It’s little after 3:15 on a quiet Friday afternoon. A group of kids comes charging through the library front door and runs down the stairs. They’re rushing to get to their architecture and building projects. It’s fun, but, please, it’s not like they are just playing with pasta and mini marshmallows. They have a lot on their minds: materials to cost out, budgets to stick to and deadlines to meet. A new day has arrived on the LPPL children’s floor.

It started in fall 2014 when the new library director, Bambi Pedu, instituted an after-school Homework and Reading Adventure Hour for grades three through five. “We have a great space here for children, and I wanted to start drawing them in. Getting them in the reading habit early is important. It’s something that will stay with them for life.” The former fourth grade teacher allowed that her motives may have been “just a little bit selfish. I missed being around those kids.”

LP resident Karen Armstrong was one of the volunteers who heeded the call for help. A former teacher, certified in nursery through six and grade seven through 12 social studies, she brought along a variety of experience from participation in the children’s literature program, as a board

member of the Children’s Literature Connection of the Capital Region and as advisor to the Charlotte Reading Club at the Farnsworth Middle School in Guilderland.

By spring of 2015, Bambi had recruited Karen for a paid, part-time position, which Karen describes as her “dream job,” taking over the children’s rooms. Every Hero Has a Story was the title of the three-day-a-week summer reading program she ran from July through mid-August. Designed for grades pre-k through five, it kicked off with a lively scavenger hunt attended by upward of 40 youngsters seeking local heroes. They found a fireman, U.S. Marine, police officer, veterinarian, book seller and a soccer coach.

In the following weeks, the kids had visits from other heroes including an Environmental Conservation Officer with his K-9, Diesel, Tamara Cantarano, author of

Adventures of Mac the Dog, and Dylan and Cooper, a theatrical tale-telling duo.

The Friday afterschool workshop series was added this fall. The first three-week session began with the architecture projects. After consulting books on famous architects and buildings, the kids put

together some very imaginative edifices utilizing cardboard, spaghetti, paper, yarn, marshmallows or any “found” materials.

“Magic” is the theme of the second Friday series, which begins this December in

From the LPPL Reading Porch

Director Bambi Pedu and children’s librarian Karen Armstrong at a signing by Kwame Alexander of his Newberry Medal and Coretta Scott King Honor Award winning book, The

Continued

Free math tutoring for local students in grades 6 through 12 is now being

offered by the LPPL. The program was conceived by director Bambi Pedu.

“There are kids out there who need help, but it isn’t always easy for

everyone to find the resources. We’re hoping that by making tutoring

available to all students we can make a difference.”

The plan, beginning December 5, is to have math instructors in the

children’s rooms at 10 each Saturday morning to meet with participants

and assess how they can best help each student. Some may be tutored

individually and others may be helped in small groups, depending upon

needs and schedules. Anyone wishing more information is encouraged to

call Bambi at 523.3200. There will be no cost to participants and students

may come on their own.

Math project goal: tutoring available to all

It’s been a turning point year for children

We’ve got music. Lots of it, about 2,000 CDs, all donated by LP native Norma Jean Lamb. The varied selections include symphonic, chamber and instrumental of the classical, romantic and 20th century periods.

Many patrons from Clinton, Essex, Franklin Library System borrow from the comprehensive jazz collection. Also, to be found in the CD cabinets is a diversified choice of folk or ethnic selections. This month, December, is a popular time for people to come in and borrow from the Christmas music section. Opera is strongly represented, especially with 17 new DVD’s of opera productions.

Ms. Lamb has begun diversifying her donations to include DVD’s of movie classics, musicals and independent production films.

A drawing of Ms. Lamb’s mother, Florence Lamb, a much loved and respected librarian here, hangs on the stairway to the classics. Norma Jean is a retired director of the music department of the Buffalo Erie Library System, who lives in Buffalo, but still spends plenty of time here. She has also given the LPPL an art gallery, dedicated to and named for her late cousin, the artist Guy Brewster Hughes.

which kids talk about magic in books and learn a few tricks.

Special Saturday “Satur Play” programs offered once a month have also been a hit. The first was all about Halloween with crafts and activities, followed by children getting into the winter mode with a November session including old fashion games and classic tales.

This month’s “Satur Play” will be the live presentation of A Christmas Carol by the Hampstead Stage Company from New Hampshire.

And, after that? “The ideas are endless,” says Karen with a laugh.

A wonderful bonus coming from all this activity is to see the kids, who earlier raced down to their architecture projects, coming back up the stairs. Most of them are carrying books.

