Paul Szmal: Welcome back to FLX Morning on Finger Lakes News Radio. It's 838. I am joined by Frank Sykes from the Geneva Public Library. Frank, good morning. Hope you're doing well on a soggy day.
Frank Sykes: Good morning. Yes, it's been raining for quite a while now.
Paul Szmal: Yeah. Well, the good news is the rain is finally going to get out of here for a little bit. So we'll get a little bit of breathing on a little bit of a breather on that for it for a couple of at least a couple of hours. So we know we know how Finger Lakes weather can be in this area sometimes, especially this time of year. You have got a boatload of stuff going on every month.
Frank Sykes: Yes, we do. Absolutely.
Paul Szmal: I want to kind of go through one by one some of the cool things that are going to be happening at the Geneva Public Library, and I want to start with an award-winning journalist coming in for a presentation on Tuesday, May the 13th, a week from yesterday.
Frank Sykes: Yep. So this is titled The Real Women of Veterans Vietnam, inspired by Chris and Hannah's novel The Women, which I just read and I highly recommend. It's a powerful, powerful novel. Award-winning journalist Nancy Lynch, who has her own book called Vietnam Mailbag Voices from the War, 1968 to 72, and it's a whole presentation about the the women throughout the war, and that's at 530 on May 13th, and it should be really, really interesting presentation.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, she's going to be sharing some accounts from people that were nurses, Red Cross workers, other women who served in various roles in Vietnam. Should give a pretty unique perspective on the Vietnam conflict, I would think.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, sorry about that.
Paul Szmal: No, that's fine. Folks, this is what live radio is all about. Sometimes technology works, and sometimes technology betrays you, and that was a case there where the technology failed for just a second, but we're back at it.
So let's pick up and talk about something that Kerry Lippincott and I had a chat about on Monday morning, which is the Historic Geneva archivist Becky Chapin coming in for a presentation on Saturday.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, that seems really incredible. So Saturday, May 10th at 10 a.m., as you mentioned, Historic Geneva's archivist Becky Chapin will talk about the Lafayette stop during the American Revolution in Geneva. So General Lafayette was in Geneva in 1825, and she's going to talk about that as we approach the 200th anniversary of his visit in 1825 on June 8th.
Paul Szmal: You know, it amazes me, Frank, that he spent, from what Kerry was telling me, he only spent about three hours in town, but you want to talk about an impactful three hours. I guess a lot went down in that time period.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, yeah, it's incredible, and I think there's different organizations throughout the state will be celebrating the 200th anniversary. This is a partnership with the Seneca chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution as well.
Paul Szmal: Okay, let's move on to some of the classes, and I think what we would classify as semi-regular or regular programs that are part of the monthly docket at the Geneva Public Library. We're talking with Frank Sykes from the Geneva Public Library here on FLX Morning, one of them being a yoga class.
Frank Sykes: Yes, so coming up, we have a series. It's a six-week series. You can come to one or you can come to all six. The first one starts this Friday, May 9th at 9 a.m., and that's run by Lisa from Geneva Breathes, and that runs through June 13th, but it's a sort of a start your day with calm and clarity, and you know, they talk about yoga and different moves and focus on breath, and it should be a nice way to end your week and start your day.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, that's good fitness and relaxation techniques you can learn from taking a yoga class like that. I take it that this is kind of scaled for people who either have prior experience or maybe exposing themselves to it for the first time.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, I think all ranges of experience with yoga for sure.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it seems really, really exciting, and people should, again, all of these programs are free. You can register on our website at gplny.org.
The next one coming up is, sounds intriguing, a genealogy research roundtable on May the 17th. What can you tell me about that, Frank?
Frank Sykes: Yeah, so that one you'll be joining with Hannah Gingrich, who is our relatively still new research and technology librarian, and we're going to talk about different genealogy techniques. This one says for sort of a one-time show and tell, bring an object or photo to kind of jumpstart the conversation about your own family history, and that's May 17th at 10 a.m.
