We have some really wonderful, hard-to-find and hard to replace reference books in our popular genealogy and local history section of the Steele Memorial Library. But, even if these books don’t leave the library, they have seen a lot of use over the years. Many are in disrepair, and quite a few could be repaired, but were beyond what we could to do to responsibly repair them in the library. We needed to send some out for a complete rebinding, but our small budget couldn’t possibly begin to cover the cost.
That’s why we are so, so, grateful to The Friends of CCLD! http://www.steele.lib.ny.us/friends.htm
The Chemung County Library District Friends made it possible for us to send the books in the most dire need of rebinding out to a professional bookbinder. They came back in this week and they are like brand-new books! Some titles that were falling apart but now are in wonderful new bindings: “Refugees of 1776 from Long Island to Connecticut”, “History of Waverly, NY”, “History of Bradford County, PA”, and “Thirty Thousand Names of Immigrants to Pennsylvania from 1727 to 1776”, among others! As a special bonus, we can now offer to our patrons for the first time a 4-volume set of the Genealogy of Early Connecticut families. This was donated to us but we couldn’t put it on the shelves due to its deteriorating leather covers. They are now in pristine condition and able to be used by our researchers.
As a genealogy and local history department, we have two main mandates regarding our collection. The first to acquire items that will be of use to people researching genealogy and local history. The second is to maintain these items in a responsible way to ensure that library patrons 100+ years from now will have access to this important and hard-to-obtain information. Thank you, Friends of CCLD, for helping us keep our collection healthy. We couldn’t have done this without your help.
Yours,
Maggie Young
