Charlotte Mecklenburg Library now offers cardholders professional attire and accessories to check out for job interviews or important meetings through its STARS for Success program through the Job Help Center at Main Library. The rental items include dress shirts, padfolios, neckties and scarves, and are available for a one-week checkout period with an opportunity to renew the checkout for another week. Returns can be made to any Library location.

“The Library is proud of its long history in helping our community find successful, meaningful careers,” said Seth Ervin, chief innovation officer for Charlotte Mecklenburg Library. “We’re constantly looking at ways to improve lives and build a stronger community, and we see this as filling a need for our cardholders. We’re happy to make these items available.”

“A lot of people come in to the Job Help Center with questions about their resume and cover letter,” said De’Trice Fox, a librarian at Main Library. “We continue to help customers improve those items, but now we’re excited to also help nail the first-impression with free professional clothes and accessories to go along with their dynamite resumes.”

Uptown’s AJ’s Dry Cleaners has partnered with the Library to dry clean every piece after use at a subsidized rate. This allows each item to benefit more members of the community in finding jobs. A similar program exists at ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center for teen job-seekers.

For more information about job help programs and resources, visit cmlibrary.org/services/job-help.

As February nears and as store shelves overflow with hearts and pink-hued stuffed animals, we can't help but feel the love for Charlotte Mecklenburg Library. 

With 20 locations across Mecklenburg County, there's a lot to love about the Library. We asked our staff to share their favorites, and we've included a sample here.

But that can't be enough, of course. Throughout February, we'd love to see your favorite place at the Library! Share a picture on your favorite social media platform of your favorite spot at the Library, tag @cmlibrary and use #CMLFavoritePlace. Also, send us pictures of your favorite spot to [email protected].

We'll share a selection of photos on our own social media platforms to spread the love. 

So, where's your favorite place at the Library?

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is the Welcome Desk at ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center. Every day, I’m able to greet and inform customers of the magic of ImaginOn. More importantly, I get to meet families, visitors, parents and children of all ages. By far the most rewarding part of my job is when a customer comes back to say “thank you” for the warm welcome and/or tour of the building.  Several years back, I had a parent say the reason her children enjoy coming to ImaginOn is because of me. How can this not be my        favorite place in the whole world?!

-Frank Mendoza, ImaginOn                                                                                                  

My favorite place at Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is near the fireplace at the Matthews Library, snuggled up reading a good mystery!

- Kim Arlia, Main Library

 My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is the Robinson-Spangler North Carolina Room’s archival vault because it holds all sorts of cool historical treasure. I love learning about Charlotte’s history through unique artifacts, diaries, love letters and photographs.

-Sydney Vaile, Robinson-Spangler Carolina Room

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is hanging out at the Scaleybark Library during special holidays. The family programs offered are a blast and make library visits extra special. #CMLFavoritePlace

Beatriz Guevara, Scaleybark Library

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center. I've loved watching my daughter fall in love with books and with theatre in a city that cares enough about children to build a palace for both, just for them.

-Melanie Baron, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation

 My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is performing outreach storytimes on air at Seacrest Studios inside the Levine Children’s Hospital. Young children and their families listen and watch from their hospital rooms as I read stories and sing songs. I love bringing the Library out into our community!

-Lonna Vines, Hickory Grove Library

  Our favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is the Mecklenburg Room inside the Robinson-Spangler Carolina Room at Main Library. The wood paneling is remarkable, and the access to historical information is unbeatable!

-Teleia White and Jenni Gaisbauer, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is definitely sitting in the storytellers chair in the Spangler Library at ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center during family storytime! This is the place where I have a front-row seat watching stories come to life in the eyes of our youngest customers!

-Cynthia McDonald, ImaginOn

My favorite place at Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is the front entrance of Main Library. I always read the quotes on the columns, even though I pass by them nearly every day, and any front entrance of a library always tempts me to enter.

-Karen Beach, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is my monthly armchair travel presentation with the Outreach team at Huntersville Oaks. I love “travelling” the world wth my favorite seniors for outreach!

- Darcey Mesaris, North County Regional Library

My favorite place at Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is at the checkout!  I can't wait to start reading or watching my materials. 

- Ann Stawski, Main Library

My favorite place in Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is the puppet closet in the offices of Spangler Library at ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center. It’s where we house a collection of not only our fabulous puppets but our favorite storytime books, flannel board kits, silly costumes and weird props, and it’s where we hunker down to plan every single one of our programs. Walking into this room always reminds me of how creative and magical my job is.

