 uses of the public internet computers.

Readers love their libraries, and the following titles in our nonfiction collection are about libraries, their history, the love readers have for them, and the fight to keep them open and free of censorship: The Library: A Fragile History by Andrew Pettegree (027.009 Pet); The Writer’s Library: The Authors You Love on the Books That Changed Their Lives (028.9 Wri); Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out by Shannon Reed (028.9 Reed); That Librarian: The Fight Against Book Banning in America by Amanda Jones (020.92 Jones); and The Book Collectors: A Band of Syrian Rebels and the Stories That Carried Them Through a War by Delphine Minoui (956.9104 Min).

Because libraries seem so magical when we are children, it is natural that libraries feature in many children’s stories: All the Books by Hayley Rocco (j E Rocco); The Secret Library by Kekla Magoon (j FIC Magoon); The Library Fish by Alyssa Satin Capucilli (j E Capucilli); Alpacas Make Terrible Librarians!! by Kristi Mahoney (j E Mahoney); Jack the Library Cat by Marietta Apollonio (j E Apo); and Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library by Chris Grabenstein (j FIC Gra).

Libraries are a favorite location for mystery murders to occur: Mrs. Christie at the Mystery Guild Library by Amanda Chapman (FIC Chapman Christie); The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill (FIC Gen); The Last Heir to Blackwood Library by Hester Fox (FIC Fox); The Case of the Missing Books: A Mobile Library Mystery, by Ian Samson (FIC Sam); Off the Shelf by Emily Thomas (FIC Thomas Secrets); The Boxcar Librarian by Brianna Labuskes (FIC Labuskes); and That Night in the Library by Eva Jurczyk (FIC Jurczyk)

Other genres also make use of libraries, particularly fantasy, but also romantic, suspense, and general fiction: In the Stacks: Short Stories about Libraries and Librarians (FIC In); The Booklover’s Library by Madeline Martin (FIC Martin); The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern (FIC Mor); The Midnight Library by Matt Haig (FIC Haig); The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson (FIC Ric); and The Invisible Library series by Genevieve Cogman (FIC Cogman Invisible).

Many of these titles are also available in e-book and e-audiobook formats through OverDrive (Libby) and Hoopla.

Explore our website or call 765-362-2242 to learn more about the library’s services and programs. The library’s regular open hours are Monday-Thursday 9 am-9 pm, Friday-Saturday 9 am-5 pm, and Sunday 1-5 pm.