Christmastime is here again. Donation. A big one.

For the past three years, the Franklin Public Library has been extraordinarily kind to us. in 2011 we received 12 boxes; we received 16 boxes of their castaways in 2012.

This year, they were a tad more generous: 24 boxes of donated fiction and nonfiction. There were some duplicates, but we are beggars and cannot be choosers.

We kept 89 titles, not including 19 titles that we used as swap-outs for books in lesser condition.
Six boxes of these books were reserved for nearby Baystate Correctional Center. Because they’re a much smaller prison, they don’t have the storage space, so we’ll send them a few boxes at a time.

15 boxes have been reserved for both Assisted Daily Living and the segregation Units. We’ll take these books as needed to these Units throughout the year.

Whenever we get a donation in — especially a donation of this size — the Library clerks are always excited to see what’s coming in, and they’re also excited to have a lengthy project to be working on. All kept material must be stamped, processed, catalogued, classified, dust jackets need covering, shelf list cards need creating and filed, data needs to be entered in the Follett system, and then everything needs to be shelved. We also need to alert the population that new material has arrived. apart from word-of-mouth, we copy covers onto colored paper and make a display in the hall display cabinets.

This time, the books needed to be brought into the Library in my absence, and thankfully both staff and Library clerks worked well together to make this happen.

All 108 books were processed in two half-day sessions.