We are on a mission during story time…a mission to find Easter eggs during our 4th Annual Story Time Egg Hunt.  First we’ll read the classic story “The Golden Egg Book” by Margaret Wise Brown before we welcome a special guest!  Then it’s time to search for some eggs in the library.  Will Janitor Jim find them first?  Join us on Friday, March 30th from 11:00-11:30 for an egg-stra special story hour!

The Blair Brownie troop will be collecting new and used children’s books at the library until March 31st.  If you have any children’s books appropriate for kids through second grade, you can drop them off at the library.  The Brownies chose to share their love of reading by collecting books for others and will also be participating in some other great reading activities at the library in the near future.  Please support these girls with your generous donations!

"The Census Taker" by Norman Rockwell

I recently attended an interesting and fun workshop on genealogy, organized by Winding Rivers Library System and presented by Megan Isely of LaCrosse Public Library Archives.  Thanks to Megan I’ve learned how to investigate my family tree using databases offered by our library system, such as Ancestry Library Edition and HeritageQuest as well as many other free websites.  Users can search a great variety of records and documents, including U.S. census reports, vital records, and immigration and church records.  Both Ancestry Library Edition and HeritageQuest are available for free through the library.  While you must be at the library to access the Ancestry Library Edition, HeritageQuest is available  at home through the BadgerLink resource at the bottom of this page.  If you have any questions about using these resources, please ask.  We love to share this information!

While at the workshop, we also learned about the upcoming release of the 1940 United States census.  This information  has been unavailable to the public for 72 years in order to protect people’s privacy.  Genealogists are eagerly anticipating the release of this information and are counting down the days until April 2nd.  For more information about the 1940 census release, just click on the image above to link to the National Archives website.

If you’ve never looked into your family tree before, now is a great time to branch out and take advantage of  your library’s many resources.

Kris McNamer
Library Director