Tiny Library Article
Small-town library serves its own is at first glance a sweet article about a tiny library. But as a librarian, things bother me about it. First would be that the hours of this library are amazingly few. They are open only 4 hours a week! Sad. Then we have horrible quotes like, "After a while, when you put it on the shelf, you know where to put it." This from a woman who has worked there for six years. Yes, libraries have a system for shelving books. That way you can find things again. And finally the awful mention that the librarian loves working at the library because she can read "practically all the time" is very sad.
Now, I know that some libraries are way underfunded and understaffed. But the low number of hours combined with a librarian who reads all the time is not going to create a positive place that will draw people in, much less serve the whole community.
As a director of a small library, we have to start insisting that even librarians in tiny communities and tiny libraries have to know more than where the books go on the shelf. Where is the passion for service? For children? For information? For connecting books with people? For all of the things that make working in libraries wonderful?