Submitted by Bradley A. Green, Library Director
The Lane Memorial Library had an excellent year of service to the public in 1992. We circulated 138,516 items, an increase of 1,246 over 1991. We added 3,906 books, cassettes, compact discs, and videos to our collection and withdrew 1,060 old and damaged items to make room for our new acquisitions. We were active with interlibrary loan and loaned out many of our items. We registered 1,265 new borrowers. We estimate that 98,904 people visited the library and we received 15,912 reference questions during the year.
Library Assistants Kathleen Bonerb and Karen Weinhold resigned and were succeeded by Melissa Kubik and Mary Fiumara. On January 4, 1993 Catherine M. Redden succeeded Bradley A. Green as Director.
Our town appropriation for 1991 was $352,156. We earned $21,820 in overdue fines, meeting room rentals, videocassette rentals, computer use, book sales, fund raisers, and donations. We expended this money on books, audio books, periodical subscriptions, compact discs, and videocassettes.
320 people attended 12 adult programs. We received grants from the New Hampshire Humanities Council for the “Words Made Visible” and “Building a Nation, Building a State” exhibits and three related programs. In the Children’s Department Kathleen Dunbrack and Joanne Straight had a wonderful “Discover Read” summer reading program which 55 youngsters completed by reading 1,353 books! For the 3rd year we participated in the Gift of Reading program sponsored by the Rockingham County Community Action Program. 44 low income Hampton preschoolers received new hardcover books. The Hampton Rotary Club and the FIrst NH Bank provided generous funding for the program. In all, 3,630 people attended 171 programs in the CHildren’s Department.
LifeWise Community Projects built a portable wheelchair ramp for entrance into the Dorothy Little Meeting Room, thus enabling us to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. In December we joined Hampton’s public school libraries in a “Food for Fines” program in which patrons paid for overdue fines with donations of non-perishable food items which were donated to St. Vincent de Paul’s soup kitchen.
The Friends of the Library were busy with their hand made Christmas quilt raffle, which was won by Karen Souney. Proceeds from this event were used to purchase books and passes to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Boston Museum of Science, the Children’s Museum in Portsmouth, and the Christa McAuliffe Planetarium in Concord. They also donated $5,000 for the Data Trek automated circulation system which went on-line in December. We thank Assistant Director William Teschek for his excellent job as project manager. This system will expedite check-in and check-out procedures, and will streamline our reserve, overdue notification, and inventory procedures.
In addition to the staff members cited above, we want to acknowledge the contributions of Alice Alford, Joan Kahl, Jean Keefe, Margaret Lovett, Joanne Mulready, and Marie Sullivan. We thank the Trustees, Friends, volunteers, Hampton Garden Club and patrons for their support and we look forward to meeting your information needs in 1993.