Tweens and Teens are invited to celebrate summer break this Friday, June 23rd at 3:00 pm with Local Paper Artist Katherine Morrison at the Sawyer Free Library at 21 Main Street in Gloucester. Everyone will all leave this hour long program with a stamped mini-book and having flexed your creative muscles!
There is something for everyone this summer at the Sawyer Free Library ! Discover all that is happening at www.sawyerfreelibrary.org, call 978-325-5500, or the Library 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester.
Throughout the summer, everyone can get their hands dirty on Thursday mornings while sharing stories, gardening and more in the Sawyer Free Library’s raised gardens with Backyard Growers.
Everyone is invited to join in on the fun on Thursday’s from 10-11am at the Sawyer Free Library’s garden, located alongside Middle Street, for story hour followed by time planting, watering, maintaining and harvesting and more in the garden! Open to all ages, recommended for ages 2-8. No pre-registration required.
To learn more about this fun program and to discover all that is happening at the Sawyer Free Library this summer, visit www.sawyerfreelibrary.org, call 978-325-5500, or the Library 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester.
Got three minutes? Share your thoughts about the Sawyer Free Library and help shape our future. We want to hear from our community! Click HERE to take the survey.
Thanks for helping us!
If you have questions, come visit us at the Sawyer Free Library located at 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester, give us a call at 978-325-5500 or check out sawyerfreelibrary.org.
Library grateful to local elected officials for helping to secure critical funding and commitment to 2025 Sawyer Free
The Sawyer Free Libraryis pleased to announce that the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (MBLC), in collaboration with the Executive Office of Administration and Finance of the State of Massachusetts (A&F), has devised a comprehensive plan to address the escalating costs for current public library construction projects within the confines of its regulations and annual cap. As part of this plan, the MBLC has approved a maximum one-time additional grant payment of up to $999,963 to the Sawyer Free Library to mitigate the impact of cost escalation for its renovation and expansion project. These funds supplement the just over $9 million construction grant awarded by the MBLC Construction Grant program to Gloucester Lyceum and Sawyer Free Library for its comprehensive renovation, modernization, and expansion.
“The Sawyer Free Library would like to extend its deep appreciation to the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners and the Executive Office of Administration and Finance for recognizing the importance of our historic renovation and expansion project and taking proactive measures to assist us in overcoming the financial challenges associated with cost escalation,” said Mern Sibley, President of the Sawyer Free Library’s Board of Trustees. “We are also especially grateful to our local elected officials including Senator Bruce Tarr, Representative Ann Margaret Ferrante, and Mayor Greg Verga, for advocating on our behalf, leading us to secure this funding and their unwavering support and commitment to our public library. This additional grant payment brings the City of Gloucester closer to realizing its vision of the 21st-century Library it so needs and deserves.”
The supplemental funding of $999,963 from the MBLC will tremendously help offset the negative impact of pandemic-fueled cost escalation. In fall 2022, the appropriation for the 2025 Sawyer Free Library project was set at a total cost of $29M, including fixtures, furnishings and equipment. Current cost estimates remain on track to be under budget.
This extraordinary additional one-time grant payment is a crucial boost to the Sawyer Free Library’s fundraising efforts to modernize and expand Gloucester’s Public Library. The Library is obligated to raise the total amount for Gloucester’s revitalized and reimagined Library. Public support for the 2025 Sawyer Free Library continues to be great and grow, evident in the funds it has raised to date. The Sawyer Free 2025 fundraising campaign, now with this grant, has over $17.5 million in committed funds, with more each day.
The Library is grateful for the tremendous engagement and investment at every level from all parts of the community. While the campaign is now over half way to its goal, the Library project still need everyone’s support. For those interested in learning more or for ways to donate to this historic project, visit www.sawyerfree2025.org
When doors open at the 2025 Sawyer Free Library, the building will exemplify what a 21st-century public library can and should be in terms of architecture, sustainability, accessibility, use of natural resources and light, wayfinding, lines of sight, air quality, and public safety. The 2025 Sawyer Free Library project will preserve the original exterior, housing an entirely redesigned interior, and will also double the size of the existing Library’s footprint with a 14,000-square-foot addition.
The Library will be designed for collaboration, creativity, and life-long learning featuring a digital makerspace, audio, and video recording studios, a 100-seat community room with state-of-the-science media presentation assets, a climate-controlled center for Gloucester history, a dedicated teen room, a beautiful expanded children’s room, study rooms for individual and group study, a 16-seat conference room, and much more.
The Sawyer Free Library Board will officially break ground on the 2025 Sawyer Free Library this Fall. The project will take approximately eighteen months. The Library is currently operating at 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester. For more information on the Sawyer Free Library’s services and summer programming, visit, sawyerfreelibrary.org.
