A standing-room-only crowd roared into a frenzy in Little Rock on Monday as Hillary Rodham Clinton became the eponym for the Central Arkansas Library System’s Children’s Library and Learning Center.
“I can think of no better name,” said Bobby Roberts, the executive director of the library system and a former aide to President Bill Clinton when he was governor of Arkansas.
Clinton, the former secretary of state and first lady, attended the renaming ceremony Monday, taking time to read The Very Hungry Caterpillar to children and to browse through a gift basket of vegetables grown in the library’s garden.
She recounted stories of summer trips to the library as a child and stressed the need for parents and teachers to read to children at a young age, because medical studies have shown the effect that reading can have on a developing brain.
“I love libraries and having this library named for me is very moving,” she said. “I cannot imagine a more exciting place in the country right now than this library and what it can mean to so many children now and in the future.’”
The system’s board of trustees voted June 27 to ask Clinton for permission to rename the library in her honor because of her extensive work with children and education in Arkansas and nationwide. Roberts said Monday that he could name more than 40 groups, boards and initiatives Clinton was pivotal in forming or pushing forward during her time in Arkansas.
“The thread that I see that pulls her forward throughout her endeavors is children,” he said, adding that without the Clintons, “We’d be sitting down here in the hot July dirt, and this library wouldn’t be here.”
The library gave out limited tickets to the event once it was announced last week that Clinton had accepted the honor and would be in town to celebrate the re-dedication of the children’s library at 4800 W. 10th St. off of Jonesboro Drive.
Some hinted during the ceremony Monday about the possibility that Clinton could throw her hat in the ring for the Democratic nomination for the 2016 presidential race. She smiled through the insinuations.
The library opened March 16 and has loaned out more than 42,000 books and other materials since then, Roberts said.
The library is unique compared with others nationwide. Many consist of a dedicated room or floor that is geared toward older children or teens. Some may have sculptures or murals, but few have the number of interactive features of Little Rock’s children’s library, which includes a kitchen, greenhouse, interactive landscape and water features for hands-on learning, as well as a children’s theater and workshop, and technology centers and reading stations geared toward children.
Roberts said he envisions even more opportunities at the library to instill a love of learning and reading, as well as having an effect on the neighboring 12th Street corridor neighborhoods. One example was on display Monday, as children were given the chance to take home books to keep. Roberts has said owning a book can change the way children view learning and relate to reading.
Clinton, who arrived before the dedication ceremony, took a few minutes to read The Very Hungry Caterpillar to a group of young children who sat on stools and animal-shaped furniture.
Clinton’s eyes widened as she described the meal the caterpillar in the book devours before becoming a butterfly, taking time to point out the colors of the book and ask the children questions that allowed them to show off what they’d learned about butterflies at a program last month at the library.
The Hillary Rodham Clinton Children’s Library and Learning Center is the 13th library in the Central Arkansas Library System to be dedicated and named after someone who contributed to the community, including former Gov. Sid McMath, prodigy Roosevelt Thompson and a host of others. Four libraries remain unnamed, he said.
“When you look at these libraries and think about who they are and what they did, they tell us about the goodness in all of us - they tell us about what our community is,” Roberts said.
Arkansas, Pages 9 on 07/09/2013