By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Let there be cake!
The Wood County District Public Library is cooking plans for the celebration of 150 years since its founding.
Local History Librarian Marnie Pratt said they decided it will be a birthday theme, and the celebration will stretch throughout 2025. The birthday theme will be carried through many of the library’s usual activities, she told the library trustees last week.
“We’ll have lots of opportunities for celebration and lots of opportunities for having cake,” Library Director Michael Penrod said. “Cake always brings them in.”
“We’re adapting things we already offer,” Pratt said.
Craft groups will have birthday themes. Book clubs will read about libraries. The walking tour will focus on the library’s history. There will be historic photo displays.
The Children’s Place will hold a celebration in July to mark 25 years since the Kiwanis Castle was installed. The date is yet to be determined.
The library will solicit birthday cards in which patrons express why the library is important to them.
Pratt said events will occur throughout the district’s sprawling service area including the Walbridge Library. The bookmobile will also carry the message.
“The end goal is that everyone in our service district knows it’s our birthday and has a chance to participate,” she said.
In preparing for the celebration, the library staff has fleshed out the details of its history.
The usual version starts with a group of prominent citizens in 1875 forming the Bowling Green Library Association. That effort though faded. Then the Shakespeare Round Table launched a fundraising drive in 1911 to revive the library.
Penrod said what happened between was less well known.
Using its local history resources including the new digital archive of local newspapers, Pratt and the staff were able to fill in the details including where the Library Association had libraries.
The newspaper also mentioned people agitating for a public library. Many organizations including the Lady Maccabees, which Pratt said she’d never heard of until she did this research, called for a public library.
The Y.M.C.A. did hold a small collection of books to loan.
The revived library opened in 1914 in the back of the Exchange Bank then on the northwest corner of the Four Corners intersection.
The bookmobile service began in 1951. The library was named the Wood County District Public Library in 1969, and the main library in downtown BG was opened in 1974 with the Walbridge branch opening in 1987.
The library will also host two writers in the WCDPL Foundation Series.
Noted British actor Paterson Joseph will visit to discuss his debut novel “The Secret Diaries of Charles Ignatius Sancho” Thursday, April 10 at 7 p.m. in the BG library atrium.
“From the Ground Up: Kevin O’Connor” will feature the Emmy-winning host of the PBS series “This Old House” as well as “Ask This Old House” on Thursday, Oct. 9 at 7 p.m. in the BGCS performing Arts Center.
For information visit WCDPL.org/The-Foundation-Series.
