Calling all cyclists of all abilities! Please come on Monday, May 13 from 6-7:30pm and celebrate National Bike Month with the Moorhead Public Library. Learn basic repair, bike safety, and more. Hope to see you there!
Bike Bash!!!
Reply
Celebrate National Library Week!!!
April 14-20 is National Library Week – First sponsored in 1958, National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and libraries across the country each April. In order to celebrate, the Moorhead Library has a few special events planned – check out the list below and be sure to join us!
National Library Worker’s Day – Tuesday, April 16th
The Moorhead Library is very lucky to have such a wonderful staff full of knowledgeable, friendly and fun people. Without them, we wouldn’t be here! So, thank you Moorhead staff!
We Can’t Even Make This Stuff Up! – Thursday, Aptil 18th @ 7:00pm
Ever wonder how real life events inspire fiction? Join Minnesota authors Barbara Deese, Mickie Turk and Wendy Webb for a discussion of how they give their plots that ripped-from-the-headlines veracity! This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Moorhead Library.
Customer Appreciation Day – Friday, April 19th 10:00am – 5:00pm
In celebration of National Library Week, the Moorhead Library would like to thank our customers for ongoing support of our programs and services! Join us, as we show our appreciation, for a day of movies, games, prizes and refreshments.
Of course, the Moorhead Library always has a variety of events going on – it’s part of what we do! For a complete list of events happening at the Moorhead Library, as well as other branches of the Lake Agassiz Regional Library, check out our online event calendar.
Food For Fines! April is Amnesty Month at LARL!
Bring your overdue library material back to the library with an unexpired, non-perishable food item and we’ll erase your late fee during the month of April! All donations will be given to local food banks throughout our Northwest Minnesota region.
*Not valid for lost items or replacement charges.
Carroll Engelhardt, Minnesota Author and Educator
The Farm at Holstein Dip, written by retired Concordia College professor Carroll Engelhardt, tells his story of growing up in Iowa and and the decline of the rural way of life. Come to the presentation at the Moorhead Library on Tuesday, April 9 at 10 am and learn what it was like to live in the rural Midwest of the 40′s and 50′s.
Civil War Nerd Trip
Calling all history buffs! Markus Krueger from the Historical and Cultural Society of Clay County recently took a father-son trip visiting famous Civil Wars sites, including Gettysburg. If you’ve ever dreamed of taking a road trip or visiting famous battle sites, you won’t want to miss this entertaining account of Markus’s “Civil War Nerd Trip.”
Markus will be speaking at 7 on Thursday, March 21st.
This isn’t the first time Markus has visited the library. In the past, he has been known to stop by dressed as a Viking!
Code Name Verity
Earlier this week one of the Minnesota History Players, Virginia Mae Hope, visited the library. The actress from the Minnesota Historical Society shared the story of this Minnesota native who served in the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) during WWII. Learning about the life of this brave woman reminded me of a wonderful book I read recently about a female WWII pilot in Great Britain, Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein. Code Name Verity is a fictional teen book, but the story it tells is just as interesting as Virginia’s.
At its heart, Code Name Verity is a novel about the unlikely friendship between Maddie and “Verity”, two women from different backgrounds who get involved in the war effort in Britain as a pilot and a spy respectively. When the book begins, we learn that the two crash landed on a covert mission in Nazi-occupied France, where Verity has been captured as an enemy agent is giving her confession.
Verity’s confession is long, and under the auspices of giving up everything she remembers about the British war effort, she weaves in the story of her friendship with Maddie and the events leading to their crash.
I won’t write much more about the book, because I don’t want to give too much away. Both Maddie and Verity are incredibly well-developed female characters. They are brave, intelligent, and complex, without seeing overly perfect or generalized (especially compare with some other YA heroines). Their friendship is believable and Wein doesn’t ruin her story with romance, or even worse, a love triangle.
The book is considered YA, but like its YA/WWII cousin, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, it’s really a book that I would easily recommend for teens or for adults. Wein doesn’t talk down to her audience or simplify her story. Maddie and Verity both have a sense of humor, so there are some great moments of levity mixed in with the sorrow. I’ll warn you; this isn’t a happy book. But, it is an engaging read and wonderful story.
Virginia Mae Hope–WWII Pilot
During World War II, Minnesotan Virginia Mae Hope served her country as part of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP). The women who were part of WASP flew planes and assisted with wartime duties within the US, freeing up more men for fly airplanes abroad.
Minnesota History Players are bringing Virginia back to life at the Moorhead Library at 2 pm on Wednesday, March 13. She’ll be sharing her experiences with us, including what it was like growing up during the depression, how the lives and roles of women changed during World War II, and what her life was like as a WASP.
This performance is part of The Beat Goes On series, funded in part or in whole with money from the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund. If you like programs like this, be sure to let your legislators know.
A Recipe to Remember–Free Scrapbooking Workshop
Pull out Great Grandma’s apple pie recipe or Great Uncle Charles favorite meatloaf recipe. The Minnesota Historical Society will be leading a class teaching you how to preserve a treasured family meal by creating a frame-worthy scrapbook page.
Sign up is now open for our A Recipe to Remember scrapbooking workshop at 7 pm on Thursday, March 14! We have twenty spots available for this class. Bring a handwritten family recipe and some photos (we’ll scan what you bring and return the originals). Everything else will be provided.
Spots are limited, so call the library at 218-233-7594 to register.
This performance is part of The Beat Goes On series, funded in part or in whole with money from the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund. If you like programs like this, be sure to let your legislators know.
Photo Credit: Lizbeth*King via Compfight CC-BY-2.0
Toni Stone–Minnesota’s Female Jackie Robinson
Baseball spring training has begun, and we have a very special baseball player visiting the library. St. Paul native Toni Stone (1921-1996), the “female Jackie Robinson”, was the first woman to play professional baseball in the Negro Leagues. This week, one of the Minnesota History Players from the Minnesota History Center will be at the Moorhead Library to share Toni’s inspiring story confronting multiple types of discrimination.
Our Toni Stone event will be at Moorhead Library at 2:00 pm on Thursday, March 7th.
This performance is part of The Beat Goes On series, funded in part or in whole with money from the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund. If you like programs like this, be sure to let your legislators know.
Harriet Bishop–Frontier School Teacher
St. Paul’s first public school teacher, Harriet Bishop, is stopping by the Moorhead Library for a visit. She’s going to teach us all about life on the frontier and all the interesting people who lived and worked in St. Paul during the early 1880s. Find out how schools have changed since her day.
Harriet Bishop is one of the Minnesota History Players from the Minnesota History Center. She’ll be at the Moorhead Library at 7:00 pm on Thursday, February 28th.
This performance is part of The Beat Goes On series, funded in part or in whole with money from the Minnesota Arts & Cultural Heritage Fund. If you like programs like this, be sure to let your legislators know.