Namaste! Enjoy yoga with your little onesat Treetop Yoga!
Join Erin McKay and Sawyer Free Library for Storytime Yoga – FREE yoga for children exploring stories, movement and fun this Tuesday, June 6 at 10:45 a.m. at Treetop Yoga!
Hosted by Sawyer Free Library, the free program will be held at Treetop Yoga Studio, 3A Pond Road. Yoga for children 5 and under and their caregivers.
Register at sawyerfreelibrary.org. Questions? Contact: jvitale@sawyerfreelibrary.org
The SAWYER FREE LIBRARYis excited to be kicking off the community consultation for its new STRATEGIC PLAN: OUR LIBRARY. OUR FUTURE.
As part of the planning process, Sawyer Free Library wants to hear from the community and gather its valuable input. The 2025-2029 strategic planning process is especially important due to new opportunities that will be possible with the opening of the renovated, modernized and expanded 2025 Sawyer Free Library.
The Library will be hosting a series of 4 PUBLIC COMMUNITY CONVERSATIONS, and an ONLINE SURVEYand wants to hear from YOU! The Library encourages individuals from all backgrounds and age groups, community organizations, local businesses, and other stakeholders, to participate and provide their unique perspectives.
Community Conversations will be held IN PERSON on:
Monday, May 22, at Cape Ann YMCA from 6:00 -7:30 p.m.
Monday, June 5, at the Sawyer Free Library’s temporary space at 21 Main Street from 2:00-3:30 p.m.
Community Conversations take place VIRTUALLY over Zoom:
Friday, June 2, from 6:00-7:30 p.m.
Tuesday, June 13, from 10-11:30 a.m.
Gloucester Conversations will moderate these public forums, which are open to everyone to attend, and share their thoughts, ideas, and insights about how the 2025 Sawyer Free Library can best serve them and the greater community.
All Gloucester residents and visitors are also encouraged to fill out the Sawyer Free Library‘s new COMMUNITY SURVEY. The online survey is available online at SawyerFreeLibrary.org and will be open through July 1, 2023.
Regardless of how much or how little individuals use its services, everyone’s perspectives are welcome and encouraged to participate! This survey is the first piece of research that will help to inform the new strategic plan and will be critical in influencing the Library’s priorities for the next five years.
The Sawyer Free Library expects to analyze the results this summer and compile a summary report, which will be shared with the community when the Library Board of Trustees finalizes the new 2025-2029 Strategic Plan. The Library’s most recent five-year strategic plan was completed in 2020, which runs through 2024.
Community members can visit sawyerfreelibrary.org for more information and updates on ways to participate in the strategic planning process. The Library will also provide regular updates to keep community members informed and engaged throughout the process.
As a part of May’s Memoir Month, the Sawyer Free Library is pleased to welcome local author Stella Nahatis on Thursday, May 11 at 5:30 to discuss her newly released memoir, Taxi to America: A Greek Orphan’s Adoption Journey. All are welcome to attend this special event at the Library located at 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester. To register click HERE or for more information, visit, sawyerfreelibrary.org.
Stella’s journey from Thessaloniki, Greece, to America begins with a pre-dawn taxi ride that she and her sister share while the coffin holding a loved one rides along in the taxi’s trunk. Orphaned and separated from her younger sister “for her own good” as the culture dictated at the time, Stella ends up being adopted by a Greek couple that had emigrated to Boston, Massachusetts. At age 11, she overcomes multiple losses and cultural differences to find a place in her new homeland while finding ways to stay connected to those she loved in Greece.
This story of resilience and perseverance follows Stella’s journey of becoming an “Amerikanaki” and eventually reconnecting with her sister, who had stayed in Greece with her own set of adoptive parents. Even as Stella embraces her new life and culture in America, she rebuilds her loving relationship with her sister after an eight-year separation. Later in life, the sisters take another taxi ride together, this time to recover important details of their birth parents’ life stories that mirror the determination to survive and thrive that marks their own.
The Sawyer Free Library is proud to present this important community event about stroke health, made possible by Encompass Health and Beth Israel Lahey Health.
Join us on Tuesday, May 2 from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. at Sawyer Free Library at 21 Main Street and learn the warning signs of a stroke and how to help prevent one from occurring by knowing the risk factors. The presenter is Chris S. Burke, MD who is a Neurologist and the Stroke Medical Director at Beverly and Addison Gilbert Hospitals. Register at SawyerFreeLibrary.org.
The Sawyer Free Library (SFL) is pleased to share that it has selected a temporary location for the Library during the upcoming renovation and expansion project. The construction project, which involves a renovation of the Library’s 1976 main building at 2 Dale Avenue and an addition of 15,000-square-feet, is expected to begin in early 2023 and take approximately eighteen months.
