Due to the easing of COVID restrictions, the Board of Trustees of the Chester County Library System/Chester County Library will now be hosting their monthly board meeting as a hybrid offering. If you have always wanted to attend a meeting but haven’t had the time, this is your opportunity. Please click this link at 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday, July 20 to join the Chester County Library System Board Meeting virtually; or attend in person at Chester County Library, 450 Exton Square Parkway, PA 19341. The Chester County Library Board Meeting will immediately follow.
If you are a person with a disability and wish to attend this meeting and require an auxiliary aid, service, or other accommodation to observe or participate in the proceedings, please call Chester County Library’s Administration Office at 610-344-5600 to discuss how we may best accommodate your needs.
Since 1985, people in the United States have celebrated Park and Recreation Month in July to promote building strong, vibrant, and resilient communities through the power of parks and recreation, and to recognize the more than 160,000 full-time park and recreation professionals — along with hundreds of thousands of part-time and seasonal workers and volunteers — that maintain our country’s local, state and community parks.
Join us in the great outdoors to celebrate Park and Recreation Month at our StoryWalk® in Exton Park, a ½ mile paved walkway surrounding two playgrounds and a picnic area. The StoryWalk® project consists of 20 reading stations, each featuring a page in a children’s storybook, which promotes health and literacy in young children by encouraging exercise and reading. Their are even some fun interactive activities along the way that you can access with your cellphone along the way. The book currently featured is Ruby’s Birds by Mya Thompson and the StoryWalk® is changed twice a year in the spring and fall.
This summer, you can learn about careers in engineering when The Franklin Institute presents Facebook Live Ask an Engineer! events. Scientists from The Franklin Institute will host several Facebook Live conversations with guest engineers about their work and career paths. This is the perfect follow-up to the 2021 GSK Science in the Summer Be an Engineer! program.
No pre-registration is required. Click the link at the event time to hear from these scientists.
Even if you missed the registration or weren’t selected in the lottery, your family can still participate in the 2021 GSK Science in the Summer program. This summer, the theme is Be an Engineer! All activity guides, materials lists, and videos are available online. Assemble your own materials and have fun being engineers at home!
Once your family has completed the experiments, don’t forget to sign up to join one or more live virtual event, hosted by educators and scientists from The Franklin Institute! These meetings will be live interactions where your children can share the results of their research with other program participants. Remember, you should complete the activity at home prior to attending the Live Virtual Event. Attendees will participate via chat.
All of the “Be an Engineer” information and the links to register for the Live Virtual Events can be found at http://scienceinthesummer.fi.edu/
Summer 2021 has reached the midpoint. Is your summer reading going well? We have many ways for you to still enjoy your summer and keep up with your reading. There’s still time to register online at Readsquared so that you can track your daily reading and earn reading badges. OR you can visit the library to get the paper version. We’ve already awarded reading badges to kids who complete just 3 activities per badge. School reading lists are available too, and we are happy to help you find the books you need for your school’s reading assignments. Our preschool, K-5, and teen virtual programs have been so much fun already, and there are more to come! Visit our events calendar to see what’s next and to register.
You can also have fun reading via Bookflix and Trueflix! Just have a library card ready and click here for BOOKFLIX; or click here for TRUEFLIX. If you are traveling and wish to read on your devices, you can check out an ebook or eaudiobook, which still count towards your summer reading. Have your library card ready and click here for our overdrive site.
This summer Henrietta Hankin Branch Library is happy to host local historian, lecturer and teacher emeritus, Roger W. Arthur for Presidential Murders, a 2-part lecture series that begins with “Part 1: Abraham Lincoln” on Monday, July 26th; and finishes up with “Part 2: John F. Kennedy” on Monday, August 2nd. Both programs will be presented virtually on Zoom from 6:00 – 7:30 pm.
“These two presidential murders have been thought to have much in common,” explains Mr. Arthur. “Both victims were shot in the head. Both were attacked from behind and on a Friday. Both were killed in the presence of their wives. One was the first Republican ever elected, while the other was the first Roman Catholic ever elected. Both were elected in a ‘zero’ numbered year. The national shock of these murders stunned the country. Other comparisons between them have been offered but most of those are either false or contrived.”
“With the advance of technology the news of the killings soon spread quickly across the land. One by telegraph, the other by television. Americans craved more news in both cases. The unknown killer of Kennedy was captured within hours. While the nationally famous killer of Lincoln escaped into the night and stayed at large from nearly two weeks. Both murderers were killed before they came to indictment, trial and conviction. Lincoln’s killer was shot by a soldier on duty. Kennedy’s killer murdered him in cold blood in the presence of the police who were there to protect him.”