-Becca Worthington, ImaginOn

Full-court fever is indigenous to North Carolina, but it’s especially strong this winter as we welcome the NBA All-Star Game to our Hive Feb. 15 through Feb. 17. Charlotte Mecklenburg Library can help you prepare to cheer on Kemba Walker as he represents your hometown Hornets with books that cover everything from the history and rules of the game to today’s hottest hoopsters. Check out RBDigital for access to back issues of Slam, and the latest player news in ESPN the Magazine. And teens, join us at ImaginOn: The Joe and Joan Martin Center on Feb. 7 for our NBA Jam Tournament!

Here’s a jam-packed list of All-Star materials to get you in the game.

For adults

• Challenge your friends to find out who knows the rules and penalties the best with NBA Rules Quiz Book by Wayne Wheelwright. 
• Basketball: A Love Story by Jackie MacMullen is a new book that documents hundreds of basketball legends, including Steph Curry, Dr. J, Phil Jackson, Cheryl Miller and Lisa Leslie, talking about their passion for the game.
• Rise and Fire: The Origins, Science, and Evolution of the Jump Shot—And How It Transformed Basketball Forever by Shawn Fury is part history book, tracing the history of the game from dirt courts of the 1930s to state-of-the-art NBA floors, and part memoir, featuring interviews with some of the game’s greatest shooters, including Jerry West and Denise Long.
• Chasing Perfection: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the High-Stakes Game of Creating an NBA Champion by Andy Glockner is everything you want to know about the data analysis and theory that go into building a winning NBA team.

Celebrating Carolina’s own

• The Boy Who Never Gave Up: Stephen Curry by Anthony Curcio is a picture book biography of Charlotte’s own Golden State Warrior.
• Golden: The Miraculous Rise of Steph Curry by Marcus Thompson is a biography for adults, written by a Warriors reporter who focuses on Curry’s work ethic and intensity.
• In Salt in His Shoes: Michael Jordan in Pursuit of a Dream by Roslyn Jordan, Michael’s mother and sister team up to tell children the story of his hard work and dedication.
• There Is No Next: NBA Legends on the Legacy of Michael Jordan by Sam Smith is an oral history featuring interviews with the icons, including Phil Jackson, Reggie Miller and Karl Malone, who coached, competed against and played with Michael.
• Michael Jordan in His Own Words by Geoffrey Giuliano is more than just “his own words,” because the audiobook includes interviews with Scottie Pippin, President Bill Clinton, David Stern and more.
• In In the Land of Giants: My Life in Basketball, Tyrone “Muggsy” Bogues tells the story of all 5 feet, 3 inches of himself making it to the NBA.
• Resilience: Faith, Focus, Triumph by Alonzo Mourning details the faith, focus and determination that have carried him through life. (Yes, he spent most of his career with the Miami Heat, but the Hornets drafted him to the NBA, so we can take a little credit for his success!)

Picture books

• H.O.R.S.E.: A Game of Basketball and Imagination by Christopher Myers is a fun look at two friends competing against each other with one crazy shot after the other.
• Dickie V’s ABCs and 1-2-3s: A Great Start for Young Superstars by Dick Vitale is nothing short of “Awesome Baby!”
• Join the crowd at “Mastadon Square Garden” for an entertaining game of Dino-Basketball by Lisa Wheeler.
• George learns kids can overcome obstacles and achieve their goals in Curious George Joins the Team by Cynthia Platt.
• Swish! by Bill Martin offers high-energy rhymes in a fast-paced story of a girls’ championship basketball game.

Fiction and nonfiction for children

• Basketball Belles: How Two Teams and One Scrappy Player Put Women’s Hoops on the Map by Sue Macy tells the story of the first-ever intercollegiate women’s basketball game, when Stanford took on the University of California at Berkeley in 1896.
• In Hoop Genius: How a Desperate Teacher and a Rowdy Gym Class Invented Basketball by John Coy we learn how James Naismith invented the game in 1891.
• Basketball’s Greatest Players by S.A. Kramer is for beginning readers and features 11 legends of the game.
• There’s no better way to get excited about physics than with Slam Dunk! Science Projects with Basketball by Robert Gardner.
• Elena Delle Donne, WNBA MVP, Olympic gold medalist and Global Ambassador for Special Olympics, writes the Hoops series to entertain young readers.
• Free Throw is a title from Jake Maddox’s sports series, in which young athletes find their inner strength through challenge and struggle.
• In Slam Dunk! by Sharon Robinson, the new kid in school works to raise money to start a basketball team at his Harlem middle school.
• Stanford Wong Flunks Big-Time, by Lisa Yee tells the story of a basketball prodigy’s struggles with academics and parental expectations.