Music for loan

Linda Blair is the face and the spirit of the LPPL, the person most patrons expect to see when they come through the door. Especially children, as anyone who has substituted for her has learned when faced with crestfallen look of a youngster wanting an explanation: “Where’s Miss Linda?” She is the one who has introduced countless children, including ones now coming in for after school activities as well as their parents, to the library with stories, songs and dancing at her Thursday morning story hours. In April it will have been 40 years since she began working with Therese Kendrick Dixon Patnode. From the beginning, she was drawn to the reading needs of children and pre-kindergarteners, taking it upon herself to become more versed in the field with courses in children’s literature at Skidmore College. Over the years, she has come to remember the reading tastes of many long-time patrons who depend upon her for recommendations from the many books she reads. Her openness to people has led to many longtime friendships, including close ones with a couple of the foreign students who have found a reassuring place in the library due to her kindness. The LPPL trustees and people who work with Linda cannot imagine what the library would have been without her and offer congratulations on her record 40 years serving the community from behind her desk.

Cont...

Therese’s Garden Dedicated

The woman who guided our library for more than three decades, who built and maintained an outstanding collection, and who is still greatly missed, was celebrated early this fall with the dedication of a garden to her memory.

Walking to work on Main Street, Therese Kendrick Dixon Patnode and her West Highland terrier, Laddie, a.k.a. Library Dog, could easily have been cast as villagers from Agatha Christie’s St. Mary Mead. Along with a discriminating mind, schooled in a wide range of fiction, nonfiction and current events, Therese brought a rare variety of kindness, common sense and a sense of humor to her position, qualities that made the library a relaxed and welcoming place for everyone, a culture we try to preserve. She began as an assistant in 1968, becoming library director in 1973 and holding that post until 2003 when she semi-retired to become director emerita until her death in April of 2010. It took a while for the LPPL board of trustees and the members of Therese’s family to decide how to remember her in a way she would have liked. A raised garden, part of the expansion project in the late 1990s, was the answer. It had been beautiful for many years, but lately had become overgrown and sustaining serious damage this past winter. Library trustees, with advice from former president and master library gardener, Heidi Roland, voted funds donated in Therese’s memory, to hire professionals to rebuild a collapsed retaining wall. Then board members Nancy Shurtleff and Keela Rogers, with the help of Nancy’s cousin, Elizabeth Millen, volunteered many hours late this past summer and fall removing out-of-control old growth and replanting. Birds and flora were among Therese’s joys in life,; rolling in the snow and sniffing everything were high on Laddie’s list. They especially enjoyed the back lawn, which beckoned from the other side of her old office door. That is the space that is now their garden.

Bambi Pedu, Library Director

Linda Blair, Assistant Librarian

Ron Huber, Computer Specialist

Lisa Forrest, ILL, PR., Newsletter, Gallery

Kate Curry, Assistant Librarian

Karen Armstrong, Children’s Librarian

Tom Smith, Indoor Maintenance

Kent Pratt, Outdoor Maintenance

Peter Lynch, President

Keela Rogers, Vice President

Barbara Erickson

John DiGiacomo

Nancy Shurtleff

Martha Bullock

Jennifer Briggs

Warm Winter Wishes from

the LPPL Staff & Board of Trustees

Write in your library book Really. It was something Therese encouraged. How many times have you checked one out only to discover you’ve already read it. As a way to discover this (for some of us) increasingly common memory slip before you lug it home, get to chapter 16 and suddenly realize you know whodunit, we suggest you write your initials in the back of the book with a pencil. Really. If you remember.

Visiting librarians are like visiting firemen: They can’t

walk by a library without going in, so it was no surprise

when hundreds stopped by this past October during

the 125th annual New York Library Association meeting.

Most were from large, urban institutions, a far cry from

our small reading library, but they were very

complimentary, and most registered surprise that we

are much bigger than we appear from the sidewalk, and

that we have such an extensive collection.

One of our favorites was a woman who exclaimed: “A

woman told me I had to come in here, because it’s like

walking into The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,

and she was right!”

Assistant librarian Kate Curry utilized some of our

Melville Dewey ephemera in producing the official sign

welcoming participants at the convention center.

Materials about Dewey, his decimal system and samples

of his simplified English spelling system are still on

display here at the library.

NYLA pays a visit

Lake Placid Public Library 2471 Main Street Lake Placid, NY 12946

518.523.3200 www.lakeplacidlibrary.org

Presorted Standard U.S. Postage Paid

Lake Placid, NY 12946 Permit No. 12

We hope to see you here for the Hampstead Stage Company’s live performance of

Charles Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol” on Saturday, Dec. 12, from 3 to 4 p.m.

-This LPPL contribution to the Holiday Village Stroll is funded by a

grant for children’s programs from the Lake Placid Education Foundation.

You’re Invited

We have Kindles to Loan

Thanks to the Lake Placid Lions Club, the library now has two Kindles to loan. They are available to all, but are especially meant for readers who have difficulty seeing normal size print. Several books chosen by the CEF library system are currently available to be downloaded. Users can then adjust the type to whatever size they find comfortable.