• results in change, making possible experimentation, innovation, and adaptation of roles to changing needs;
• provides the margin of excellence that makes good libraries great libraries;
• provides the opportunity to leverage public dollars;
• spurs collaborations and partnerships; and
• creates a higher level of responsiveness to needs and opportunities.

Craig Buthod, Director of the Louisville Free Public Library, stated “donor dollars fund change.” He understands that private donors are “inspired by the chance to contribute to rapid improvements for the evolution of the library – not by filling gaps in government funding.”

Through private donations to the Library Foundation, the Louisville Free Public Library has been able to provide programs and services and to pursue capital projects that would not be possible otherwise.  Private funding is responsible for

• the Iroquois Project, an outreach program targeted to the immigrant community in south Louisville;
• the Digital Media Initiative, providing the library with thousands of CDs, DVDs, and audiobooks;
• the Technology 2000 campaign, providing the library with hundreds of public-access computers, software, and electronic research tools;
• the Job Shop, offering a wide range of resources to help unemployed or under-employed people find work;
• the Summer Reading program, the library’s largest and longest-running program, reaching more than 50,000 annually;
• upgraded furnishings and technology for the new Newburg branch library;
• restoration and renovation of the historic Main Library, which made possible highly successful partnerships with JCPS adult education and the University of Louisville;
• scholarships for library employees; and
• supplemental funding for the cost of taking the GED.

Thank you!

Through generous donor support, the Library Foundation is pleased to provide funding for new books and for upgrades in the furnishings and technology for the new Fairdale branch library.  Click here for more information about the Fairdale project.

Louisville, Ky. (March 6, 2012) – Join two award-winning local poets for a lively reading and good conversation about writing at the Louisville Free Public Library’s Poetry Night.  Kentucky poet laureate Maureen Morehead and poet and teacher Kathleen Driskell will share some of their recent work on Wednesday, March 14, 7 p.m. at the Main Library.  Both are on the faculty at Spalding University’s brief-residency MFA in Writing program, where Driskell also serves as associate director.

Morehead – appointed poet laureate by Governor Steve Beshear for 2011-12 – has taught for more than 30 years, including teaching advanced placement English, creative writing and journalism in Jefferson County public schools.  The most recent of her three books of poetry, “The Melancholy Teacher” (Larkspur Press, 2010), addresses the role of poetry in our times.  Morehead says, “It suggests why poetry matters in a world with very little emphasis on taking time to ponder the big questions: who we are, what we’re doing here, how to make meaningful these very, very short lives we’ve been given.”

Kathleen Driskell is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Spalding. In addition to the nationally bestselling “Seed Across Snow,” she is the author of one previous book of poetry, “Laughing Sickness,” and the editor of two anthologies of creative writing. Her poems have appeared in many national literary magazines including North American Review, The Southern Review, and The Greensboro Review.   Her newest project is a forthcoming publication “Peck and Pock: A Graphic Poem.”

Poetry Night at the Library is Wednesday, March 14, at 7 p.m.  It follows the third session of “The Creative Process,” a five-week short course lead by University of Louisville humanities professor Dr. Annette Allen. For more information on “The Creative Process” or Poetry Night, please visit www.lfpl.org.  Both programs are free and open to the public.

Contact: Paul Burns  502-574-1683 [Office]

A lively, diverse and ever-changing group has been meeting from noon to 1 p.m. on one Wednesday each month at the Main Library at Fourth and York streets.
Their passports have taken them to Ethiopia (“Cutting for Stone”), Iran (“Persepolis”), China (“Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress”), Afghanistan (“The Kabul Beauty School”), England (“A Christmas Carol”) and more.
“We’ve also been blessed by serendipity,” said Charlton Braganza, one of two librarians who oversee the group. “As we read ‘Persepolis,’ Iran was in the news. As we read about the global economy in Thomas Friedman’s ‘The World is Flat,’ the financial crisis in Greece was making headlines.”
“I love the variety of the people who’ve joined us,” said Kelly Dunnagan, the other librarian. “Some have traveled the world or have personal experiences they can share with the group.”
The day the group discussed “The World is Flat,” for example, Alex Gerassimides, Mayor Greg Fischer’s wife and a book club regular, told folks attending that she had just left their daughter in Greece a week earlier to spend a semester attending school there while living with grandparents.
“It’s been eye-opening for her,” she said, to be the country at a time of demonstrations in the streets — and economic and social change.
As the club celebrates its half-year birthday, it’s ready to chart its course for the next several months.
Here are the books it plans to read:
March 21: “The Elegance of the Hedgehog,” by Muriel Barbery
April 18: “The Devil’s Highway” by Luis Alberto Urrea
May 16: “You Have Given Me a Country” by Neela Vaswani
June 20: “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe
July 18: “At Home” by Bill Bryson
Aug. 15: “In the Time of the Butterflies” by Julia Alvarez
Sept. 19: “The Tiger’s Wife” by Te’a Obreht Anyone can join in any time. Brown-bag lunches are welcome. The library has a number of copies of each book. For more information, go to lfpl.org and click on “Read Around the World.”
Judy Rosenfield, education manager at the Louisville Free Public Library, is a former editor at The Courier-Journal.

Genealogy Joe

Joe Hardesty, LFPL’s Kentucky History and Genealogy Librarian, has a new accreditation.  Joe recently received a Professional Learning Certificate in Genealogical Studies (PLCGS) for Librarianship from the University of Toronto – the first in Kentucky.  Another great employee resource available only at our Library!

And speaking of genealogy, Saturday, April 14 is this year’s date for LFPL’s Genealogy Day.