Paul Szmal: I think genealogy has become a very popular thing in the past few years where people want to know where they came from.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, yeah, and it's sometimes unlimited with the amount of resources we have now, and people dive in and really start to learn, and what's neat about genealogy is you're not just doing it for yourself. You're researching, and then you get to share all of that information with your entire family.
Paul Szmal: Absolutely.
The One Book Owl Kids are meeting up on May the 31st.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, so that's a program throughout the entire Owl Library system, and so on, like I said, Saturday, May 31st at 11 a.m., there's going to be a story time with Going Places by Peter Reynolds, and then the kids will take part in a hands-on building of their own simple machine, which is inspired by the book, and then every child at the event gets to take home a copy for themselves.
Paul Szmal: Oh, nice, very nice, yeah, and one of the homeschool meetups is coming up. That's going to be next Friday, May the 16th.
Frank Sykes: Yep, and so there's a homeschool group that already meets during that time for grades around kindergarten to fifth grade or so, and then we wanted a meetup for the older kids as well, so during the same time period on Friday, May 16th at 1 p.m., there's grades six through 12, because what we found out is, you know, there's siblings that come to the homeschool meetup, but maybe nothing for the younger or the older to do, and now there's something for everyone.
Paul Szmal: Right, right, and part of that, I guess, is going to be a sewing project.
Frank Sykes: Yes, yep, they do a sewing project. They do different crafts, and just there's something new every time, which is great about the library and about, you know, Brandy Roselle, our youth services librarian. She's always got something fresh going on.
Paul Szmal: Here's something you may not know about the Geneva Public Library is they have, not only do they have multimedia available to utilize, but they have a family movie night, and that's going to happen on May the 16th.
Frank Sykes: Yep, family movie night with free popcorn and pizza at 6 p.m. on May 16th, and this movie is Dog Man, so I don't know if you've ever read the books or know anybody that's read the books. The movie came out really fun, so Dog Man, Friday the 16th at 6 p.m.
Paul Szmal: And I take it that's an all-ages type of movie?
Frank Sykes: All-ages, it is absolutely encouraged to be a family movie night someplace where people can go and enjoy each other's time for free. Again, all these programs are free.
Paul Szmal: Right, right, and that includes the popcorn and the pizza, which sometimes costs more than the movie tickets when you go to the theater.
Frank Sykes: Oh my gosh, yes it does, yes, yep, but this is free, free at the library.
Paul Szmal: Awesome.
Also some music, live music happening at the library.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, we have Stan Proffitt coming back this Friday, May 9th at 7 30. He does amazing piano work. This Friday will be Bach's Italian Concerto along with some contemporary favorites like the Beatles, Clapton, Dylan, Elton John, Carole King, and more, and my gosh, he is amazingly talented. I've got to hear some of his rehearsals, and it's a special event for sure, so Stan Proffitt, May 9th at 7 30.
Paul Szmal: And again, as we keep emphasizing, these are all free events.
Frank Sykes: Yes, absolutely, absolutely.
Paul Szmal: On the business side of things for the public library, you have a budget and trustee vote coming up a week from, or in a couple of weeks on May the 20th.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, alongside the the school vote on May 20th, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. at North Street School. Be sure to stop in and vote. This year we have one trustee up for election, one seat, so that again is Tuesday, May 20th from 11 a.m. until 8 p.m.
Paul Szmal: Wonderful. All right, we've covered a lot of ground here in the course of the past few minutes.
Frank Sykes: Yes, absolutely.
Paul Szmal: And if anybody came in in the middle and said, oh hey, wait a minute, I want to find out more about this particular event or that particular activity, how do they go about doing that, Frank?
Frank Sykes: Yeah, everything is on our website, gplny.org. You can find our regular events, our special events. You can register on there for events. You can book. We have three different rooms. We have the meeting room and two study rooms. You can reserve those. You can also see what other services we have, like copying and printing and faxing and scanning. We do it all.
Paul Szmal: All right, wonderful. Thank you so much, Frank. Appreciate it.
Frank Sykes: Yeah, you're welcome. Thank you for having me. Take care.
Paul Szmal: 849 on FLX Morning.
