52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 19: At the Library

This week in 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks, Amy Johnson Crow asks us to post about libraries.

It was my aunt Elizabeth who got me into the library habit.  We had few books at home, along with not much in the way of possessions, generally.  That stemmed from my father having had happy feet, which meant we moved just about once a year.  My mother had to be the one to supervise all the packing and do most of it, so we had little in the way of tchatchkes or much of anything else.

Aside from a wonderful multi-volume work called Journeys Through Bookland, there were just not that many books in the house.  That set began in volume 1 with nursery rhymes and songs, and ended in something like volume 14 with Gulliver's Travels, The Descent into the Maelstrom, and other classic works of literature.  

So, if I wanted more books, the library was the place to get them.  

San Marco Branch Library

Our library was what is now called the San Marco Branch of the Jacksonville Public Library System.  In my childhood and youth, it was called the Southside Branch Library.  When I was in early elementary school, my aunt would take me to the library as part of the round of errands she called "Do Day."  As she spent the weekdays educating the people of Florida about their health as Director of Health Information for the state, Saturday was the day she got her errands done.  

Later, when I was in fifth grade up into junior high school, I would ride my bicycle to the library, a distance of at least five or six miles.  I put a lot of mileage on that bike.  As a few more years passed, and we lived even farther from the library, I would still get on my bicycle and ride to the library, now a trip of about twelve miles.  More often, at that time, since I had an allowance, I would ride not to the library, but to White's Books in the San Marco Square shopping center.  

But I never forgot the library, to the point that, when I graduated from Florida State University with a degree in Government, I accepted an offer of a grant under the federal Library Services and Construction Act of 1964 to get a graduate degree in Library Science at FSU.  This included a paid summer internship in the Jacksonville Public Library, and put me under obligation to work at least two years in that system after graduation.  I did so, in the Art and Music Department at the main library, under a wonderful boss named Jeff Driggers.  He had a marvelous sense of humor.  I think my knowledge of the movies had a part in my getting the job in Art and Music.  My boyfriend (now my husband of 54 years) was a Mass Communications major at FSU, and I chose as electives the courses he was taking concerning the history and technique of the movies.  In the Art and Music Department, I was placed in charge of the weekly film series offerings, writing the program notes and editing and putting together the department's film catalog.  I also was the one who ordered films for the library when the budget came through.

I still value libraries.  When our county, many years ago, asked for an extra one cent in sales tax (counties in Florida can pass additional sales tax amounts for county projects), I voted in favor of the increase because the county officials promised that part of the revenue would be used to build new libraries.  They kept their promise on that.

Support your local library. 

Photo credit:  Jacksonville Public Library System