Friends of the Free Library – Frankford Branch

I have been meaning to talk a bit about the Frankford Library since Chris Wink wrote his goodbye piece to Frankford a year ago.  He said:

I’ll miss being able to walk to the always welcoming and warm Frankford Library

That captures how it is when you walk in those doors.  My opportunity came with the invitation to post information about the Friends of the Free Library meeting to be held this week.  I posted the date on the calendar and then made note that I wanted to stop by and meet these folks.

So who are the Friends of the Free Library and what are the doing at the Frankford branch?  There is never enough time, money or people.  The City of Philadelphia funds the Free Library and every year we go through the “what gets cut from the budget” exercise.  The Friends are there to fill that gap in whatever way is needed.  They may do a fund raiser.  They may volunteer in the library.  When are left the meeting yesterday they were brainstorming ways to get more volunteers.

The Free Library branch in Frankford serves people of all ages.  It is not just for students working on school projects.  The computers there see heavy use by adults doing job searches.  People come in looking for all sorts of information.  Of course some people do come in looking to borrow books and I have to make the occasional stop in there to research databases on their system that the Library does not make available on line over the internet.  It is a tremendous community asset.

The next meeting of the Friends of the Free Library Frankford Branch is on Wednesday, March 16, 5:30-6:30 p.m. in the library meeting room.  Stop by and say hello.  They could use your help.