Back On Line

At last, we are finally back on-line, or should I say on-line at our new home. What an adventure!! It is Friday - Monday we will open to the public and we still have a lot to do. We will be working through tomorrow and some of us will be here Sunday. When ten o'clock comes Monday morning we will still be getting settled. On top of that, it will be the first day we will be on the PINES system. On top of that, Tuesday we have a visiting author. Oh, yeah, the play starts FRIDAY!!!!! What a week!!

I once again have limited time to blog and I apologize wholeheartedly for not being able to blog the last two weeks, but that is just how it worked out. For some odd reason, I was unable to blog from my home. I tried and tried, but could not.

The movers did an excellent job. It was quite a show. They came in with these huge wooden book carts. They took the books off of the shelves and filled up a lot of these carts. Once the books were on the carts, they disassembled the shelves. The shelves were taken over to Manhattan and reassembled in their correct places. The books were then taken off of the carts and put back on the shelves. Each row of the carts was tagged with location information. Moving the books and the shelves was not a problem at all downstairs. Upstairs became a little more involved...or so we thought. These guys have seen it all. They once again put all the books onto the carts and disassembled the shelves. In most cases they were able to keep the frames together. They simply lifted the frames over the glass wall down to someone on the first floor. That person was usually on a table or something like that. That also was done pretty easily.

Moving the books and shelves was the easy part. Once this was done, all of the other junk had to be moved. This was what was so intense. Office supplies, tables, chairs, tools, catalog equipment, book equipment, fax machine, copiers, scanners, all the circulation equipment, cleaning supplies, food and drinks, ladders, computers, monitors, keyboards, mouses, printers, magazines, newspapers, wooden shelves from offices, desks and contents, countless power cords, countless computer cords, paper...everything. We had boxed up just about everything and labelled the boxes. My boxes were labelled Rich. My name was outside my new office in the Manhattan building. The movers simply put all of my boxes in my new office. Easy!! Some of the boxes, however, never got labbeled. These would wind up somewhere. Whoever the box belonged to would have to find it. That was fun for most folks.

The movers could have had us moved in no time, but the construction at Manhattan was very involved. What made it worse for the workers was a time limit. They were really under the gun. It was amazing how they were able to do what they did. In less than a month, they took an empty 100,000 square foot building and turned it into a 20,000 foot area, complete with offices, made specifically for a library. They made eight offices, a workroom, and a storage room we named Easy (because the things in it were to be easy to get to). Oh, we also have two bathrooms that we will all share. Needless to say, there was much more work - construction, electrical, heat and air, plumbing, cleaning, etc.

Our staff came back yesterday, the 24th. They have been busy moving things around, setting-up...good gosh, the things that have to be done just for someone to be able to check out a book!! Anyway, they have been and will be busy into next week. All the while getting used to working in a new place - most of these people have not been away from Lake Blackshear in thirteen years. Indeed, some of us have only been at Lake Blackshear.

Although the move is practically over, I will continue to blog at least for awhile. Perhaps I will turn my attention to the theater event coming next week. That's another intersting topic. I'll do that a little next time. If I have left out anything I will blog it as soon as I can. I hope you enjoy this and again I am sorry for being away for two weeks.

To be continued...

It's Happening

I apologize for not blogging more, but we have been very busy. This moving thing is something else! You never know how much junk you have until you have to move. Now, I have moved several times and we always had a lot of junk at home. It is the same at a library. I suppose you could say we are weeding everything - not just the collection.

As LB begins to look bare, Manhattan is beginning to look like a library - okay, a temporary library. Yesterday was a huge day as far as progress goes. It was perhaps the biggest leap in getting that place ready. Most of the offices have walls. Most of the books are moved. I believe all of the helves are in place. Perhaps the biggest change from previous days was the separation wall going up. This is the wall that goes all the way to the ceiling. This wall will make it much easier to heat and cool the library. It should be finished Friday.

Right now, we are so busy that I have to end this blog. Later today, when we get a chance - more blogging.

Photos of Move

We now can see walls at Manhattan

Workers taking down shelves at LBRL

Putting books on shelves at Manhattan

Setting up shelves at the Manhattan site

Books on carts at Manhattan site









Looking down from second floor at carts and books in main lobby of LBRL

Books on carts at LBRL

It Has Begun!!!

At approximately 9:15 this morning, the movers arrived to begin moving the Lake Blackshear Regional Library. It is great to see this day arrive. Southeast Storage Solutions, Inc. out of High Springs, Florida have been working all day moving our shelves and books. For those of you familiar with our library - the workers are disassembling the shelves that hold the non-fiction books, beginning with the Dewey Decimal number 001. Looking at the first floor shelves, the workers are beginning near the window and working towards the back of the library. At the end of the day Monday they had moved nine complete shelves and one single sided shelf - working well past the elevator on the first floor. The books are taken off the shelves and loaded onto big wooden carts. The carts are then rolled onto a truck and transported to the Manhattan building. The books remain on the carts until the shelves are in place.

We can finally see what the Manhattan building will look like. We visited over there about 3:30 and there were four shelves in place (the other five will be up this evening). By the end of this week we will surely get a good look at what the stacks will look like. Also, we are beginning to see walls put up on the various offices and workrooms.

It has been a very interesting day. We went from not knowing anything about the book moving operation to seeing it close up and feeling pretty good about everything. We certainly are optimistic about opening January 22nd. Shortly after that date, work will begin on the Lake Blackshear Regional building.

Tomorrow we will post some pictures from today of both sites. Check back with us tomorrow afternoon.

Photos from Tripp Street

Looking into the staff workroom from the door heading out to the desk.

Looking along the wall of the offices towards the bathrooms in back.

A view of one of the offices with the staff workroom behind.

Looking through the door of the staff workroom out into the desk area. The front desk will be just outside this doorway.

Looking towards the desk area. The desk will be left to right running in front of this wall and behind the beam. The staff workroom is in the back.

Looking along the back wall of the new library towards what will be the children's area. The offices will be straight back to the left.

Another look at the desk area. The doorway in this photo will lead to the staff workroom.