Library Book Sale
The used book sale is open during the Library's regular hours at the Perkins House (next to Library). It features over 5,000 titles that change constantly. At any time of the year, you can find best-sellers in hardcover and paperback, non-fiction, biographies, audiobooks, videos, music cds, and much more.

Cookbook
I Want That Recipe! is a unique collection of recipes from the patrons of the Library. Now in its fifth printing, the collection has sold over 7,900 copies. A book that has garnered national recognition is available for sale at the Library for $23.00 (tax included), can be shipped by mail ($27.00 tax and postage included), or purchased on Amazon.com

Flower Show and Birdhouse Auction
The bi-annual flower show happens again on the first Sunday of August in 2011. Flower arrangements are made by participating patrons (and visitors) and are judge by peers during the evening party. This fundraising event combines books, flowers, and a great deal of imagination. Contestants may enter their arrangement(s) in several categories: general, men's, miniatures, children's, and large container. Wooden birdhouses are decorated by local artists and auctioned off during the flower show.

Annual Fund Drive

July, 2010

When I began my tenure on the Board of Trustees at the Louis T. Graves Memorial Public Library nearly six years ago, digital books were a mere whisper. To imagine a society where everyone read from glowing screens rather than cupping the crisp pages of an actual book in their hands seemed like something out of a Ray Bradbury story.

Today, digital books don’t quite rule the market, but they are certainly biting into the sales of traditional physical books. This fact makes a question I was asked recently seem less hypothetical than it might have just a few short years ago: What is the place of a library in the digital age?

Well, I can answer that question in a single word: Community.

Now, let me be clear: when I say community, I mean something much larger than a shared zip code, or area code, for that matter. I mean people, people bound together by a commonality. A little piece of plastic and circuitry might be capable of holding thousands of book titles, but it will not take your seven-year-old by the hand and suggest a new book. It will not be a place for new mothers to meet and talk eye to eye, or heart to heart. It will not care about you.

Graves Library is a nucleus of community activity. With over 6,000 active library card holders, circulation remained steady last year. Attendance at our public programs increased by 15%. Our library community includes no less than 51 volunteers. This amazing group worked over 4,600 hours last year, which means that roughly 99.9% of the time Graves Library is open—42 hours per week—a volunteer is staffing our main circulation desk. Now that is community.

But all community gathering and volunteerism aside, Graves Library must buy books, audio books, magazines, and DVDs to fill our shelves. We must do this because we believe that our community needs to remain connected by something other than bits and bytes.

Graves Library receives only a portion of its annual budget from the Town of Kennebunkport. To make up the significant balance, we host regular fundraising events and we ask you, our patrons, to support our annual fund drive. Each year, we strive to meet a goal of $30,000. With help from each and every one of you, this is possible. I ask you to support our bastion of community and please consider making a donation. No amount is too small.

As new technologies arrive, conventional wisdom says we should shed old technologies. But listen, I’ll let you in on a little secret: conventional wisdom is often wrong. The roots of Graves Library date back to 1894. That’s 116 years of cultivating community. There is nothing old-fashioned about that. And there never will be.

This is your community. Be a part of it.

Faithfully,  Joshua Bodwell, Board President

If you would like to donate to our Annual Fund Drive, please send your contribution to: Annual Fund Drive, Louis T. Graves Memorial Public Library, P.O. Box 391, Kennebunkport, ME 04046. You will receive a receipt of your donation.