Stay Tuned: NYPL's Central Children's Room
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Debra Lau Whelan -- School Library Journal, 02/04/2008
Once the Donnell Library Center of the New York Public Library closes in May, will people still have one-stop access to all the wonderful resources in the Central Children’s Room and Teen Central? And what’s going to happen to the original Winnie the Pooh stuffed animals and Mary Poppins’s umbrella?
First off, there will be a temporary Central Children’s Room and Teen Central while Donnell is razed to make way for an 11-story hotel and a smaller library—but it’s still uncertain whether parts of the collections will be dispersed and where they’ll be located, say New York Public Library (NYPL) officials.
The fate of Pooh and friends, however, is a bit clearer. They’re heading to the Humanities and Social Sciences Library at 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue, where they’re expected to be on display, says Herb Scher, NYPL’s director of public relations.
Until a new Donnell is rebuilt, some of its collections will be spread out to other branches while others will head to a temporary leased retail space, says Scher.
Donnell Chief Librarian Anne Hofmann says a transition team made up of department heads and staff—including John Peters, the supervising librarian of the children’s room, and Joanne Rosario, the head of Teen Central—are currently devising recommendations for the transitional space.
“[Peters] is concerned about the collections and services and being able to continue them in the interim, and having them available to the public, which is something that we’re all looking for,” Hofmann says.
And what will the new library look like? The new Donnell will offer children’s and teen services, but it’s up in the air whether the same Central Children’s Room and Teen Central that users have come to love and rely upon will still exist. “We haven’t gotten anywhere near that stage of planning yet,” says Hofmann, adding that the library hasn’t even hired an architect.
Scher confirms that NYPL will have a permanent and improved Central Children’s Room and Teen Central in terms of architecture, technology, and services—and their materials will be accessible to the public. But “as to whether the Children’s Room and Teen Central will go back to Donnell, we’re still considering more than one option for that.”
News that Donnell could lose its Central Children’s Room greatly disturbs award-winning author Jon Scieszka, who was recently named the new National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. “I think it would be a loss for everybody in children’s books if there wasn’t a real dedicated Children’s Room,” says Scieszka, who says he edited The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales (Scholastic, 1993), conducted research, and even wrote some of his early works in the room. “It would really be a loss for kids and send a message that kids’ books aren’t really that important.”
As for the library staff, Scher stresses that although the library system is going through staff restructuring, there are no plans to dismantle the “central children's services and young adult services departments and… no layoffs are planned.”
Donnell’s staff has been anxious to learn about the fate of the library’s collections—and their jobs—since November 7, 2007, when it was announced that the building and its land were sold to Orient-Express Hotels for $59 million in cash.