The Library’s Board of Trustees secured a multi-year lease for 21 Main Street in downtown Gloucester, the former space of Cape Ann Cinema and Stage. The SFL plans to move to its new temporary location this fall.
“When 21 Main Street was proposed as an option for the temporary Sawyer Free Library, we jumped at the opportunity,” said Mern Sibley, President of the Gloucester Lyceum and Sawyer Free Library’s Board of Trustees. “Located downtown, just a few blocks from our current location, it has the space and the requirements our dedicated library staff need in order to continue serving our community’s diverse cultural, educational, and informational needs and interests.”
“The commercial real estate market is very tight in Gloucester with few available properties,” continued Sibley. “We feel fortunate to have secured a space that meets our specifications with only minor modifications needed. This temporary space presented itself at the right time, and it is one that we believe will serve the community best during this exciting and historic time for the Sawyer Free Library.”
In its new temporary home, the Sawyer Free Library will offer select in-person services, curbside services, outreach programming, and an enhanced level of online services. The approximately 3,600 sq. ft. at 21 Main Street will accommodate library services for both children and adults, as well as the Library’s local history research resources and Wellspring House’s client intake center. The space will have public computers, Wi-Fi access and study tables. The size of the space limits the quantity of materials onsite. However, through the hold system, cardholders have access to thousands of titles and resources from storage in Saunders House and other NOBLE libraries.
The Library’s hours will remain the same, open six days a week, with the familiar faces of the Sawyer Free Library’s staff available to assist the public. The centrally located space on Main Street is handicap accessible and offers ample parking in the nearby city lot.
SFL will continue to offer a robust schedule of programs for residents of all ages throughout the community and is looking at off-site locations in Gloucester’s public schools, preschools, community centers, municipal spaces, local cultural institutions, parks, and other outdoor spaces. It will also work with its many community partners to host collaborative programming. In addition, the Library will continue to utilize and enhance its remote and online virtual programs.
“Community residents have come to expect a wide range of educational and informational services and programs from our library, and we intend on continuing to deliver on that promise,” said Library Director Jenny Benedict. “Our dedicated Sawyer Free Library staff is committed to making this temporary transition smooth for all. We are excited to share our expertise in new and creative ways. Our talented librarians, resources, and services that Gloucester looks to and relies on will continue to be there for them, whether it be in person in our temporary space, out in the community, or online. We are beyond excited for the 2025 Sawyer Free Library and all it will mean for our community.”
SFL will be working with a relocation service to facilitate the upcoming move of library collections, furnishings and equipment to the temporary location. The Saunders House will be used for library staff office space and onsite storage during the construction. The exact dates and the specifics of the move will be forthcoming.
“In order for the 2025 Sawyer Free Library project to move forward on schedule, it’s imperative that the current Library is available to the construction company as soon as the project and financial approvals are in place,” said Sibley. “There is also an urgency to relocate before the winter in order to move the public and our collections and equipment into a safe space where they are no longer at risk due to the deteriorating conditions of the current building.”
When doors open at the 2025 Sawyer Free Library, the building will exemplify what a 21st-century public library can and should be in terms of architecture, sustainability, accessibility, use of natural resources and light, wayfinding, lines of sight, air quality, and public safety. The modernized and expanded Library will double in size with the addition. It will boast new community spaces, including a 110-seat community room with state-of-the-art science presentation technology, a dedicated room for teens, and a digital maker space with a film production suite and a sound recording studio. Additional features will include a Library History Center, a quiet Reading Room, and a 16-seat Conference Room.
The Sawyer Free Library recently announced the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners approval of the funding for a $9 million provisional construction grant toward the estimated $28 million historic project. In October, the Gloucester City Council is expected to vote on the Gloucester Lyceum and Sawyer Free Library’s request for a city loan to provide the financing for the project and allow the City to access the state grant. Gloucester’s public library is owned by the Gloucester Lyceum and Sawyer Free Library, a nonprofit corporation, which will repay the loan through grants, corporate and individual donations.
The Sawyer Free 2025 fundraising campaign is underway, with several large corporate gifts committed, the campaign continues to gain traction and is attracting donations both big and small. Sawyer Free 2025 continues to seek funding through individual and corporate donors, federal, state, and municipal government grants, and nonprofit foundations. The public is encouraged to learn more about the project by visiting sawyerfree2025.org.
Artist rendering of the view from the northwest corner on Dale Avenue of the Sawyer Free 2025. Rendering by Oudens Ello Architecture provided by Sawyer Free Library
Cape Ann Community 