The monthly meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Bethlehem Area Public Library will be held at the Main Library (11 W. Church St., Bethlehem) on October 11 at 6pm. The agenda can be found here. Contact jberk@bapl.org with questions.
Beginning on Monday October 11, 2021, we will be re-opening the Cohen Room at the Main Library as a quiet study room. This will be available during normal library hours except for occasions when the room is in use for a library event or other presentation. Please note the following: Sign-in is required at the […]
Welcoming Cleveland Wall: Our Newest Team Member at BAPL! By Dominic Trabosci The library is proud to welcome our newest hire Cleveland Wall to the team! Officially referred to as our Satellite Technician, Cleveland will act as the jack-of-all-trades at the new Books on the Hill satellite branch in Fountain Hill. She’s excited to help […]
Homework help is available at the Main Library and the South Side Branch. At South Side, students from Lehigh are available to help students in Kindergarten through 12th grade with any subject, Monday – Thursday from 4:00-5:30 PM. No appointment is necessary. For more information, call the South Side Branch at 610-867-7852. At the Main […]
This article comes out of a multi-year effort to index the “vertical clip files”—which are articles and pictures cut from newspapers and other sources over the past 100 years or so, lovingly saved by our wise predecessors at the library—that take up many long drawers in the Bethlehem Room. From time to time as we […]
By Dominic Trabosci We’ve known it for a long time, but BAPL’s Janine Santoro is now officially a “Star.” She received the Community Star Award on September 16th from the Lehigh Valley IronPigs in recognition of her outstanding contributions to the local community. The award was created by the Iron Pigs to recognize “any person […]
We were so saddened to hear that Bethlehem Area school district reading specialist Lydia Haddad passed away this month. Throughout her career she was known for the passion she brought to teaching reading to students of the district including those at Donegan Elementary and Freemansburg Elementary School. In lieu of flowers, her family asks that […]
Please remember your masks when you come to the library. As per city order, masks must be worn in all City buildings. This includes all BAPL locations. See more information as to what is currently available in the library and what steps we are taking to keep everyone safe here. […]
We challenged our library users to submit reviews of the books they were reading, and we got a great response! Bethlehem Area Public Library users entered reviews online, filled out review slips at our branches, and submitted entries at the Bookmobile. Each entry earned the reviewer a chance in our weekly raffle. Our two latest […]
After the library’s slate of antiracism conversations from 2020-2021, BAPL’s Janine Carambot Santoro sought to answer the question that many of our community members had: “Now that we know better, what do we do now?” Dr. Melinda González, a fellow colleague from Rutgers University, an anthropologist, and winner of the 2021 Mary Fran Myers Gender […]
What do you call a Bookmobile that doesn’t move? It’s not a riddle, it’s a real question that library staff at BAPL had to ponder after purchasing a “decommissioned” bookmobile and towing it to Fountain Hill. The name they came up with is “Books on the Hill” and after a long and windy road, it’s […]
Share your story! The Bethlehem Area Public Library invites you to write prose or a poem about an animal (or animals) that has played an important role in your life. You could win a prize! Have you had a special pet? Do you have a story about an amazing encounter in the wild? Do you […]
Book Launch to be held at BAPL on August 21 Professional skateboarder Ray Gurz of Emmaus loves to skate, travel, take chances, and play extremely loud music. He also wrote a children’s book. “What seems impossible can happen if you put your heart into it,” said Gurz. “This is my first book and I expected […]
We here at the Bethlehem Area Public Library are overjoyed to see the return of Musikfest again this year! In celebration we put together a small display using local history materials from the library archives and items on loan from Information Technician Mary Catherine Bluder, who also created the display. From pins to postcards to program […]
BAPL is happy to be a drop-off location for Plant-A-Row Lehigh Valley. Plant a Row is a volunteer-run organization that takes donations from local gardeners to food pantries and shelters in the Valley. It can be anything you’d like to plant. Help feed your neighbors with your extra veggies! The drop-off is at the Main […]