Young adult basketball-themed fiction

• Chuck Bell’s upset about spending the summer with his grandparents but discovers a passion for basketball in Rebound by Kwame Alexander.
• Hooper by Geoff Herboch is the story of a Polish orphan whose talent for basketball should be his ticket for success in the U.S., but social dynamics complicate his path.
• Teens in Oakland, California, learn the benefits of dedication and teamwork in L.J. Alonge’s Blacktop series.
• Two basketball players with tragic pasts, one African-American and one Irish-American, find friendship in Boy 21 by Matthew Quick.

And, finally, to answer the question that’s been gnawing at you since you began reading this blog post, yes, we do have Space Jam on DVD.

See you on the court and in the Library.

P.S. We’ve compiled all these resources into one comprehensive list so you can easily keep track of your basketball books.

Celebrate Black History Month this February with Charlotte Mecklenburg Library by reading books and attending programs that highlight and celebrate black history and culture. This tradition dates back to 1926 and is celebrated in February because Fredrick Douglass, author and abolitionist, and Abraham Lincoln, the “Great Emancipator” and president, were both born in February. The Library has a wealth of information about Black History Month, but take a look below at some of our top picks.

One great book to share with children is the multi-award-winning The Patchwork Path: A Quilt Map to Freedom by Bettye Stroud. In this story, a young girl named Hannah and her father use a coded quilt from her mother to find their way to freedom from slavery. One fun activity for families to do while reading this book is to encourage children to design quilt squares and attach them to a poster board to replicate a freedom quilt.

Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor is the perfect book to share with second-graders and older children; this book also won the 1977 Newbery Medal. Set in the Great Depression, this book follows Cassie as she confronts racism. If you’re looking for more, this title is the sequel to Song of the Trees and is followed by two other books and a prequel.

Dear Martin by Nic Stone stars Justyce in this young adult fiction book. Justyce is a great student, on his way to an Ivy League college. After an incident involving the police, Justyce turns to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. However, after another incident with an off-duty officer, Justyce battles with himself and asks, “What would Martin do?” This is a powerful story and is a good way to start conversations with teens about race and violence.

Octavia E. Butler’s novel Kindred is the first science fiction novel written by an African-American woman. Dana is celebrating her birthday in California when she’s whisked away through time to antebellum Maryland. Through multiple time traveling trips, Dana soon learns she‘s meant to protect a young slaveholder because he’s the father of Dana’s great grandmother. This book gives the modern woman a glimpse into the horrors of the antebellum South and slavery. Kindred is great for both young adults and adults.

Along with vast amounts of fiction available to start conversations during Black History Month, the Library has numerous biographies to help readers learn more about African-American culture and history. Just search the catalog on our website. Be sure to check out our young adult and children’s booklist as well as a booklist that can inspire people of all ages.

For other options, visit Beatties Ford Road Regional Library and the LATIBAH Museum's exhibit of Door of No Return: Story of the Middle Passage. This event is free for families, but you must register online. Additionally, ImaginOn:The Joe and Joan Martin Center and West Boulevard will also offer programs for children to celebrate Black History Month.

Situated conveniently off I-85 and Beatties Ford Road, Allegra Westbrooks Regional Library is located in the Lincoln Heights community in Charlotte’s Historic West End.

Formerly Beatties Ford Road Regional Library, Allegra Westbrooks Regional is the only Charlotte Mecklenburg Library named for an individual. Ms. Westbrooks began her career with the Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County in 1947. Prior to desegregation, she managed the only library serving African American residents in Charlotte at the time—the Brevard Street Library for Negroes. Ms. Westbrooks was promoted to Supervisor of Branches in 1957, making her the first African American public library supervisor in North Carolina. She served in this role for many years until her retirement in 1984. Ms. Westbrooks passed away in April 2017 at the age of 96.

Allegra Westbrooks Regional Library welcomes customers from many neighborhoods along and around busy Beatties Ford Road serving a diverse community of readers, learners, job seekers, entrepreneurs, community leaders, and more. A variety of library programs are offered including multiple book clubs, a multigenerational chess club, technology classes, and Storytime among others. Collections include a diverse selection of materials such as fiction and non-fiction titles in multiple world languages, African-American fiction collection and African-American and religion non-circulating collections.

