The Cazenovia library is a small town library part of a larger library system called Mid-York (which includes Madison, Oneida, and Herkimer counties.) We serve a population of approximately 6,500 and circulate about 167,000 (with just 42,000 in holdings.) The library also houses an Art Gallery for local artists, a Local History display area, and a museum-- with a Mummy! We additionally have an archives with assorted historical documents. If you wish to schedule a group meeting (i.e. boy or girl scouts, book groups, or other non-for-profit events), we have a community room, as well as a smaller board room, and our story hour room (which was repainted in the summer of 1999 to resemble The Secret Garden).
See a floor plan of the old and new buildings.
The art gallery connects the old library house with the new library building. If features displays by local artists, changing on a monthly basis. In April, the gallery showcases works in conjunction with the April Program. Please contact Patti Christakos at 655-9785 for more information if you wish to show your works.
The Local History Room is used exclusively for exhibitions relating to our region, including Central New York, Madison County, Cazenovia village and township and other nearby villages and towns. Our current display is "Cazenovia Pictoral History."
The Library's Museum is installed in three rooms of our original, 165-year-old building, which now houses our Museum and reference, reading and study rooms. The exhibitions, cases and settings are designed in the manner of late nineteenth century small town museums, descendants of the "cabinet of curiosities" approach that informed the first Western museums. For a century the Library has served as the community's "attic", a repository for things of local interest, and things gathered in their travels, that Cazenovians thought merited preservation. While the Library had for a century a small upstairs museum room, our newly installed rooms allow us to show more of the collection, and in a more systematic and viewer friendly manner.
One room has a sampling of the collection in glass cases above our reference shelves. The Museum proper consists of two additional rooms. The first is devoted to natural history and the objects of other cultures. The second is our Mummy Room, and houses an actual Egyptian mummy still in its wrapping and its original wooden sarcophagus, along with gilded mummy masks, mummy chest plates, scarabs, ushabtis and other Egyptian material, and ancient material from other areas. The objects in our Museum were brought back to our village by Cazenovians making Grand Tours in the 19th century. Many of the original old labels, and much of the feeling of those times, have been preserved in our presentation.Bibliography & Webliography for Egyptian resources at the Cazenovia Public Library
Assorted local history documents, including brochures, booklets, books, old phone books, and yearbooks. Available Monday - Friday 10am - 9pm.
TrusteesReturn to homepage
Friends