Cook Memorial Library

Tamworth, NH

Jay’s book picks

Each year I choose a Book of the Year, my personal favorite. Here they are, going back as far as I can remember.

Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann 2009

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society Fiction by Mary Anne Shaffer 2008
Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell, and Carly Simon–and the journey [...]

Tamworth's Oral History Project

In the 1970s and 80s, an oral history project recorded a number of local people of advanced age reminiscing about early days in Tamworth, between the turn of the century and the Great Depression. These interviews were recorded on audio cassettes, and they have been languishing unheard in the library for many years.
Sponsored by The [...]

Don't Forget to Vote!

This is today’s scene at the Townhouse
Let’s break the record for getting out the New Hampshire vote.
Polling Information for Democrats
Polling Information for Republicans
New Hampshire uses both hand counts and Accuvote voting machines.
The primary results show that we could have a problem
Let’s protect the count in New Hampshire.
If the electronic summary differs from the paper summary, [...]

Closed on Veteran's Day

The library will be closed on Veteran’s Day, on Tuesday, November 11th.
This summer I visited the site of the B52 bomber crash on Elephant Mountain, near Greenville on Moosehead Lake. This crash occurred on a very cold January night in 1963. Two airmen survived by ejecting seconds before the crash, but seven others perished. There [...]

Countdown to the 2008 Election

In these last weeks before the elections, the political and economic turmoil is much in the news. This is the first presidential election to play out so prominently on the Internet, with amateur junkies and professional pundits alike mouthing off right and left. I’ve been exploring the ways and means of online coverage. Certainly the [...]

Online Olympics Coverage

The official site is worth taking a look at.
For those who missed the spectacular opening ceremonies, here are many renditions to choose from.
For news and results, click on Fox, New York Times, USA Olympic Committee, ESPN and many others
For Olympic history in general, here are some kodak moments, and some YouTube moments. For Michael Phelps [...]

Ashley Bryan, Artist and Illustrator

Recently I had the good fortune to be invited by my friend, Marie, to spend a long weekend on Little Cranberry Island, way out in the North Atlantic off Mt. Desert Island. In the small village of Islesford live approximately 70 year-round residents, amongst them the children’s book illustrator, Ashley Bryan. He is a most [...]

Who's on First? History of New Hampshire Libraries

Recently I happened to run across this statement on the Peterborough Town Library website: “The Peterborough Town Library, established 1833, is the oldest public library in the world.” Celebrating their 175th anniversary, Peterborough’s website states:
The library was established in 1833 due to the efforts of Dr. Abiel Abbot, Unitarian minister, who encouraged the creation of [...]

Artist of the Month – June 2008

Gay Freeborn’s Couch Potato
‘The Painting Group,’ on display in June, has been painting together for many years. Presently the group consists of Gay Freeborn, Herb Hollingsworth, Ed Cooke, Mardi Freeman, and Jay Rancourt. Inspired by the Impressionists, we get together weekly to paint, trading techniques and critiquing each other’s work, sharing a bowl of soup [...]

Sustainable Tamworth

Photo by Dennis Quinn

It was just about a year ago that the library, with the help of the community, assembled a collection of titles on Sustainability. Now, a year later, with the Community School’s CSA garden, the Stonehedge Farm vegetable stand, Peg’s wonderful wood-fired bread, and the first summer season of the Tamworth farmer’s market [...]

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