Children’s Storytimes Resume in September

@ Maring-Hunt
Call 741.5151 to register!

Preschool Storytime
Fridays at 10:30 am
Children 3-5 years

Jumpstart Reading
Wednesdays at 9:30 am
Toddlers (18-36 months)

@ Kennedy
Call 741.7333 to register!

Gingerbread Babies
Mondays @ 10:00 am
Infants 4-18 months
lapsit program
pre-registration required

Jumpstart Reading
Tuesdays at 10:30 am
Toddlers (18-36 months)

Reading Music, Reading Words
Wednesdays at 10:30 am
Children 3-5 years old

Adult Summer Reading Winners

Congratulations Adult Summer Reading Winners!

Grand Prize of $150 to Books-A-Million: George Chance

2nd Prize of $100 Thermal Eye Lift from Bliss Medspa: Stephanie Dillinger

3rd Prize of $50 to G&M Pet & Garden: Christine Ruh

Thanks to all readers for making Adult SRP a success this year!

Congratulations Kids Summer Reading Winners!

Computer Winner - Nashon Prater

MP3 Player Winner - Kaity Privett

$50 Gift Certificate Winners:
Danielle Inman
Shepherd Cunningham
Timothy Clay
Tommie Collins
Veronica Rhine

Miscellaneous Prize Winners:
Maria Brown
Alicen Tarter
Kelsey Abner
Abby Fenwick
Sarah Newberry
Shelby Miller
Noel Keith
Victoria Steed

Gift Bag Winners:
Diana Shaner
Ben Polk
Hannah Knodel
Sam Arnold
Levi Hinds
Alexis Smith
Isabelle Wright
Celeste Posey

Thanks to all readers for making Summer Reading Program a success!

MPL is now on Facebook, Myspace, and YouTube!

Come visit us on Facebook, Myspace, and YouTube and let us know how we’re doing! Submit stories, videos, book or movie reviews, and find out what’s going on at MPL!

Facebook!
Myspace
YouTube

Abe Lincoln at Maring-Hunt

Indiana's Lincoln Exhibit

 

Indiana (Lincoln’s childhood home) and the rest of America, will honor Abraham Lincoln’s 200th birthday (February 12, 2009) with a bicentennial celebration that kicks off in February 2008 and continues through 2010. Stop by Maring-Hunt Library during regular Library hours from July 7-August 31 to experience “The Lincoln Family Album,” an interactive and hands-on display for the whole family.

Friends of MPL Book Sale!

NO FRIDAY SALE!

Saturday, June 28 from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Public Sale–All welcome!

Sunday, June 29 from 1:30-3:30 p.m. Public Sale–All welcome!

All sales at Maring-Hunt Library. Huge inventory of used, donated and like-new books.
Books 50 cents a pound! Books on Tape 50 cents, Videos $1, DVD’s $2,Other Items as Marked.

Friends-Show your card, get 20% off at the Saturday and Sunday Sales Only!

 

Art @ Kennedy

Beaty is an art student at Ball State University and is an employee of Muncie Public Library. If you are a local artist or part of an art organization and would like to display your art at Kennedy Library or Maring-Hunt Library, stop by either location to make an appointment with the display coordinator. To display art at Kennedy Library contact Harriette Harra at hharra@munpl.org. To display art at Maring-Hunt Library contact Katherine Mitchell at kmitchell@munpl.org. Guidelines and policies are in place regarding the subject matter of art displayed and availability of space.

Summer Reading Events for Kids!

6/10/2008 - Maring-Hunt: Bug Explorers! (Gr. K-5) 3:30-4:30 pm
Explore the world of bugs with us! We’ll read, learn and search for bugs!Create your own bug box during craft time. Register online here.

6/11/2008 - Carnegie: Buggily Book Bunch! (Gr. 2-5) 2:30-4 pm
Sign up to be a part of our first ever Summer Reading Book Club! Earn 30 minutes of reading time each session. Enjoy reading, activities, crafts, and fun! Register online here.

6/12/2008 - Conley: Cool Caterpillars (3-5 yrs) 10 am
Come enjoy The Very Hungry Caterpillar and other stories by Eric Carle. We will make a very cool craft. Register online here.

 

6/12/2008 - Kennedy: Magician C.R. Ryan (Family Event) 6-7 pm
C.R. Ryan is back! Did you catch his show last year? This family friendly magician will astound you and amaze you with all the tricks he has up his sleeve. You might even get to be a magician’s assistant! Register online here. Visit his website now!

 

 6/16/2008 - Kennedy: Backyard Safari (Gr. K-5) 10:30 am
Go on a bug safari with us! We’ll read “buzzingly” good books and go on a bug scavenger hunt! Then, “fly” over to the craft table to create your very own bug to take home! Register online here.

Registration for all events begins May 31. Register online or in person at any library location or call one of the following numbers: Carnegie 741.5158, Conley  747.8216, Kennedy 741.7333 or Maring-Hunt 741.5151.

SBDC to offer Class in Muncie, Indiana

MUNCIE, IN.  The East Central Indiana Small Business Development Center (SBDC) will be offering a class entitled “Writing an Effective Business Plan” on Thursday, June 5, 2008. The SBDC specializes in providing comprehensive counseling and training services to small businesses and prospective small businesses.