Located just over a mile away from the Library is Johnson C. Smith University, Charlotte’s only   historically Black college/university (HBCU) and West Complex,  “the largest culturally centered placemaking project on the West Side.” Unique community organizations like For the Struggle, Inc.  and Beatties Ford Road Vocational Training Center can also be found just blocks away from Allegra Westbrooks Regional. Well-established eateries like West End Fresh Seafood Market and Original Chicken and Ribs along with newcomer Archive CLT, a local staff favorite.

New residents may find support through the Office of Equity, Mobility, and Immigrant Integration , Refugee Health – Mecklenburg County Public Health, and Refugee Support Services. Are you new to Charlotte? Explore other neighborhoods through the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library blog and WelcomeCLT, a digital space created for newcomers to Charlotte.

Resources:

• Allegra Westbrooks Regional Library – 2412 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, NC 28216 | 704-416-3000
• Archive CLT – 2023 Beatties Ford Rd Suite D Charlotte, NC 28216 | 980-349-5595
• Beatties Ford Road Vocational Training Center –  1406 Beatties Ford Rd, Charlotte, NC 28216 | 980-349-4067
• For the Struggle, Inc – 1420 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, NC 28216 | 704-800-6628
• Johnson C. Smith University – 100 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, NC 28216 | 704-378-1000
• Office of Equity, Mobility, and Immigrant Inclusion – 600 E. Trade St Charlotte, NC 28202 | 704-336-1264
• Original Chicken and Ribs – 1100 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, N 28216 | 704-3322902
• Refugee Health – Mecklenburg Count Public Health – 2845 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, NC 28216 | 980-314-9470
• Refugee Support Services – 3925 Willard Farrow Dr Charlotte, NC 28215 | 704-458-3245
• West End Fresh Seafood Market – 2206 Beatties Ford Rd Charlotte, NC 28216 | 704-398-9001

This blog post was written by Alesha Lackey, regional manager for Charlotte Mecklenburg Library.

*This blog was compiled with information from charlottemuseum.org*

Censorship of information in public libraries and schools has become a hot topic for debate in recent months. While we haven’t yet had to implement these ‘book bans’ here in Charlotte, we are certainly witnessing a significant moment in our country’s history as lengthy lists of accredited authors and titles are prohibited from public and educational spaces. Charlotte Mecklenburg Library and Charlotte Museum of History have partnered to bring these beloved and incredibly important stories to readers of all levels in the Charlotte community: introducing Banned Book Story Time!

Join us for one “banned” title a month and share in the magic of storytelling. Learn about key moments in our history, expose your young readers to new perspectives, encourage creativity and imagination, and excite their love of reading!

Each program will differ in theme so there is always something new and exciting to look forward to. All programs will include an interactive ‘banned book’ storytime session with a Charlotte Mecklenburg Library representative, and a supplementary activity to reinforce that month’s theme. Let’s put an end to censorship by celebrating the many stories, people, cultures, and perspectives that make up our diverse Charlotte community (and beyond!).

All storytimes are free and located at the Charlotte Museum of History. The following dates are the scheduled storytimes (click the links to register): 

• 9/19 – Elementary-school focus, led by Duany Morrison
• 10/3 (Banned Books Week) – Elementary-school focus, led by Becca Worthington
• 11/14 – Pre-K focus, led by Duany Morrison
• 12/12 – Elementary focus, led by Becca Worthington
• 1/9 – Elementary focus, led by Duany Morrison
• 2/6 – Pre-K focus, led by Brittani Forbes
• 4/2 – Elementary focus, led by Annemarie Chaussard
• 5/14 – Open to all – Mobile Library reserved, led by TBD

The Charlotte Museum of History saves and shares the Charlotte region’s history, connecting the past to current issues and opportunities. We believe a shared understanding of the past can enrich the community’s future, and we work to tell the stories of all parts of our community and all those who have inhabited our area.

The museum sits on an eight-acre wooded campus in fast-changing East Charlotte. It’s the site of the oldest surviving house in Mecklenburg County, the Rock House built circa 1774 for the Hezekiah Alexander household. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places and a designated local landmark, the house is Charlotte’s only remaining structure from the days of the Revolutionary period. Nearby are a relocated barn dating to the era, a reproduction log kitchen, and a reconstructed two-story springhouse. Tours of the site and museum programs highlight how people lived during that era and tell of the many cultures that came together to build Charlotte, including the stories of Black, Indigenous, and immigrant communities.

Find more at Charlotte Museum of History Events.