Haddenham Library is over the border– we’re one of 12 volunteer-run libraries in Cambridgeshire. Recently our 21 volunteers have returned to a post-pandemic world onto an uphill trajectory.
Over the last year, Robin Gildersleeve, co-chair of the Friends of Haddenham Library, guided us through a discussion of ‘where we are now’ and where we want to go as a library. A user survey led to a vision which we are now working towards. Meanwhile we achieved charity status with a hard-working team of six trustees.
Given the direction that larger county-run libraries have gone over the last two decades, offering a wide range of activities, classes, advice sessions and events etc, we’d like to do some catching up as we approach our 20th year as a volunteer-run library. Often village offerings are fragmented, so we’d like to see a more co-operative and cohesive offering. We know our village wants it, we think our residents deserve it, and we know our village library should be at the heart of it.
With the enthusiastic support of our Parish Council, we’ve been heartened as we helped initiate and co-ordinate a cross-community response of Haddenham organisations to create a winter warm hub at our village Sports and Social Club.
We’ve already found Hunts Forum’s support invaluable in finalising the charity’s policies for an imminent website launch, and we hope our membership continues to keep us on the straight and narrow. Along with that support comes, we hope, a wealth of experience from other organisations who are also striving to achieve change in their communities at a time of ever dwindling funds and ever decreasing numbers of people in our communities with time to spare.
We are big on ideas and small on space as our bijou library is also Parish Council office and local history archive. Future plans depend on more space – we just haven’t quite worked out how yet! Meanwhile we’re strengthening links with local village organisations, and we never forget our roots – a library run by volunteers who love books (we have about 7000 on the shelves, mostly donated) and we want to see a community of readers around us.
We’d love it if you’d come and visit us, or check out our lovely new website www.haddenhamlibrarycambs.co.uk (created, of course, by a community volunteer) or follow our very active Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/HaddenhamLibraryCambs
Keep reading.
Andrea Chambers (co-chair of the Friends of Haddenham library)
