Happy New Year!

2014 was a successful year for the Friends of the Brunswick Library. Between the reading programs, the visits from characters from kids’ books, and the recent installation of The Boat in the children’s section of the Library, this has been a busy and rewarding year.

And we couldn’t have done it without our donors and especially our members. Thank YOU for your continued support.

It’s a new year, which means it’s time to renew your membership. Please visit our Membership page where you can find our membership form that you can download as well as our different membership levels. Thank you for your support in 2015.

Local author James R. Castle will be discussing chapter one of his new book  History In Our Attics: Photos and Documents of Brunswick, Maryland.

Books will be available for sale and for every book purchased at the event, James will donate $5.00 to the Friends of the Brunswick Library “Float the Boat“ campaign. Already have a book? No Problem. Bring your copy of the book to follow along with the discussion and James will still make a donation to the Friends of the Brunswick Library.

Saturday, November 15, 2014 – 1:00pm – 3:00pm.

Light refreshments will be served and James will donate a copy of his book to the Brunswick Branch as well as to the Maryland Room.

For more information, contact Jim at Jamesrcastle@comcast.net.

Up until October, 2011, the Friends of the Library – Brunswick Branch was part of the Friends of the Frederick County Libraries umbrella organization and were covered by their 501(c)3 designation. When that organization folded, we decided to re-organize as the Friends of the Brunswick Library, Inc. and apply for tax-exempt status.

Well, we have finally received notification from the IRS that our application as a 501(c)3 organization has been approved!

If you have donated to the Friends of the Brunswick Library and have not declared the donation on your taxes, you may be able to declare it on this year’s tax return. Consult your tax professional.

At our annual membership meeting, we added two new members to our Board. Please welcome Carrie Blough and Toni Chancellor! Four other members of our board were also re-elected for two year terms: Al Everett, Carol Fessmann, Jill Lieberman, and Elizabeth Riitano.

We also had some changes among our officers. Elizabeth Riitano stepped down as our President. Al Everett was chosen to succeed her. Since that then left a vacancy at Treasurer, Carol Fessmann stepped up to take over.

Congratulations to our new Board Members and Officers.

In our area, many children depend on the school lunch program in order to have something eat every day. During the summer months when school is not in session and that resource is unavailable, many children must do without. The need is especially great in the Brunswick area.

The Brunswick Public Library and Friends are pleased to present and prepare a summer lunch program for children at our library. We will be providing healthy bag lunches combined with a literacy activity and a free book to take home one day per week, every week for the 9 weeks of summer. This program will emphasize good nutrition with fresh food and engage minds with literacy programming and activities. We plan to provide for 50 children every week.

We are seeking $3,000 to create and run this program this summer. We are asking local businesses and individuals to consider supporting this project. We are proud of these efforts to help community children and we hope you will be interested in the opportunity to have your name or business as a sponsor for the 450 children we plan to feed along with identifying you as a supporter to their families and the nearly 25,000 people that come through our doors every summer.

We have several levels of sponsorship including the unique opportunity to completely fund one week of lunches and books, making you or your business our official sponsor of the week:

Sponsor of the Week: Donate $500 or more and you will be our weekly sponsor. Your funding will entirely pay for the food and books for any week you specify and your business or corporate logo will be in the advertising and/or signage for that week. Your logo will be on all the lunch bags that children receive their lunches in and appear as a book plate in the books the children receive. Children and families at that session will be made aware that lunch that day was brought to them by you.

Advocate: Donate at least $250 and your corporate logo will be placed on all the bag lunches the children enjoy for one week. Your name or business will be announced at the program.

Friend: Donate $100 and your name or corporate logo will appear as a book plate in the books we give away to the children for one week. Your name or business will be announced at the program.

Benefactor: Donate $50 and you will be named as a benefactor at the program. Any amount helps us bring lunches to children in our community and we appreciate your support.

Please make all funds available to the Friends of the Brunswick Library, 915 N. Maple Ave., Brunswick, MD 21716 by April 1, 2013.

We hope you are as anxious to see a program of this type come to our community as we are and are willing to help make this an amazing success for our children. If you have questions or are interested in volunteering for the program, please contact Robin Bowers at the Brunswick Library 301-600-7250 or robowers@frederickcountymd.gov.

Sincerely,

Elizabeth Riitano
President
Friends of the Brunswick Library

Now that the new Library has opened, there is so much more space. Even with so much of the exterior walls being floor-to-ceiling windows, there are still plenty of places inside that could do with a little decoration.

One of the primary purposes of the Friends of the Library is to seek out and acquire art for the Library. As such, we’re looking for a large, signature piece to mount above the fireplace.

As such, we’re looking for an artist who lives or works within a 50-mile radius of Brunswick to create some art for the Library.

Details here: Request for Proposal: Artwork for Brunswick

The Frederick County Community Foundation will allocate up to $15,000 for the creation of a piece of artwork for the Fireplace Reading Lounge of the Brunswick Public Library. The scope of the work will consist of:

One (1) piece of art to be installed in the Fireplace Reading Lounge. Preference given to artwork that features a theme that is unique to the Brunswick area or southern region of Frederick County. The artwork will be installed on a brick wall above the fireplace. The area directly above the fireplace measures approximately. 9′ 6″ h x 11’11” w

Responses must be submitted by April 12, 2012. (Full details at the RFP.)

You might think that the advent of ebook readers like the Kindle and the NOOK might spell the end of libraries as we know them. Au contraire!

Ebook checkouts increased by more than 200% in 2010, according to a recent study from OverDrive, the leading distributor of ebooks and digital audiobooks to libraries.

Ebook checkouts continue to accelerate, almost tripling through September. This adds to the more than 12 million ebook checkouts so far in 2011, paidContent reports.

More than two-thirds of public libraries in the U.S. now offer ebook checkouts, more than 15,000 of which use OverDrive’s platform. That includes heavy hitters like the New York Public Library.

Read the rest at Mashable: Libraries Fight Back: Ebook Checkouts Up 200%