Wednesday, August 19, 2015
The Library of the Month is a celebration of Wisconsin libraries compiled by the BadgerLink team.
For 2015, there were more than 2,250 hits to the BadgerLink website from Tomahawk. That means that in the past 5 months the equivalent of 75% of the population of Tomahawk visited the BadgerLink website! That’s pretty amazing! Let’s see why:
Tomahawk Public Library serves the City of Tomahawk, Lincoln County, and also parts of Oneida and Price Counties. With such a large geographic area, the library is always busy and provides a variety of services beyond “just books.“
The population of Tomahawk triples during the summer with seasonal residents as people travel to Tomahawk for vacation, high school reunions, and the annual 4th of July parade. And luckily, summer is a great time to be at the library!
Tomahawk Library offers public computers and free Wi-Fi. In the summer, Wi-Fi is particularly important to library users because often the library is the only place where seasonal residents can get online. An internet connection is a vital part of today’s lifestyle. Even though you’re on vacation, you may still need to check your work email. Also, you may want to stay in touch with friends or family, send pictures, or play games--it is vacation after all!
Library users come to the library to use Wi-Fi or public computers and stay at the library because it’s a great place to play. Look no further than the summer library program for evidence of the fun and energizing environment where people play and learn.
In the summer, Tomahawk Public Library hosts their summer reading program. For children and teens, there is special programming. There were two portable planetarium programs where kids learned about stars in the School District of Tomahawk’s gym as well as programming in the Northwood wildlife center. The summer library theme this year was “heroic stories” and the library celebrated local heroes like the police department, rescue dogs, and seeing eye dogs. In August, the library will present, “Stories on the River” once a week which is an outside story time. Bring a chair or blanket and listen to a story alongside a landscaped area by the Wisconsin River.
Lincoln County Reads, the adult summer reading program, is offered in all libraries across the county and everyone over 18 can participate through Labor Day. Adults can also participate by reading to kids!
Tomahawk Public Library works with the local school to provide access to BadgerLink resources. The children’s and Youth Services Librarian, Annette Miller, visits the schools (both public and parochial) on a regular basis - 12 classrooms per month plus in the fall she is invited to High School Freshman English classes - promoting all the great resources at our library, which of course, includes BadgerLink. Annette works closely with the Tomahawk School Library Media Instructional Technology Coordinator, Peg Billing, to coordinate BadgerLink training among students.
Tomahawk Public Library is at the heart of the community and provides important resources to their users.