The Manlius Library recently celebrated 100 years of service to the community with a celebration on Oct. 17, which included an unveiling of a new teen room and the addition of an 18-piece Audubon gallery.
In addition to the unveilings, a special story time with Miss Karen kicked off the event at 10:15 a.m., and musical performances were held throughout the day by pianist Tom Reitano, the FM Singers vocal group and violinist Jessica Tumajyan of the CNY Music Teachers Association. Throughout the day, attendees could watch showings of silent films made in the 1910s and play traditional old-fashioned games. Food and drink for the event were donated by numerous businesses in the Manlius community.
The newly renovated teen room was made possible with a $25,000 grant from the state which was created to allow for needed repairs and renovations and to improve energy-efficiency in libraries across the state. The new teen room is located in the former quiet reading room and now houses the young adult section of the library along with charging stations, laptops for use within the library and furniture that is easy to move around. According to Manlius Library Director Jen Milligan, this helps to allow a space for collaboration and use of technology.
One unique aspect to the new teen center in the “Cent-ennial” desktop made out of pennies which creates a space for anyone who wishes to use it to use technology and charge them at the same time.
The John James Audubon Gallery print collection was also unveiled at the centennial celebration and was donated by Harold and Barbara Jones, residents of the town of Manlius. Harold is a retired professor of Spanish literature at Syracuse University who got the idea to donate an Audubon print of a swan because it is a symbol for the village of Manlius, but didn’t see a good place to put it. With the renovation of the teen room, wall space was made available and Jones got the idea to expand on the swan print and decided to donate a total of 18 pieces that relate the bird life in the local area to commemorate the centennial milestone.
“This library is in the top one percent of libraries of this size in the whole country. I thought having a focal point of something that is both beautiful and historically interesting would help give a focus to the library and encourage all other kinds of library programs in the future,” said Jones.
Founded in 1915, the Manlius Library was first housed in the Presbyterian Church with 700 donated books. Within a year, it moved to the Russell house on Seneca Street, where it stayed for 26 years. In 1941, the library moved back to the former site of the Presbyterian Church, where a new red brick municipal building had been erected on the corner of Washington and East Seneca streets. The library and municipal departments outgrew the building by 1981, and moved into the current location at One Arkie Albanese Ave., a former elementary school. Ten years ago, thanks to the generosity of the Manlius community, the library expanded to its current space.
Manlius Library serves the village of Manlius and town of Pompey. More than 10,000 registered borrowers have active cards and visit the library for innovative and traditional programming and services, from story times to tech help and notary services, with everything in between.
“We love coming here,” said Saraswati K., who has a young son and daughter who participate in library sponsored programs. “It’s a great place to bring the kids to learn, make new friends and have fun.”
Visit manliuslibrary.org to see growing digital resources, including local historical yearbooks, informative lecture recordings, and a huge selection of ebooks, audiobooks, and more through OverDrive, 3M and Hoopla.