Mr. Arthur has been fascinated by American history all of his life. He studied it in college, taught it in school and has traveled the country learning about it first hand. He currently teaches Modern American History at Bishop Shanahan High School in Downingtown, PA. In the evenings in the Spring and Fall, he offers a variety of adult enrichment courses at the Chester County Night School, and from time to time is an instructor at Manor College and the Mainline School Night. He is also a special presenter for libraries, clubs and civic groups. Mr. was nominated to be “American History Teacher of the Year” by the Gilder-Lehrman Institute in 2012. His passion for history—and his desire to share it with others—continues to be a central motif of his life.
Register now for one or both of these thought-provoking, interactive programs that you can enjoy from the comfort of your own home! To register for Part 1: Abraham Lincoln, click here. To register for Part 2: John F. Kennedy, click here.
The Chester County Library Business and Career Center helps small business owners and job applicants succeed with top-notch, authoritative information. Our LinkedIn page places free tools, news, and assistance at your fingertips. Follow us for:
upcoming library programs (Resume Writing, LinkedIn, Entrepreneurship Panels, and more)
new and highlighted library resources (personalized research and resume consultations, Business Plans Handbook, consumer and industry data, current books and magazines, and more)
events and offers from local organizations (SCORE, PA CareerLink/United Way Financial Stability Center, chambers, Small Business Development Centers, and more)
timely news and articles from big names in business and careers (Harvard Business Review, Philadelphia Business Journal, The Muse, Inc, and more)
Happy Pride Month!🏳🌈 Here are some book suggestions to celebrate.
1) Rainbow Warrior: My Life in Color by Gilbert Baker, memoir of the late activist who designed the original rainbow Pride flag. Baker chronicles his beginnings as a repressed child of the 1950s and closeted war veteran, and his foray into gay liberation activism, which led to the now iconic flag’s creation.
2) We Are Everywhere: Protest, Power and Pride in the History of Queer Liberation provides a rich visual history of LGBTQ pride, from the underground communities and post-Stonewall Pride protests, to AIDS activism and the present generation of activists continuing to fight for their rights and liberties.
3) Real Queer America: LGBT Stories from Red States by Samantha Allen takes readers across numerous, tight-knit LGBTQ communities in the American South. Allen interviews many queer Southerners about their identities and experiences, providing intersections of race, class and religious spirituality often unseen in mainstream perceptions of the community.
4) Everything You Want to Know About Trans (But Were Afraid to Ask) by Brynne Tannehill serves as a primer for anyone curious about the increasingly visible, often misunderstood transgender community. A trans woman herself, Tannehill dispels misconceptions and myths surrounding trans, non-binary and gender-nonconforming people, while also answering questions often considered uncomfortable or difficult.
5) Queer Love in Color by Jamal Jordan is a photo book that provides a rich tapestry of American LGBTQ couples and families across cultures, races, ethnicities and age groups. Jordan includes interviews with each of his subjects, showing the many forms love in the LGBTQ community can take.
6) The Shared Heart: Portraits and Stories Celebrating Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Young People by Adam Mastoon is a candid photo collection illustrating the various experiences of homosexual and bisexual people in their late teens and early twenties. Each of the youth featured in Mastoon’s collection relay their own stories of coming out and self-acceptance of their sexual identities.
Starting the week of June 28, the Henrietta Hankin Library is offering programs for children from birth through high school. Six weeks of fun events are scheduled! All programs are virtual and registration is required.
Family Fun – Rhymes, music and books for all ages – Wednesdays at 10:00am
Play K – Get Ready for Kindergarten – 4-6 years old – Tuesdays at 10:00am
Hankineers – 1st-5th graders – Thursdays at 2:00pm
Teen Programs – 6th-12th graders – Wednesdays at 1:30pm
And there’s more . . . our popular “Take-It and Make-It Crafts” are back this summer! Come to the Henrietta Hankin Library Youth Services Dept. on Tuesdays starting June 29 to pick up your craft pack. We are offering six weeks of crafting-at-home fun. No reservations needed – while supplies last.
Need a new hobby to keep your spirits up while we’re all social distancing? Been watching K-Dramas for years and want to meet new K-Drama lovers? Love BTS but don’t know much about Korean television? Break out the kimchi and join us to watch an episode of one the hottest Korean shows, then pop onto a Zoom call to chat about the show, the newest Korean music, and Korean culture – all from the comfort of our own homes.
On June 27, from 3:00pm – 5:00pm, we will be watching the pilot episode of “Doom at Your Service.” Tak Dong-Kyung has been living a fairly ordinary, stable life since the death of her parents until everything starts to come crashing down around her. She finds out that her boyfriend is married with a child on the way, gets scolded by her boss, is spied on by a pervert, has her brother constantly pestering her for money, and then, worst of all, is diagnosed with brain cancer. One night, in a bout of drunken misery, she wishes on a shooting star for all the world to end – and accidentally calls up Myul Mang, a messenger of destruction between gods and humans, who chooses to fulfill her wish.
Ages 16+
Registration is required to receive the Zoom link and viewing instructions. Register on the event calendar here.
For questions, please email us at: ccljtc@ccls.org.