Misc. Notes
My Memories of the DuBois Public Library
By Maxine Albert Barron
On the Fiftieth Anniversary of the DuBois Public Library, I thinkabout my first library card. I received it in the first library fromthe first librarian, Miss Inez Crandall. But I remember her mostvividly for her dramatic delivery of ?Why The Chimes Rang? during avisit to my First Ward classroom.
Just a little later, I recall the Summer Vacation Reading Club and thegolf star reports on the ?books read? which I made almost every day tothe Library Assistants ? Martha Moorehead (Schwem) and Nora JaneGoodman (Geisler). These reports led to my first speaking i9nvitation? a talk about the Summer Vacation Reading Club Program which I madeat the time the Library moved to its present location.
The day after my high school graduation in June 1927, I started fulltime work as a library Assistant under Miss Edna Dinwiddie, whoreplaced Miss Crandall about that time. My formal training I LibraryScience started the next summer at Millersville State Teachers Collegeunder a scholarship from the Pennsylvania State Library Association.
It was while working on a Pennsylvania Library Association conventionin Altoona some time later that I first met Carl William Hull, thenlibrarian at the Indiana Free Public Library. I never thought at thattime that he would be coming to DuBois before long to succeed GladysTuke Seymour (Hellerwill) as Librarian.
During those depression years, I worked with Mr. Hull, as AssistantLibrarian, on what now seems to have been an almost endless series oflibrary conventions, Works Progress Administration writing projects,and National Youth Administration book mending projects, in additionto handling our ever-growing circulation.
After Pearl Harbour, the DuBois Public Library became a depot for thecollection of books for servicemen. The Mr. Hull took a leave ofabsence to organize overseas libraries for the American Red Cross.
For a few months, I served as Acting Librarian until I left DuBois forwartime Washington, D.C. after my marriage to former DuBoisUndergraduate Center professor, Jim Barron.
Thus, in February 1943, my sixteen years of work in the DuBois Public Library came to an end.
/signed/ Tuesday
22 September 1970.
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