The Hartford Public Library will be celebrating its 100th anniversary this Saturday with a special event.
Library Director Stephanie Daniels tells us everyone’s invited to come out from noon to 2 p.m. for a variety of activities for the whole family.
“We’re going to have a water slide and a bounce house and the Monster Shredder Truck is going to be with us during that time,” Daniels said. “And we’re going to have free lunch and music and some drawings for some prizes and cupcakes for our anniversary.”
Daniels says the Hartford Public Library started out informally as the Hartford Ladies Library, moving from place to place. But then the donation of a building made the official formation of the library possible.
“It was April of 1925 that it first had its own building. It was given to them by Jennie Merriman. It was part of her estate. And that was the first time that the Hartford Library actually had a location.”
And Daniels notes another local woman, Bonna Vanderlyn, made the library’s current location possible. Vanderlyn donated $1.3 million to construct the new building at 12 Church Street in 2019.
Featured at this Saturday’s anniversary celebration will be a panorama of the library as it changed from 1925 to 2025. Daniels says she’s thrilled to be able to mark this milestone.
