On Oct. 16, 1946 the Grand Forks Public Library entered the world in a small upstairs room of the post office, which is now city hall.
It was a grassroots operation in those days, says current library director Mandy Furru, and a far cry from today’s operation. But it was an important addition to the community.
“Ray Orser, Stan Orris, Marjorie Reynolds, and a few more people got together in the Gazette newspaper office and said ‘What steps do we need to take to get a library in town?’ From there, they got some donations. It was people wanting a library, believing it was important, and taking the steps needed to accomplish that.”
The library subsequently moved to the main floor of the post office, then shared space with the Boundary Museum in Gyro Park. Its current building on 5th Street was constructed in 1982.
On Friday, the library will celebrate its 80th birthday. Furru credits a “very keen staff member” who brought the milestone to her attention a few months ago. Since then, they’ve been working with the Boundary Museum and Archives to collect historical photos and artifacts that will be displayed as part of the celebration.
The event will take place from 11 a.m to 1 p.m. Archivist Kelsey Ehler will do a presentation starting at noon on the library’s history. In preparing for the celebration, staff members, board members, and members of the Friends of the Library group were asked to write down what the library means to them.
“Some people said they see the library as a haven, a sanctuary, the heart of the community,” Furru said. “If you look at our statistics from last year, we had more than 3,000 people attend library programs, more than 43,000 people visited, and more than 100,000 items were checked out. I think it really does reflect that we’re the heart of the community.”
