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In last week's article, there were high hopes to have the Mifflin County Library moved into the new building at 123 North Wayne Street, Lewistown by August 1974. Well, with one thing and another, the new building didn't open until March 9, 1975. Or I should say, the Grand Opening ceremony wasn't held until March 9. I have photos of the staff moving books and getting organized.
I recognize the book shelves that we still have 50 years later, as well as the dumbwaiter, which is still at the library but hasn't worked in about fifteen years. I have to wonder if the electric dumbwaiter was viewed as a great piece of modern engineering at the time. It would have saved a lot of physical strain on the staff.
Many people attended the reopening. According to one Sentinel article, there were more than 100 people.
Why the need for the new building? I've written about this before in my many months of recording library history. But the real reason is accessibility. That's really why we change.
The library on Brown Street had so many books in it that it was inaccessible to people. Some people were, let's face it, freaked out. The books were piled all over the place and it was hard for patrons to move around, hard for patrons to find what they needed. And because there were a few steps leading into the library, it was hard for some people to enter the building. I'm curious about the bathrooms. I don't know if, in 1975, people talked openly about bathroom accessibility like we do now, but I imagine that the bathrooms were in need of an upgrade just like the rest of the building.
Following the ceremony on March 9, the public was permitted to tour the whole library, even the lower level. I have a wonderful photo of an open basement. I can't figure out if it shows the (now) children's library since the whole lower level was open with the exception of the community room. In looking at the photos from the shin-dig, I can see that a lot is still the same. We still have the book drop that goes into the building (although when we put in the elevator, we had to move it over by a few feet). The magazine area is unchanged, with the exception of new furniture. And of course, all of the metal bookcases.
The differences include the card catalogs. In the photos, there are several of the cabinets with the little drawers that you pull out and look through the index cards to find the book titles in the collection. Another big change was Mrs. Stuckenrath, the library director since 1948, retired on Dec. 31, 1974 before the construction was completed.
The board held a testimonial dinner on April 16, 1975 for her; I'm not sure if she attended the open house. A photo of her isn't in any that I have of the event. My understanding is that her health had started to decline. In one of the board meeting minutes, it is noted that she fainted in her office.
With the new library building, came a new director and a new building for the Kish Branch Library in Belleville. More on that next week.
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Susan Miriello is the Executive Director of the Mifflin County Library. New books added to the collection include: The Summer Book Club by Susan Mallery; The Busy Body by Kemper Donovan; and Crosshairs: a Michael Bennett thriller by James Patterson.