February 12, 2025
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Library pushing envelope of role in community

ST. GEORGE – Jackson Memorial Library in Tenants Harbor is changing the concept of a community library.

The library, which serves all the villages in the Knox County peninsula town of St. George, is expanding its outreach program, especially for its youth.

The library has two paid staff members – library director Yvonne Gloede and youth activities coordinator Toni Small who works part time – and up to 30 volunteers.

Sally Zierden, a volunteer and chairwoman of the youth activities program, said her committee helps Small plan her programs and determines where she needs help.

Zierden said she got some new ideas when she started reading professional library journals that talked about using community resources. One example that stood out was a library in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., which has a youth program very similar to the one implemented at Jackson.

The library also has become a resource for the St. George School, she pointed out. “We’re just another resource for them,” she said

Zierden gave credit to volunteer Susan Bates for her design of the Web site, which hosts a community calendar for the town.

The library is in the Route 131 bungalow of the late Mary Elinor Jackson, who shared books from her personal library with friends and neighbors. After her death in 1933, friends bought her books and house and donated them to the town.

The town, in turn, agreed to dedicate the building to be used as a privately run library.

Now every nook and cranny in the former home is used. The children’s space occupies the second floor, where a new computer, bought with a grant, takes up a corner. Books donated for the annual book sale, a fundraiser, have to be kept in the basement. Whenever there’s a library program, such as a photography exhibit or poetry reading, shelves have to be pushed aside to create a common space.

At the 2005 annual town meeting, residents voted to deed land across the street from the library for a new facility. The library has 10 years from the date of the transfer to raise private money and construct a 7,000- to 8,000-square-foot building.

Bill Zierden, president of the Jackson Memorial Library board of trustees, sees the new building as a gathering place for St. George, a center for lifelong learning and a source of support for the town.

Then he got the idea to reach out to the town’s youths.

If you want to just lend books to retirees, you don’t need a new building, he said.

The job description for a youth activities coordinator was written for Small in 2007, Zierden said. Now she is leaving to attend college to study art.

During the time she has been at Jackson, she has developed eight youth programs for six institutions, including the library, St. George School, Herring Gut Learning Center, St. George Sailing Foundation, Trekkers, and Blueberry Cove of Tanglewood, with such projects as the Book Fair, Maine Community Heritage Project for 2008, and the grades 5-8 Book Clubs for 2007 and 2008.

The book clubs involve adult mentors to work with the children. Small said only girls joined at first, but this year five boys are participating in addition to 20 girls.

She’s proud of such projects as World Ocean Day, Make A Book 2007, with Debbie Atwell of the Thomaston Public Library, and the Ed Ingalls Memorial Maritime Program in 2007 and 2008.

Small sees the River of Words project, a California-based poetry writing program for children in grades 2, 4, 5, 6 and 7, as one of the major accomplishments.

Altogether 79 students wrote 94 haikus to send to the River of Words contest in Berkeley, Calif., she said.

gchappell@bangordailynews.net

236-4598


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