A Present Waiting to be Opened

It is a sheer joy to see how many people care about the library," says Yvonne Oliger, Director of the Brown County Public Library. We are speaking at a table outside her office in the "old" library amongst piles of books and children here to study after school and wait for their rides home. I ask her about the new library building being constructed on the north side of town.

"Sometime in '94 or '95 we were preparing a long-range plan and one of the things that came out was whether or not we might ever build a new library. I said that there will be a series of things that will happen telling us if it's a good idea."

Soon after they received, "A substantial bequest from two library people: Mr. Foster McKinney and Dr. Culbertson. They gave us the idea that we might actually try for a new library.

"We did site selection first, pinpointing property around the community and patrons came in and evaluated our findings. We actually ended up buying two pieces of property and we didn't tear anything down," she adds.

"About that time, knowing that we were looking to buy property, Senator Vi Simpson helped us get a `Build Indiana' grant (for $125,000). The next piece that fell into place was the Brown County Community Foundation helping us acquire a $200,000 Lilly Endowment Initiative Grant. So we started planning on building a library."

Then they interviewed architectural firms and Ratio Architects was chosen. An Indianapolis firm, Ratio "is known for historic preservation and planning. It means we were building a building that looked like it belonged here. That was part of the community. They've been wonderful to work with."

One more piece of the puzzle dropped into place when the Onya La Tour Community Center decided to be part of the new building. They are presently occupying a building that was once the town hall. "The Onya La Tour Center deeded the property over to us and we in turn sold it back to the town because they had a use for it. That money went right back into the project.

"What we have then is a two story building. The upper level is truly library and has the collection and circulation and the lower level is more like a community center in the spirit of Onya La Tour, who was a local benefactress. Her gift brings a meeting room that is approximately 30 by 60 and can be divided into 3 rooms. Part of the Lilly gift for Initiative provides distance learning, and also helps pay for that space. What we've done is pooled people's money together to try and get something more for everyone."

The Brown County Literacy Coalition also threw their hat into the ring. "It's a community based coalition. They will have offices and tutoring space. This will be their first permanent home. The minute you walk in the lower level door you will see their offices. We hope that will encourage people to use the services. They've had a great deal of success in the jail program, but they have also been working with students, children and families, and in the workplace.

"We're also looking at eventually providing a distance education site. If you're a single parent, the head of the household, and you're trying to take classes at Ivy Tech to better yourself, you are just one car repair away from the rest of your future. We were hoping that by having distance education and working with Ivy Tech and other universities, a person could take a class via the new technology at their home library."

Yvonne grew up in Montana. After receiving her undergraduate degree from Montana State University she came to Indiana for her library masters degree. "My husband worked at Cummins, and when we got married we moved to Bloomington. He drove to Columbus and I drove to Bedford because I was children's librarian there for 13 years. One day I happened to open the newspaper and they were advertising this position, and I thought that would be pretty wonderful!

"I quietly came over and looked over the library and then I met the interview team and the board. I really enjoyed my conversations with them and they offered me the position. I've loved it ever since. That was in May of '92.

"Then we had to look for a house and you know it's interesting looking for houses in Brown County. We moved in February of '93.

"That was the year it snowed quite a bit and the people helping us move couldn't get up our drive. So they carried our belongings around for four or five days. That told us how wonderful people are in Brown County.

"Coming from Montana, which is a drier climate, and a lot sparser, it took some getting used to the lushness of this landscape. Where we live we have a great big open yard, a vista, and these glorious trees. I'm still fascinated by the birds, the whippoorwill, the little tree frogs. There are none of those in Montana.

"I woke one morning and there were deer in the yard and cardinals against the white snow. When I go out at night I can see stars from one end of the sky to the other. We absolutely love it."

It's been a year since work began on the new library. "We broke ground ceremonially on January 2nd and it was fun to turn the soil over. We started really pushing dirt around the 13th of January and we're going to be in our new building in December of this year. We may not have all our shelving installed yet but the building will be ours."

Oliger points out that, "This library has a rich history of benefactors. The fireplace was donated as were the children's area furnishings. The stair-rail is being manufactured by a local blacksmith. We will have a book of giving and a giving wall to recognize the gifts of all the people who have made themselves a part of this library."

One story she likes recall sums up her feelings about all of the library's friends. "One day I saw two patrons who had given us gifts and I walked up and thanked them. One had given me a gift of ten dollars and the other a gift of a thousand dollars. And what I know about each of those patrons is the gifts were of equal value. They gave what they felt they could."

The library would be far more expensive to build without the help of many volunteers."We've been landscaping the library in an effort to save money for three or four weeks now. We've had twenty volunteers at a time working. It's been wonderful."

Volunteers, including members of the Rotary and the Lions Club recently drove up to the Carmel Public Library to help Oliger dismantle all of their old shelving, loading it into semi-trailers.

"The new library has windows on three sides. We're planning spaces where people can be comfortable on a sofa, read, enjoy the sun, and watch the seasons change. We've a fireplace on one end of the building that stretches all the way down to the meeting room below. It's faced in Brown County foundation stone that was donated to us.

"They don't teach you how to build a library in school. Most library directors will probably only do one building in their life. And some never do. I'm lucky enough to have this one. But it wouldn't have been possible without the library board. The president of the board is David Martin, who was a schoolteacher. He's been a builder and has been on the site daily. His knowledge of building practices has saved the community a significant amount of money. It has also provided the building with grace."

She credits all the board's members with important contributions in making the building possible.

George Bredewater, who has stopped by to photograph the new building says, "I serve on the board because of her willingness to help and advance the education level of everybody, not just children, everybody."

"I love public libraries. I tell the children here," she laughs, "that when I was a child Saturday was the best day and the worst day. It was the best day because I could go to the library and get ten books, which was my quota. It was the worst day because I had to go all over the house to find the ten I'd checked out the week before and bring them back.

"I like the mission of public libraries. The whole purpose for being a librarian is to provide services. For me as a director it means I'm to take care of the structure so that everybody has a library to enjoy. That's basically what I think my role in life is. To use whatever resources I have to provide library service for all."

She tells me one final story. "Somebody from out of the community was looking at our library and said `People in Brown County must really value their library service to build a building as beautiful as this.'

"We're like a present just waiting to be opened."