Your Business Plan is an invaluable tool towards marketing your business to investors and guiding your operations.  This presentation will provide hands on exercises on how to develop the components integral to writing a successful business plan.

This class will be offered at the boardroom of the Energize ECI Engagement Center at 122 E. Main St., Muncie, IN from 9:00 am to 12:00.  (Visit the Energize ECI website.) There is a $20.00 registration fee.  Space is limited, so pre-registration is suggested.  Please call 765.282.9950 for more information.

About SBDC

The East Central Indiana Small Business Development Center is part of a Network of 11 centers that provide comprehensive business counseling, training and market research services to small business owners.  This program is funded through a collaborative agreement between the US Small Business Administration, the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, Ivy Tech Community College and local funding sources. 

Media Contacts:

Vickie Bevans, SBDC, 765.282.9950

Funded in part through a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration.  All opinions, conclusions or recommendations expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the SBA.

MPL Tolstoy Event on NPR

A report filed by IPR/WBST reporter Marcus Jackman has been selected to be a part of Voice of America on National Public Radio. Jackman attended the Tolstoy Revealed! event at MPL as part of The Big Read. 

Russian Author on American Reading List

By Marcus Jackman 11 April 2008

Jackman report - Download (MP3)
Jackman report - Listen (MP3)

Russian author Leo Tolstoy made connections through his writings… connections across classes, across cultures, and across centuries. Almost 100 years after his death, more than a hundred people crowded a library meeting room in Muncie, Indiana, this week… to talk about Tolstoy’s works, history, and legacy. As Marcus Jackman reports, it’s all part of a national literary program called The Big Read.

The Big Read is designed to encourage reading, but also to draw communities together, by having everyone read the same book at the same time and then discuss it together. The National Endowment for the Arts, concerned about the decline of reading in the United States, launched the program in 2006 in 10 communities. Just two years later, more than 125 cities and towns take part.

Public libraries in each community select the books for their program. In previous years, participants have read 12 titles, including The Great Gatsby, A Farewell to Arms, and To Kill a Mockingbird. This year, Muncie, Indiana’s libraries chose Leo Tolstoy’s novella The Death of Ivan Ilyich.

The highlight of the month-long program was a discussion about the book led by Vladimir Tolstoy, the author’s great-great-grandson.

Speaking through an interpreter, Tolstoy said he was excited to be invited to be part of the program because Ivan Ilyich was the first Big Read book by a non-American author. “But also I view the Big Read as a very important program,” he said, admitting, “I wish we had one like it in Russia because, especially in the younger generations, the reading level is going down.”

Tolstoy told the crowd Ivan Ilyich touches on the basic human need to live life sincerely, authentically, without pretense… and that makes the novella accessible to anybody.

Kristin Schwartz was in the audience for the discussion. She hadn’t read the book, but her Russian friend encouraged her to go. She said she was fascinated to learn about the influence Leo Tolstoy had around the world… and about the influences on him, including social Christianity and nonviolent resistance.

“I didn’t realize how political and philosophical his writings were, but there is a lot of historical significance.” Schwartz said she normally reads a lot of non-fiction, and picked up on a quote repeated during the discussion. “‘Thoreau was the seed, Tolstoy was the tree, and Gandhi was the fruit.’ I haven’t read a lot of Tolstoy but I have read Thoreau, so I’m really excited to read more Tolstoy and see the connections there.”

Responses like that are everything planners were hoping for when they chose The Death of Ivan Ilyich for Muncie’s Big Read, according to Donna Browne, who works for Muncie Public Library. “We’ve been enormously pleased. Truly we didn’t know what to expect. We had high hopes and fortunately they’ve all been fulfilled for adults and kids. Today, as you can see, we had a standing room only of mostly adults. We’re thrilled with that sort of response. You can see people lining up for autographs like they’re rock stars! We didn’t expect that at all.”

Vladimir Tolstoy isn’t just the author’s great-great-grandson. He’s also the director of the Leo Tolstoy Estate Museum at the family estate at Yasnaya Polyana, southwest of Moscow. He encourages readers to visit the museum, explaining that nothing can replace studying Tolstoy’s writings at the author’s own home, because his work can’t be separated from the land or culture it was written in. “I also hope that those readers who open Tolstoy for the first time, reading Death of Ivan, won’t stop at that, but will continue reading and learn from other writings the range Tolstoy had, and variety of themes in his writings.”

Those writings have touched people around the world, according to Galina Alexeeva, head of academic research at Tolstoy’s Yasnaya Polyana Estate Museum. She says it’s not surprising that Americans especially might feel a deep connection with him.

“I believe that if Leo Tolstoy were alive, he would be very happy to know that in America they still read his works,” Alexeeva says, “because for Tolstoy, America was the most sympathetic country, and he loved this country, and he received 2500 letters from America. And there were close ties between Tolstoy and many American writers and public figures in his life time. So it’s very nice that the tradition continues.”

What was surprising to the Russian visitors, though, was the serious interest with which Americans are reading Ivan Ilyich. Communities in Illinois and Pennsylvania also read the novella. Tolstoy says they have been very impressed with the profound questions they’ve been asked… particularly by young people. “Those questions were very deep and precise, and to a detail. They were not just something you’d ask generally. But they were looking for the answers and waiting for the answers and trying to find them. They were very sincere,” he says.

And such sincerity would surely have pleased his great-great-grandfather, too.