Literary Landmark

Hackley Public Library designated a Literary Landmark for connection to children's author Verna Aardema Vugteveen

Published: Monday, October 31, 2011, 12:05 PM     Updated: Wednesday, November 02, 2011, 4:18 PM

By Lynn Moore | The Muskegon Chronicle

 

Historic Hackley Public Library has a new distinction as a "Literary Landmark" as the result of its connection to an award-winning author of children's books.
Verna Aardema Vugteveen received a lot of accolades for her books, one of which received the respected Caldecott Medal.
Now the library where she conducted much of her research is getting its own recognition. A division of the American Library Association has named the 121-year-old library a Literary Landmark, the seventh award given in Michigan.
“Hackley Library is such a treasure to our community,” said Carolyn Madden, a board member with the Friends of Hackley Public Library who headed up the effort to get the Literary Landmark recognition.
“This is just another way to acknowledge what a special place it is,” Madden said. “I think it gives credit to the staff, to the extent that they were going to help Verna Aardema.”
Vugteveen, who wrote under the pen name Verna Aardema, died in 2000 at age 88.
She had been an elementary school teacher for 25 years, retiring from Mona Shores' Lincoln School in 1973 so she could write full time. She eventually would write 33 books, including the first, “Tales from the Story Hat” in 1960.
She often based her stories on African folk tales, and was noted for her use of ideophones — words that sound like actions — in her stories. She said she developed her collections of folk tales by researching volumes of anthropology books and recording stories told by missionaries.
Madden said Vugteveen did much of that research at Hackley Public Library, and had acknowledged the help provided by the staff there and the library's resources.
“She had a lot of acclaim during her lifetime,” Madden said.
In 1976, her book “Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears” was awarded the Caldecott Medal, considered the Pulitzer Prize of children's books.
On Christmas Day 1991, First Lady Barbara Bush read Vugteveen's “Who's in Rabbit's House” on ABC Radio as part of the “Mrs. Bush's Story Time” series.
Vugteveen herself was known as Muskegon's “Story Lady, often reading her stories to local children at school assemblies, book stores and libraries.
The Literary Landmark program is a project of the Association of Library Trustees, Advocates, Friends and Foundations, a division of the American Library Association. The Friends of Hackley Public Library's efforts to get the distinction won the group a $500 “Love Your Community” minigrant from the Community Foundation for Muskegon County.
That grant helped pay for the cost of applying for the Literary Landmark designation and will also pay for costs of a community celebration for the designation.
That celebration likely will be held next spring or early summer, possibly in connection with the completion of renovations to the library's Youth Services Department. The library's Friends group also raised $102,000 to put toward those renovations, Madden said.
As part of the Literary Landmark designation, the library will receive a bronze plaque that will be displayed at the library.
Other Literary Landmarks in Michigan include the library in Idlewild, vacation spot for such writers as Langston Hughes and W.E.B. DuBois; and the Marquette County Courthouse, in honor of Judge John D. Voelker, author of "Anatomy of a Murder."
Email: lmoore@muskegonchronicle.com