After a 20-year wait, SLO County town opens its first library since 1979
Parents and teachers corralled about 14 toddlers into the Templeton Community Library for the first official story time hour Tuesday morning.
The children giggled and wiggled but listened attentively as Templeton library volunteer Kristen Barnhart read storybooks with animated inflection.
Her pile of books contained classics such as “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?” and contemporary favorites like “The Duckling Gets a Cookie,” part of the popular Pigeon series.
It was a sneak peek of Tuesday mornings to come for local children and families who, after decades without a library, now have a place to gather and share in a favorite childhood experience — story time.
It has taken the Templeton Community Library Association more than two decades to bring the vision of a library in the North County town to life.
“It has been a community love,” Templeton Community Library Association President Melinda Reed said. “We’re almost ready.”
Templeton Community Library officially opens later in December
The doors to the Templeton Community Library will officially open to the public after a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Dec. 17. Until then, the library is hosting a soft opening for friends, volunteers and members of the association who are still getting things squared away.
The library is located on the Templeton High School property at the corner of Vineyard Drive and South Main Street, and is built out of sustainably constructed modulars from the Stockton-based company Enviroplex.
“People are amazed when they come through the doors,” Reed said. “First of all, they don’t believe and don’t realize it’s a modular because we hung onto our design elements from the very beginning.”
The goal was for the library to feel like more than the typical high school portable, she said.
The interior is light and bright, with big, comfy furniture.
A stand-out piece is the George R. Hearst leather chair-and-a-half, which is the perfect size for parents to curl up with small children to read a story.
“It’s first thing you see when you walk in,” Reed said of the big, comfy chair.
The chair is named in honor of George R. Hearst, the grandson of publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst. George Hearst donated $100,000 out of his personal account to help them kick off plans to build the library.
Under the Hearst chair is a cowhide rug and other details to capture Templeton’s Western cowboy roots.
“Our board agreed to spend a little bit more money to get board and siding to make it look like a little Templeton farmhouse,” Reed said.
The library has a high-top laptop bar, speedy wifi and a children’s section complete with every Randolph Caldecott Medal winner from 1938 to 2022, she said.
The furniture, technology, fixtures and all the books were donated by library supporters, Reed said.
Jolee Wantembach, the owner of the now-closed Ann’s Books in Atascadero donated the commercial bookcases that once shelved literature in her store.
“And that made such a difference,” Reed said.
Another notable contribution came from former Templeton resident Mary Bianco, who gave a monetary gift as well as her farmhouse-style furniture, a music collection, and the vibrant, eclectic art that once hung in her home.
A former Hollywood producer also donated his office furniture to the library.
“This is a full-on library with fabulous furniture with wonderful bookcases with wonderful quality books,” Reed said.
Why did it take so long for Templeton to build a library?
The idea to build a community library in Templeton was spurred by Josh Gibson, who in 1999 noticed his hometown was one of the only places in the county without a library.
As a teenager, Gibson raised $5,000 for the library project for his Eagle Scout project. The money was used to establish the Friends of the Templeton Library nonprofit, now the Templeton Community Library Association.
In 2000, the group secured a lease with the Templeton Unified School District for a space on the Templeton High School grounds for 60 years, paying just $1 per year, according to past Tribune reporting.
But the project hit a snag. The rule in San Luis Obispo County is that funding for building a new library needs to be split 50/50, with half paid for by the county and the other half by the city, or in Templeton’s case, the nonprofit supporting the project.
About 20 years ago, local architect Robert McCormick designed an elaborate brick-and-mortar farmhouse-style library for Templeton, which was estimated to cost roughly $5.1 million to build, according to past Tribune reporting.
For two decades, the nonprofit Templeton Community Library Association worked to raise the $2.5 million in capital costs it would need to contribute to make the building a reality.
In 2018, Templeton native Margaret Anderson Radunich left about $900,000 to the Templeton Community Library Association in her will, giving the nonprofit the money it needed to contribute its 50% to the project.
But the county didn’t have the money for the match.
By March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic required the county to focus squarely on pandemic response, making it unlikely that the county library system was going to be funded anytime soon, Reed said.
“The county and government did not give us any money,” Reed said.
Reed and the Templeton Community Library Association board felt they waited long enough and decided to use the modulars instead of a building a brick-and-mortar, which dropped the cost to about one-fifth of the original estimate for the McCormick design.
The Templeton library is run by volunteers, funded by community
The Templeton library is completely run by volunteers, who handled everything from setting up the library to staffing it once it’s open to the public.
“We had always originally planned on building a library. We had never planned to operate a library,” Reed said. “The county was always going to take it over, of course, as a branch.”
But the COVID-19 pandemic upended the possibility that the county could absorb the Templeton Community Library into its fold.
“Don’t ask us how to train or do anything,” Reed said the county told the nonprofit. “We’re on our own.”
The nonprofit hired a legal adviser who helped establish standard operating processes and procedures and, under the nonprofit umbrella, the Templeton Community Library Association planned to hire professionals to help staff the facility.
Paso Robles City Library Angelica Fortin was instrumental with coaching and helping Reed turn the vision for a Templeton library into a reality.
“She said to me, ‘You don’t have to have a fully stocked library in order to have a library and a space for groups,’” Reed said. It was a lightbulb moment.
Instead of hiring professionals, at this stage the Templeton Community Library opted to rely on the enthusiasm of volunteers, such as Templeton resident and retired children’s librarian Kristen Barnhart, who led story time on Tuesday.
Barnhart started her career as a children’s librarian in the East Bay Area before moving to the San Luis Obispo County library system. She worked as a children’s library for more than 40 years and had originally planned on returning to the county system — “I had been so lonely for the kids” — but opted to stay closer to home, supporting the vision for the Templeton library as a community center.
“I’m a great believer in professionals, but this library has chosen to be a community center,” Barnhart said. “It’s from the bottom-up instead of the top-down. ... It’s a unique situation for a library.”
Reed said more than 35 background-screened volunteers have signed up to help with the library, but some are still moving through training and orientation.
“When you come through the doors of that Templeton library, you’re greeted by all volunteers,” she said. At least one of the nine board members will also be on-site while volunteers are working.
The nonprofit has about $400,000 set aside for operational costs for a minimum of five years, but it’s always accepting donations to keep the machine running. The priority now is working on landscaping and irrigation to beautify the exterior of the library.
How can you support the Templeton Community Library?
The Templeton Community Library offers library cards for children and adults. All that’s needed is a phone number, email address and physical address to sign up, along with parent permission for children.
There are no late fees for books or DVDs that are overdue. Instead, a bill will be sent to the patron for the replacement cost of the item unless the item can be recovered, Reed said.
Monetary donations as well as gently used books and DVDs are always welcomed.
Donations can be sent to the Templeton Community Library Association online at templetonlibrary.org or by mail at PO Box 292, Templeton, CA 93465.
The library is at 1173 S. Main St. in Templeton and is open five days a week. Hours are Tuesday 10 to 11 a.m. for story time, then 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. for everyone; Wednesdays and Fridays 1-5 p.m., Thursdays 1-7 p.m., Saturday, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Closed Sundays and Mondays.
This story was originally published December 12, 2022 at 5:30 AM.
CORRECTION: The original version of the story misstated Kristen Barnhart’s first name. The error has been corrected.
