Library Days @ OHVA

Library Days at OHVA are a time for students to gather with their Learning Coaches/Parents and explore, discover, and enjoy all the services Ohio's Public Libraries offer.

This year, Library Days at OHVA will celebrate Ohio's library system and the influence Carnegie Libraries had on our state.

We hope you will join us as a school in discovering Ohio's free libraries and the services and opportunities they provide for our students and their families.

One of the most spectacular architectural gems of Carnegie's funded Libraries is the Columbus Metropolitan Library in downtown Columbus. Built in 1904, this building in the Beaux Arts Second Renaissance Revival architectural style has various words carved on its structure that represent Carnegie's devotion to assuring all had free access to books through public libraries.

The Latin phrase carved above the door on the historic Carnegie building of the Columbus Metropolitan Library Main Library is "Bibliotheca Fons Eruditionis," which translates to "The Library a fountain of learning."

OPEN TO ALL is carved directly above the doors at the main entrance.

At Carnegie's suggestion, MY TREASURES ARE WITHIN is inscribed on a stone bench outside the library.

Eight cherubins, each cut from a solid block of marble, represent arts and letters. Other carvings on the front of the library say, "Homer," "Virgil," "Erected with funds donated by Andrew Carnegie and dedicated to the advancement of learning," and "Anno MCMIV." The latter represents 1904, the year of the laying of the cornerstone. The building was opened to the public in 1907.

Library Days at OHVA feature activities with OHVA teachers and staff

Library Days at OHVA feature a tour of the library highlighting the following

• Services libraries provide for students and families who school at home
• Ohio authors & Illustrators
• Unique collections, features, and history of each library

Library Days at OHVA feature food options for all who attend

• Cheese & Pepperoni Pizzas are delivered
• Those not wishing to eat pizza may bring their own sack lunch
• Everyone should bring water in a spill-proof bottle

Library Days at OHVA attendees can include

• OHVA K-8th grade students - main focus of these event
• Learning Coach/Parent of OHVA students
• OHVA high school students are welcomed
• Siblings of OHVA students may attend

• C – Franklin County/Columbus
• NE – Cuyahoga County/Cleveland area
• NE - Richland County/Mansfield
• NE - Trumbull County/Warren
• NW – Lucas County/Maumee
• SC – Ross County/Chillicothe
• SE – Athens County/Nelsonville
• SW – Greene County/Xenia
• SW – Hamilton County/Cincinnati
• SW – Clermont County/Loveland

Sign-ups for Library Days at OHVA are found on the OHVA EVENT CALENDAR or through the OHVA App EVENT icon.

Remember that space is limited based on each library's community room capacity.

Please be sure to SHOW UP if you sign up because pizza purchases are based on sign ups.

Ohio received over 100 Carnegie library grants between 1899 and 1915, funding more than 104 public libraries and 7 academic libraries across the state. Here are some of the main influences Carnegie had on Ohio libraries:

• Open Stacks: Replaced traditional closed-stack retrieval systems with open book shelves, letting the public browse collections directly.
• Central Reference Desks: Introduced open, central monitoring and help desks that improved librarian-to-patron communication.
• Neo-Classic & Regional Styles: Prominent architects like Frank Packard designed numerous regional buildings (such as in Athens, Cambridge, and Miamisburg) featuring grand pillars, stone entryways, and stone inscriptions like "Open To All".

"A library outranks any other one thing a community can do to benefit its people. It is a never failing spring in the desert."

"There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library, this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration."

"I choose free libraries as the best agencies for improving the masses of the people, because they give nothing for nothing. They only help those who help themselves.

"No man becomes rich unless he enriches others."

"It was from my own early experience that I decided there was no use to which money could be applied so productive of good to girls and boys who have good within them and ability and ambition to develop it as the founding of a public library."

"The man who dies thus rich dies disgraced."