Free to Be: January

This year marks the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It’s an important historical birthday for the United States, and we will be celebrating it all year-round with our new Free to Be series. With respect to Marlo Thomas, our Free to Be posts will be celebrating unique freedoms we enjoy as Americans. And first up, we’re looking at how we’re free to learn.

Continue reading “Free to Be: January”

Last Chance To Be Part of the New Building’s Story!

Our fundraising appeal postcard shows the frame going up back in October

Next summer, we should be moving into our new library. It’s an exciting time for us, but our work is not quite done!

We have raised all the money we need to build the building, but we still need to raise money for furnishings.

Continue reading “Last Chance To Be Part of the New Building’s Story!”

Groundbreaking! New Library, Here We Come!

Earlier this week, we broke ground on our new library! This moment has been years in the making! A big thank you to everyone who’s volunteered, donated, helped us spread the word, and more to help make this dream a reality. Also, a big thank you to everyone who turned out to support us on what ended up being a beautiful day, perfect for a groundbreaking ceremony.

Continue reading “Groundbreaking! New Library, Here We Come!”

There’s Still Time to be Part of This Story!

As many of you know, the Berryville Public Library has long needed a new building, and we have been raising money for that since 2021.

And, today, we have some very exciting news.

Continue reading “There’s Still Time to be Part of This Story!”

Friend the Library!

Friends of the Berryville Library gather around as Mayor Tim McKinney signs a proclamation celebrating Friends of Libraries Week.

This week is National Friends of Libraries Week, which means it is the perfect time to celebrate and tout our very own Friends of the Berryville Library group!

Continue reading “Friend the Library!”

Summer Reading 2024 Update

Thanks so much to everyone who participated in our summer reading program! We had 299 readers of all ages who recorded 10,725 hours in 8 weeks. In addition to the reading challenge, we hosted a range of programs including a hot air balloon demonstration.

Continue reading “Summer Reading 2024 Update”

$150K Down, $150K to Go Before December 31st!

In early November, our Berryville Library Building Project launched a fundraising challenge: raise $300,000 before the end of the year. If we reach this goal, we have an anonymous donor who will donate $100,000 to the building fund. The combined $400,000 from this challenge would get us to $3.2 million already raised since April 2021 and allow us to set a date to break ground in 2024. The plan is to then raise the remaining $300,000 needed during the building process.

In November, we raised an amazing $150,000, 50% of our goal, through a mailing, radio spots on our local KTHS and KUAF stations, and a telethon on KTHS.

We cannot thank the people who donated and helped us with the telethon and mailing and other fundraising efforts enough. However, we still need to raise that other 50% to reach our goal!

Continue reading “$150K Down, $150K to Go Before December 31st!”

Nothing’s Sweeter Than Being a Friend of the Library

Friends board members and volunteers gathered around one of the kids’ tables. We’ve outgrown the library! Help us build a new one.

It’s October, which means it’s time to start renewing your Friends of the Berryville Library memberships! Or joining for the first time. 🙂

We’ve had a really eventful year for the Friends, so keep reading to learn more about how the building project and other Friends work is progressing.

Continue reading “Nothing’s Sweeter Than Being a Friend of the Library”

We Get By With a Little Help From Our Friends (Of the Berryville Library)

If you’ve been following our blog for any length of time or are a resident of Carroll County, you likely know about our quest to raise money for a new library building. Whenever people ask us what they can do to help, donating to our Berryville Library Building Project fund probably comes to mind first. And, of course, that’s a fantastic way to help. But if you really want to help, we ask that you also join the Friends of the Berryville Library.

This week is National Friends of Libraries Week. Friends groups are indispensable allies for libraries everywhere, but our Friends group is particularly important to us because it has been one of the driving forces in helping us reach our goal of building a new library.

Continue reading “We Get By With a Little Help From Our Friends (Of the Berryville Library)”

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

As we’ve done the past two summers, we hosted a fundraising/reading summer challenge--every hour read equals a dollar for the building fund. Except this year was our boldest challenge yet–25,000 hours for $25,000 in just 8 weeks. How’d we do?!

Continue reading “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”