Lakeport >> The 73rd quilt block on the Lake County Quilt Trail (LCQT) is “Friends of the Library” designed by library technician, Jan Cook, who has been a quilter for 40 years.
Cook’s design incorporates four friendship stars and an open book. The four red stars represent Lake County’s four public libraries and the support the libraries get from Friends of the Lake County Library.
The open book symbolizes the library’s information-sharing function for the people of Lake County. Red in the block represents the warmth and cheer of friendship. Light blue from Lake County Library cards represents Clear Lake and Lake County’s clear skies. “Friends” made all of Lake County’s early libraries possible when individuals, civic improvement clubs and library committees banded together to form libraries in their towns.
Lakeport’s library committee started the town’s first library in 1907 in the Levy Building. The committee applied for and received a Carnegie grant to open Lakeport’s Carnegie building in 1918.
Upper Lake’s first library was housed in J. N. League’s store for two years before Harriet Lee Hammond and the Upper Lake Women’s Protective Club provided the Harriet Lee Hammond Library in 1916. The Hammond Library will celebrate its centennial in 2016.
Chauncey W. Gibson made it possible for Middletown to have a temporary library in 1929 and a permanent one in 1930, which is now the Gibson Museum and Cultural Center.
The Park Study Club founded the Redbud Library on Golf Avenue in Clearlake in the 1960s.
These four independent town libraries formed the Lake County Library system in the 1970s. In 1986 Lakeport’s new library, the headquarters of the Lake County Library system, opened at 1425 N. High St. its current location. New modern libraries have replaced the older buildings in Clearlake and Middletown. The Friends of the Lake County Library continues the tradition of community support for libraries and literacy in Lake County.
The Lake County Library is on the Internet at library.lakecountyca.gov and the Friends of the Lake County Library can be found on Facebook at facebook.com/pages/Friends-of-the-Lake-County-Library/.
The LCQT is an agricultural and tourism project designed to promote community pride. The 4-by-4-foot quilt block was drawn and painted by the LCQT team, a group of dedicated quilters, graphic artists, painters, writers, carpenters and a videographer.
For more information about the LCQT visit lakecountyquilttrail.com.
Lakeport Library is located at 1425 N. High St.
