What a wonderful school year we’ve had at the Library! As we reflect on our first full school year of back to “regularly scheduled” programs, we can’t help but call it a total success! We’ve enjoyed classroom visits to the Library, special Storytimes with preschool friends, Library card sign-ups, and early-out Thursdays. We’ve had fun playing games, making crafts, watching movies, and visiting with friends. Please remember that Thursday, May 18 is the final after school program of the year at the Library. Thank you for joining us all school year!
We’re deep into summer reading prep and so excited to continue having fun, learning, and finding our voices with you. Summer Reading officially begins June 1 through July 31. During the final week of school, Solon students preschool through 7th grade will each receive a summer reading backpack with a program brochure and reading logs to get started, 8th graders will receive reading logs, high school students are invited to pick up a backpack and forms from the high school library. Additional brochures and reading logs will be available at the Library after May 26. You can get an early look at the details for summer on our website, solon.lib.ia.us, under the Services menu, click on Summer Reading.
Library Events
Try new recipes, and chat with other foodies at Cookbook Club on Saturday, May 20 at 11:00 a.m. This month is all about Food Science — chemistry, physics, physiology, microbiology and biochemistry all play a role in how food is made and how the recipes develop. Test out a new recipe (or two!) and bring it to share.
Game Night is Thursday, May 25 at 6:30 p.m. Join us for a fun night of Cribbage, Scrabble, or try something new. It’s a great time to get out and socialize with a little friendly competition!
Join us Tuesday mornings at 10:30 for Storytime! We’ll share songs, books, and games with friends and caregivers. Each month youth services librarian, Lily, selects a new theme and each week the details they share are expanded. May is all about food! Growing food, buying food, cooking food and sharing food. This summer Lily will expand to a Family Storytime, the second Saturday of the month at 10:30 a.m. This will be an all-ages story time, and we’ll continue to share songs, books, and games together. Join us on Saturdays, June 10, July 8, and August 12 for Family Storytime.
Save the date to help us kick off the summer with a FOAM PARTY! On Monday, June 5 from 2-4 p.m. we invite everyone to join us on the Library lawn for a foam party. Wear clothing (or swimsuits) that can get wet and dirty, bring a towel too.
Library Access
Regular Library hours are Monday-Thursday from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Friday-Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed Sundays.
Please note the Library will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Friday, May 19 due to our monthly staff in-service. The Library will be closed on Monday, May 29 in observance of Memorial Day.
Don’t forget, the digital library is always available! Find an eBook, eAudiobook, magazines and more with Bridges, or with the Libby app on your favorite smart device. You can even stream classic films, discover new favorites, and more with Kanopy on your favorite smart device.
Everyone is welcome at the Library and our programs. Please contact us with access needs.
What’s New?
Learn something new or find a new passion with something on the new non-fiction shelves.
The Day the World Came to Town: 9/11 in Gander, Newfoundland by Jim DeFede. Read the true story behind the smash hit musical Come from Away (featured at Hancher Fall 2023) that shares the experiences of the citizens of Gander, Newfoundland, who were hosts to the more than six thousand passengers of thirty-eight U.S.-bound jetliners forced to land there in the wake of the September 11th attacks.
A Fever in the Heartland by Timothy Egan. The Roaring Twenties–the Jazz Age–has been characterized as a time of Gatsby frivolity. But it was also the height of the uniquely American hate group, the Ku Klux Klan. Their domain was not the old Confederacy, but the Heartland and the West. They hated Blacks, Jews, Catholics and immigrants in equal measure, and took radical steps to keep these people from the American promise. And the man who set in motion their takeover of great swaths of America was a charismatic charlatan named D.C. Stephenson.
Stephenson was a magnetic presence whose life story changed with every telling. Within two years of his arrival in Indiana, he’d become the Grand Dragon of the state and the architect of the strategy that brought the group out of the shadows – their message endorsed from the pulpits of local churches, spread at family picnics and town celebrations. Judges, prosecutors, ministers, governors and senators across the country all proudly proclaimed their membership. But at the peak of his influence, it was a seemingly powerless woman – Madge Oberholtzer – who would reveal his secret cruelties, and whose deathbed testimony finally brought the Klan to their knees.
When Books Went to War by Molly Guptill Manning. When America entered World War II in 1941, we faced an enemy that had banned and burned 100 million books. Outraged librarians launched a campaign to send free books to American troops, gathering 20 million hardcover donations. Two years later, the War Department and the publishing industry stepped in with an extraordinary program: 120 million specially printed paperbacks designed for troops to carry in their pockets and rucksacks in every theater of war. These small, lightweight Armed Services Editions were beloved by the troops and are still fondly remembered today. Soldiers read them while waiting to land at Normandy, in hellish trenches in the midst of battles in the Pacific, in field hospitals, and on long bombing flights. This pioneering project not only listed soldiers’ spirits, but also helped rescue The Great Gatsby from obscurity and made Betty Smith, author of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, into a national icon.
Solon Public Library news
May 17, 2023
BAM POW friends busy at a Build It activity. The Solon Public Library’s after school programs end for the school year on Thursday, May 18.