Pine Grove library fights to preserve history

In the 1990s, a school bus would stop at the Pine Library in Pine Grove twice a week. Students would meet with their homework groups or use the computers, which had some of the only internet access in town.

The bus doesn’t drive down to Pine Grove anymore.

Fewer school-age children live in the area now, and some older patrons have stopped checking out physical books, instead choosing to download e-books.

“Really, in the last five to 10 years, things have changed quite a bit,” said North Fork Library Association President Patty Mcllvaine. “We talk a lot at our meetings about trying to stay relevant in the digital age.”

The library has always been a nonprofit organization, staffed entirely by volunteers. Facing a shortage of volunteers, the library recently shifted from being open three days a week to two.

“Growing and having the community use (the library) more would be ideal,” library volunteer Carly Martin said. “But obviously, just keeping it alive,” she added, would be enough.

To increase library access, a series of outdoor bookshelves on the side of the building are always open to the public, with books for sale for $1 or less, paid through the honor system to a drop box at the front of the library. The library also offers free WiFi 24/7.

“Sometimes we’re not even open, and people are parked and using our internet, which is fine,” Mcllvaine said. “That’s what it’s there for. We want to be a community service.”

The library has been serving the communities of Pine Grove and the neighboring Buffalo Creek since 1975 when a group of women who regularly met to play cards and trade books gained the building in an effort to give back to the community.

The library is home to an incredible collection of Pine Grove history, including interviews with dozens of Pine Grove residents, who talk about how the community has changed since the 1960s. Residents talk about stories from their grandparents, who arrived to the area on covered wagons, as well as daily life in the community.

Transcriptions and VHS recordings of the interviews are available, which can be played on the library’s VHS player.

For Pine Grove residents, these interviews tie the present to the past. Volunteer Carly Martin moved to the area two years ago and has spent her recent volunteer shifts at the library mining through these interviews for any mention of the cabin she now lives in, which was built in 1890.

The library is open from 3-6 p.m. Thursdays and 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturdays, and will also be holding a large book sale from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sept. 2 as part of a Pine Grove community celebration. All funds raised at the sale will go toward improving the library’s outdoor bookshelves and storage shed.

“When you’re coming through Pine Grove, if the open sign is out there, come in and say hi,” McIlvaine said.