Saturday is the anniversary of the day in 1930 when Ellen Church became the first airline stewardess (today's flight attendant), flying on a United Airlines flight from San Francisco to Cheyenne, Wyoming. Ten years later, nylon hose went on sale for the first time at stores throughout the country.

Sunday is the 70th anniversary of the Academy Awards. About 270 people attended the ceremony, at which the first Academy Awards were given in 12 categories. The silent film "Wings" won the award for Best Picture.

WHAT'S HAPPENING?

Raccoons are the theme of Wednesday's 10:00 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. storytimes. Participants will make a mural. Saturday morning's 10:00 storytime celebrates Armed Forces Day with stories and crafts. Participants will make glitter dragons and meet a former Air Force officer who will share memorabilia.

BOOK TALK

The library's Bob Kerwick provides this week's book information. In "The Legacy of the Civil War," noted author Robert Penn Warren makes the observation that "The Civil War is, for the American imagination, the great single event of our history." This is one reason for the great popularity of books about the Civil War, and why the library has such a large selection of materials on the subject.

In the non-fiction area, you'll find books on every aspect of the war. There are books on all the major battles and many of the minor ones; biographies of all the famous and many of the no-so-famous players. There are materials at all reading levels: Children's, Young Adult, and Adult. In short, there is something for everyone.

Warren makes a further observation that, whereas historians seek the "facts" about their world and are limited by documents, novelists want to know about the "inside" of their world and work within what is "historically possible." Thus, we have a multitude of novels about the Civil War.

Some of the more recent ones include "Look Away" and "Unto the End," by Harold Coyle; "Gods and Generals" and "The Last Full Measure," by Jeff Shaara; and "Cold Mountain," by Charles Frazier. And who could (or would want to) forget old classics like Margaret Mitchell's "Gone With the Wind" or MacKinley Kantor's "Andersonville," or Michael Shaara's "Killer Angels"?

As always, this is only a partial listing, and the friendly folks on the reference desk would be happy to help you find more.

DID YOU KNOW?

On May 18, you will be given an opportunity to vote on a bond issue that will almost double the size of the existing library. However, you can cast your vote right now (until May 13) at City Hall.

The library's collection of almost 160,000 materials is half again what the current facility was built to accommodate. In fact, the library reached its capacity of 110,000 materials in 1991. Technology (such as the library's automated check-out system and the terminals for public access to the Internet) has taken up extra space. In addition, use of the library has more than doubled over the last ten years, which makes not only the shelves full, but the aisles and reading areas as well.

We hope that you will visit your Roswell Public Library to see for yourself how busy it is and how much it provides our community. If you have questions or would like a speaker to visit your organization or club, contact Betty Long at 622-7101 or Darlene Logan at 624-8191.