One thousand pounds of books and equipment, 25 willing students and three instructors transformed the bar at La Viva Naughton, north of Kemmerer into a temporary reference library and classroom. Star Valley and LaBarge libraries were closed. The library at Kemmerer was emptied of staff except for the director, Karling Abernathy. The staff attended an intensive three-day University of Wyoming credit seminar in library public services.
The instructors were Nora Van Burgh, Marcia Wright and Corky Walters. One student reported that after the first day, her children asked if she had a good time and she growled: “No, I didn’t have a ‘good time’… I worked harder than I do on the job.”
Marcia Wright wrote new lyrics to “Home on the Range” and Corky Walters led the round with her ukulele.
Oh, give me a home where the reference books rest
Where the phone doesn’t jangle away
Where questions may cease and I find release
From the copier zinging all day
Books, books, reference books
Where answers and facts abound
Information galore, we always want more
At the workshop we had in the bar
This article, written by Nora Van Burgh, was originally published in the Fall/Winter 1989 issue of the Wyoming Library Roundup.
In the photo above are Marcia Wright, Corky Walters, and Nora Van Burgh.