Mathews Memorial Library might be closed to the public because of the coronavirus threat, but staff members are still there every day, coming up with creative ways to accommodate the public’s need to read.
Director Bette Dillehay said the free pop-up library by the front door is being continuously stocked with popular novels, and the book drop is available for returning items.
People may select a book from the online catalog at catalog.mathewslibrary.org and call the library to arrange for curbside pickup, weather permitting. Or just call the library and ask if they have a certain title available.
For the younger set, the library is livestreaming Preschool Story Time every Wednesday at 10 a.m., when a library staff member reads a picture book. This is accessible at facebook.com/MathewsMemorialLibrary.
Beyond that, the library provides digital access to a wide range of popular e-books and e-audiobooks, magazines, music, and more at downloads.mathewslibrary.org, said Dillehay. There are also reference resources available at reference.mathewslibrary.org for library patrons.
Once people confined at home get tired of cleaning out the cupboards and watching Netflix, Dillehay suggested they might like to explore their Mathews ancestry through the library’s online genealogy database at genealogy.mathewslibrary.org, learn a new language at rocketlanguages.mathewslibrary.org, or take one of hundreds of classes available through universalclass.mathewslibrary.org.
The library’s own collection isn’t all that’s available online, though. Dillehay said that Internet Archive, which provides access to titles commonly held by academic and public libraries, has created a free National Emergency Library that will be available to the public through at least the end of June. This can be accessed at https://archive.org/details/nationalemergencylibrary.
In addition to print and digital resources, Dillehay said that library staff members are happy to provide information people who need to apply for unemployment benefits, and the library is serving as a portal for information about government actions and relief information.
To top it all off, the library has extended its Wi-Fi to outside of the building for free public access so people can take advantage of all that’s being offered.
For more information about what the library has to offer, call 804-725-5747.
Talks cancelled
Two lectures that were scheduled at the library for April have been cancelled because of the coronavirus outbreak: An April 2 talk, “A World Turned Upside Down, “by Dr. Walter Witschey of Longwood College on the history of getting computers to ‘think’ like humans, and an April 16 talk by Architectural Historian Carl Lounsbury on “Housing Patterns in Early Mathews County, 1790-1860.”