Library feature: The Dalles Public Library

One thing we want to do here (but have been terrible about) is keep a better record of the libraries we've visited.  From my first visit to the Twin Falls Public Library with its cement lions guarding the door, I've loved these places.  Of course, there's the books.  But there's so much history and creativity and culture in the development of American libraries, and every library has its quirks, eccentricities, and little-known secrets...

Like The Dalles.  (The Dalles itself just begs to be researched.  How many cities are there that begin with a definite article? And what are dalles, anyway?)  We stopped at The Dalles Public Library on the way home from a trip to the Oregon Coast, and learned some neat things about it.

First--it has some fun artwork:

Bears on a log.  More on these later, but aren't they adorable?

This appealed to my calligrapher's heart.

A puffin.

 The bear sculpture outdoors sits in the middle of a big deck shaded by a London sycamore tree that was planted in about 1870.

Once, the bears were stolen.  I can only imagine how the librarians and patrons felt to see them gone. What a loss.  And then, just as suddenly--they were returned.  The whole thing remains a mystery.

Like many across the country, The Dalles Public Library is a Carnegie library.  And like many Carnegie libraries, it has outgrown its original building.

The original Carnegie building.

The current building.

Spacious first floor, with more around the mezzanine upstairs.

One of this library's biggest claims to fame is that it's at the end of the Overland Trail and is a repository for many local genealogical records.  Genealogists come for pilgrimages here, to pore over old documents.

There's also a geocache hidden here.  As in--IN the library!  (Note to self:  Find that handheld GPS or buy another one!  The boys are the perfect age for geocaching.)

Another fun thing we loved--the library has "check-out sketchbooks!"  Blank bound books are among the holdings here. Patrons can check one out, look at drawings by patrons who have checked them out previously, then add a sketch or three, and return them.  Annually the library has judges look through the sketchbooks and award prizes, and there are plans to make a book featuring the winning sketches.

How absolutely cool is that?