Public libraries: Not just for books anymore - and no shushing
Nov. 27—N eed some artwork to brighten up your new office?
How about a cotton candy maker or popcorn machine for your next party?
Maybe you want to learn the ukulele, take up snowshoeing or get a telescope for stargazing, but you'd like to try it out first?
Head to your local library.
New Hampshire's public libraries now offer a wealth of items that patrons can borrow. The "Library of Things," as it's called, is catching on in the Granite State.
"Libraries have always been very creative about addressing the needs in their communities," says Denise van Zanten, director of the Manchester City Library, which offers a variety of artworks that patrons can borrow.
The Library of Things is just the latest adaptation, said van Zanten, who is president of the New Hampshire Library Association.
It's about "items that you wouldn't normally buy for yourself because it's a one-time use," she said. "You can go to the library and borrow it now instead of having to pay for it or rent it."
Michael York, New Hampshire's state librarian, says a lot of people "have antiquated thoughts that a library is for fiction on the main floor, and nonfiction on the second floor."
Every community in New Hampshire has a public library, all 234 of them, York said. Those libraries constantly respond to community needs and wants, he said.
Many libraries began lending artwork in the 1960s, York said. In the 1980s, they offered VCRs and movies. About 20 years ago, some started buying specialty cake pans for patrons to borrow.
Now some libraries offer video game systems, tools and telescopes.
"I think this is the natural evolution that we get in libraries all the time," York said. "We recognize something that needs to be done."
York is happy to see libraries embrace new ideas. "I started my career back when the earth was cooling, and I've seen these dramatic changes that libraries have adapted to," he said.
Snowshoes to voltage converters
One such innovation was the New Hampshire Downloadable Book Consortium, which now includes 205 of the state's 234 libraries, York said.
After New Hampshire received $2.3 million from the American Rescue Plan Act for libraries, the state library sent the first round of that funding to all of the public libraries. A second round was in the form of a competitive grant program, and some libraries used that money to purchase items for a Library of Things, York said.
Mindy Atwood, director of the Abbott Library in Sunapee, said her library has been building its collection of "things" over time. "Part of the vision of a Library of Things is that whole idea that informs everything we do as libraries: equal access," she said. "A public library is about shared resources."
One of the first purchases her library made was snowshoes and poles. "Some people might snowshoe every day and that's awesome, but some people just want to do it once in a while or they want to try it out," Atwood said.
The snowshoes have proven popular in the seasonal community, particularly when patrons have friends come to visit, she said.
Another popular item at the Sunapee library is a 6-foot piano mat — like the one featured in the Tom Hanks movie "Big."
"Grandparents who have grandkids visiting will check it out so that then there's something fun at Grandma and Grampa's house," Atwood said.
Abbott Library also loans mobile hotspots, knitting needles and crochet hooks — and a kit of voltage converters for international travel.
"That's something that's great to own collectively," Atwood said. "Because in the town of Sunapee, we're not all traveling internationally at the same time. It's housed at the library and people don't have to buy their own; they can just borrow ours."
D. Scott Campbell, assistant director at Wiggin Memorial Library in Stratham, has been putting together an online catalog of items patrons can borrow.
Some are what Campbell calls "reverse technology."
The library loans personal CD players, a boombox, cassette tape player and a DVD player. "We have a lot of techno gizmos like that," Campbell said.
Patrons also can borrow trail cameras to see what creatures live in their neighborhoods. A portable PA system is a popular item among local organizations, who borrow it for meetings.
Wiggin Memorial Library also has a radon detector, thanks to a patron who bought one for his own home and then decided to donate one to the library so that other families in town could check for the odorless gas, Campbell said.
Garden tools to telescopes
Some libraries have formed partnerships to expand what they have to offer their patrons.
Libraries in Northwood, Pembroke, Pittsfield and Epsom successfully applied together for grant funding to create a Library of Things for each facility.
"We were trying to focus on items that would be fun for our patrons to use," said Donna Bunker, director of the Chesley Memorial Library in Northwood.
Her library now has a cotton candy machine, a canopy tent, a hot dog steamer and a popcorn maker. More practical items include an electric garden tiller and a carpet cleaner.
And if someone wants something that one of the other three libraries has, they can borrow it from that library, Bunker said.
Bunker used the Library of Things herself when her daughter got married last summer. They borrowed the canopy tent and the hot dog steamer for the reception.
More than 100 public libraries in New Hampshire now have telescopes to lend, thanks to a program of the New Hampshire Astronomical Society.
Pete Smith, library telescope program chair for NHAS, said the program dates to 2008, when one of his group's members decided to donate a telescope to his local library in Tamworth.
In the 14 years since, NHAS has placed more than 150 telescopes in New Hampshire libraries. Relying on donations, the organization purchases the telescopes, which members customize to make them easier for amateurs to use, Smith said. They also maintain the telescopes at no cost.
Smith said libraries and his group have a shared purpose. "Our mission is about education and teaching the public about astronomy," he said "Libraries have a similar mission, if you will, in educating the public on whatever topic."
The program that started here in New Hampshire has now gone national and even international, Smith said. "The concept of libraries lending out telescopes just really took off," he said.
NHAS is now expanding the library program to include binoculars that can be used for stargazing, Smith said.
Campbell in Stratham said his library was one of the early adopters of the telescope program. "It's the granddaddy of loanable things here in New Hampshire," he said.
That encouraged librarians to consider lending out other "things," he said. "At some point we figured out if we can circulate a telescope, we can absolutely circulate a CD player or whatever," he said.
A consortium of local community organizations developed Monadnock Grows Together, a seed and tool library created with grant funding from the Cheshire County Conservation District.
Gail Zachariah, head of engagement and youth services at Keene Public Library, said her library offers patrons vegetable and pollinator flower seeds, gardening tools, seed growing kits and even canning equipment. Some bring seeds back to the library when they harvest their gardens.
The Keene library has embraced the Library of Things concept, she said. Popular items include robots, ukuleles, sewing machines, a film-to-digital converter, board games and a soldering kit.
VCRs to Nintendo Switch
Sunapee's Atwood, incoming president of the New Hampshire Library Association, sees all this as a natural evolution of the mission.
Public libraries were created at a time when books were prohibitively expensive for many people, she said. "And so this idea of sharing the resources of books, making it equally and publicly available to everyone, there was an understanding that was good for our society," she said.
As society has changed, so have libraries, Atwood said.
When VCRs were popular, public libraries invested in movies, she said. Now Abbott Library lends Nintendo Switch games — a decision Atwood defends to skeptics who question why a library would offer such things to young patrons.
"It really goes back to that model of shared resources," she said. "Wouldn't it be a shame if only the families with children who could afford to buy those games were given the opportunity to learn and grow in that way?"
Manchester's van Zanten shares that vision.
"We've always adapted, and if we see a need in the community, we try to fill it as much as we can within our mission," she said. "Helping people with things that they either can't afford or don't want to buy is kind of fun."
That makes libraries even more vital in this technological age, librarians say.
"As long as we keep expanding our vision for how we serve the public, we stay relevant to people." Sunapee's Atwood said.
Meanwhile, one stereotype about libraries is history, librarians say. "We don't shush in libraries anymore," Atwood said.
Indeed, Manchester's Van Zanten said public libraries are now busy community centers, with classes and programs for all ages. "We try not to go around shushing people," she said. "We're usually the ones making the noise."
York pushes back against any suggestion that libraries are obsolete.
"Libraries are here to stay," he said. "This nonsense that libraries are not needed anymore because of the 24-hour news cycle and Twitter and Elon Musk and everybody else — nonsense."
"We need libraries, and libraries will survive."
