Inside the Salem Library, a small care of dedicated volunteers recently spent hours preparing for Olde Salem Day.
For the past year, they, like everyone, have waited for life to return to normal. One sign of improvement is the return of Olde Salem Day and with it the Salem Library Book Sale.
The sale this year will be more visible than in the past, as it will be held in two large tents in front of the library. One tent will be dedicated to the children and young adults, while the other will contain the other topics, such as mysteries, novels, histories and the ever-popular cookbooks.
The Friends of the Salem Library (FOSL) is a group of people who love books and appreciate the importance of a library to the vitality of a city or town. They accept donations of books all year. In August, the real work begins. With the help of Boy Scout Troop 352, the donations are brought out of storage. FOSL members check each book, and the best are set aside for this annual sale.
The funds raised are used to support library activities, which may range from the viewing of the solar eclipse to teen game nights to the restocking of the seed lending library. Support of the children’s library activities is always a major project.
The sale will be held at from 1:00 to 8:00 p.m. on September 10. The sale will continue on Olde Salem Day until 4:00. Even during the best sales, there are always lots of books left after Saturday. These go on sale on Sunday afternoon from 1:30 to 4:00 p.m. at the Bagful of Books Sale. For $3.00, attendees will receive a shopping bag to fill with as many books as they can. This sale will continue through September 17 during normal library hours.
Since the COVID-19 virus caused the cancellation of almost everything last year, more books were read and more were donated. The selection of donated books is twice the usual size. This is the time to repopulate the bookshelves at prices that can’t be matched.
- Submitted by Ken Sosnowski
