A Lifelong Love
“I always tell people the library is a happening place,” said Glenda Doyle, Director of the Lee Ola Roberts Library in Whiteville. “We have people from all ages, all walks of life in the library interacting with us and with each other. We have programs from story hours for the little ones all the way up to computer classes for our more senior patrons, and everything in between. That’s a pretty good thing to have in a small town, I think.”
Doyle, a native of Whiteville and Hardeman County, remembers visiting the library she would later oversee. “When I was little, I remember coming up as early as probably 7 or 8 years old, maybe younger, and I just thought the library had everything in it. I was fascinated by dinosaurs about the time I first remember coming to the library. I would always check out the dinosaur books and then would learn to pronounce the names by breaking them down phonetically.” Doyle has been the library’s Director since 2013. Prior to working on the staff, she had been a volunteer for the library for many years; she also worked for the Bolivar Hardeman County Library.
The library is located in the former home of Mrs. Lee Ola Roberts, who left the house to the town of Whiteville to be used as a library and recreation center. Her last will and testament also indicated that the piano and a painting of Robert E. Lee, whom she said was a distant cousin, were to remain in the house, in a particular area, as long as the house was used for the library. Both are still where Mrs. Lee Ola left them when she died in 1955. Doyle says they get asked all the time if the house, built in the early 1900s, is haunted. “If something odd happens or there is a strange sound in the house, we always just laugh and say that must surely be Mrs. Lee Ola.” For many years the ladies of the Whiteville Inter-Se Club were involved in the running of the library and helping to coordinate the many events held in the building.
When the library was officially opened in 1962, there was one room set aside for the library and other areas of the house could be rented out for parties, reunions, or meetings. A side porch was converted into a small room that housed the children’s collections for several years. The library began to grow and needed more space and many renovations have been made over the years to accommodate the library’s collection of books, magazines, DVDs, cake pans, and computers. When the Whiteville High School closed the senior composite photos spanning 40-plus years were moved and displayed in the library. After that building later burned, the archway from the school was salvaged and repurposed at the library.
“I have many, many memories of coming to this building, this place as I was growing up,” Doyle said, “never thinking that one day I would be the Director of the library I loved so much.” Doyle says she and her staff are always looking for ways to help their community, and love to get suggestions from patrons. Annette Woods serves as the Assistant Director and Haley Campbell is the library’s Circulation Clerk. Woods remembers her first book was a gift from an uncle. “He gave me a copy of The Little Engine That Could; that was a childhood favorite, along with Dr. Seuss’ The Cat in the Hat.”
COVID-19 caused the staff to rethink how they would provide services to their patrons. “We just brainstormed early on of how we could do things for our patrons so they were not losing their library services during that time. Patrons would call or email requests and we would meet them in the driveway with their books or movies or whatever. Some days we were making things up as we went along, but we did not want to let our patrons down; we just worked together to make things work,” Doyle said.
Another change made during COVID was to switch from in-person to virtual story times for the younger patrons. “I had always tried to do a story hour at least once a month, sometimes more,” Doyle said. “When COVID came along I didn’t want the kids to think they were forgotten, so we decided to make story time a weekly virtual event and it would be live on our Facebook page.”
A beloved “friend” of the library, a stick horse named Lee Roy Roberts (in honor of Mrs. Lee Ola), had appeared as a part of story time for a couple of years, and Doyle said she made sure to always put him near her during virtual story time. She said he sometimes wears hats or other costumes to coordinate with the story. “If Lee Roy Roberts was not with me for story time, kids would call the library asking about him, so I quickly learned to make sure we all knew where he was.” The program was so well received that Doyle has continued it and has no plans to stop. “We are able to offer in-person story times again, but when I asked, the answer was to please keep doing virtual story time, so we will do it as long as the kids want us to.”
Doyle says she likes to read a variety of book genres and is huge fan of books by Janet Evanovich and Lindsey Sands. “The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Goodnight Moon were my children’s favorite books, and those are very special to me as well.” Woods is a fan of books by Patricia Briggs, Lindsey Sands, Danielle Steel, and Stephanie Evanovich.
Doyle said she and the staff are always looking for ways to introduce children to reading and to keep them reading. “That saying of a reader is a leader is so true,” Doyle said. “These little ones in the library today are the people who will be the leaders in our community in the future, and we want them to be readers.”
She remembers a young patron who couldn’t wait to get his own library card. “The day he got his own card I was not at the library,” she said. “The next time he came by, he was so very excited to show me his library card. Moments like that help to remind you that what we do here in our little corner of the world makes a difference in people’s lives…and we are so glad they allow us to be a part of their lives.”