[Music] >> I think we all agree this is a rural community.

I'm reminded of that often when I visit some of my family who live in other states, and they say okay why are you living in the middle of nowhere?

and so I very patiently, every time, explain that it's a choice.

There are reasons why you would want to be here and why a library ought to be here.

>> KIDS: "The window, the window, I'll throw you out the window-" [KIDS SINGING] >> J. LYNETTE GILLETTE: Every year we offer classes in the summer.

Which we-because we're a library, we call summer reading.

And the goal that I have for this program, which is actually one of our most important, is that the kids come out of our seven weeks with a love of reading.

>> JAYE BUROS: Anytime they can interact with each other and comment with each other you know- and just have good dialogue.

Especially this summer.

This is the summer of 2022 and kids have been on their computers and they haven't had real experiences, so they need interaction with art and music and dance, and that's how kids learn naturally.

So that's what I try to teach.

>> J. LYNETTE GILLETTE: Underneath all of that, we are also tying it into literature, stories, books, journaling, reading and writing.

The children make up stories, they act them out, they make little stages that they put little people and creatures into, and move them around like a puppet show.

Some days they have to stand up in front of their peers and tell a story.

We get them accustomed to interacting in ways that later in life they may be asked to do.

And these incipient readers they gain from what they do in the summer, and we've had a lot of anecdotal information from the school system that they could pretty well point out the young people that have been through our program.

>> ALISTON BRISLIN: I moved from Austin, Texas where I received my masters in library and information Sciences not knowing that I would find such a gem of a place.

And so when the job was listed and I applied and I was offered the role, I- feel very lucky to be here.

The library is really special.

It's, you know, an old adobe that's had many different iterations in its life.

It just has such a great energy and we're really lucky that we have wonderful programming, but also our patrons are what make it really special.

>> ISELA PRADO: I have one daughter, she is currently seven years old and her name is Alexandra.

She has been attending the El Rito Library since she was an Infant.

She looks forward to coming to the library every single day.

She enjoys the summer reading programs because she gets to interact with her friends, children she goes to school with.

She also enjoys the librarians.

Being in this library has helped her with her confidence and her reading skills, her social skills as well.

>> JAYE BUROS: When they read to each other, they give compliments to each other on the reading.

So, that audience participation is like really important.

Acknowledging each other and creating a great community of children.

>> J. LYNETTE GILLETTE: Because we don't have any city government, we have to, as they say "be resourceful" in how we come up with the money to run a place like this.

Our budget is about 85 percent of the money that we raise by individual donations.

We don't get city tax money.

We have no City.

Because we're an accredited library though, we do receive some money from the state and some from other governmental agencies.

>> : There are roughly 800-ish people that live in El Rito.

Predominantly Hispanic and then also Anglo.

A mixture of Agriculture and artists and the library is a really nice intersection of both, because we have patrons from all different demographics.

>> SUZANNE FROST: The Librarians they've always been very good with me, and they know my taste, or the kinds of things I like.

And Tom and Allison does it too.

They'd stash stuff under the desk and I- when I'd come in they'd say "oh, I have something I think you might like" which is always lovely to have that Personal Touch.

>>>>: We took an old card catalog and we stripped it out and put it- into it interesting specimens from the world of Natural History.

So, rocks, minerals, plants, dried up insects, wasp nests from people's yards.

Part of what I think ongoing education is all about, and it's just one more theme to tap into, that I hope would attract people to a library.

Because you can keep on learning more about those particular deep interests that you might have.

>>ARNOLD GURULE: I like history and I've been trying to research the Hallack and Howard Railroad, that operated here in Northern New Mexico.

And they've been very helpful in sort of seeing the research.

>>ARNOLD GURULE: When I was growing up, my grandfather had cattle permits and we patrolled the forest here to take on his cows, and I kept seeing artifacts, and cans of dynamite, and ties and uh- this grade, constant through the forest there.

And I found out that there was a big mill here in the early 1900s, where a railroad ran right here along this road right here.

>>ALISTON BRISLIN: People need to have access to information disseminators and those can be expensive pieces of machinery that like the average person can't afford or necessarily needs.

>>SUSAN BOYLE: Publicly accessible computers are very important in a community like that, because those are the means to get jobs, to get information.

Basic information that is really essential to people's lives.

>>J.

LYNETTE GILLETTE: The idea of censorship, unfortunately, is not a new thing.

It does seem like it's more intense right now across the country, but most libraries develop a policy of how to handle that.

I consider us very fortunate that we've never been, personally as a library, challenged for anything that we have on the shelves.

I think if you don't want to read a book on our shelf, don't read it.

>> SUSAN BOYLE: The library is the only institution within this community.

where people can meet, we can have music events, artistic events, events for children, and it really performs a very important function in this community.

[MUSIC] >>J.

LYNETTE GILLETTE: I really think that public libraries are part of the fabric of this country and that people who live in rural places shouldn't be deprived of being part of this fabric.

[MUSIC] I think rural people have equal creativity, imagination and those qualities need some nurturing.

And a library is that place that can do this for people of all ages.

[MUSIC] >>SHEL NEYMARK: We are in Vallecitos, New Mexico, a beautiful little village in Northern New Mexico, and we're at their library and Community Center.

It's a really extraordinary place.

It's in an old building, I believe it was built around 1850.

It's an adobe building, it was once a hardware store back in those days and it's been many things.

I hear that some people in the 70's used to grow pot in the Attic.

>>ERNIE GIRON: It's a small town with a- there used to be a lot of people, there's about oh-- when I was growing up there were about 200 people.

They lived off the land, they farmed and they had their cows and horses and pigs and chickens.

you know?

Actually it was booming.

They had a baseball team and they had the saloon right there on the side of the road.

They used to have dances for Fourth of July, New Year's, Christmas and it was always a big, you know shindig, sawmills were pretty popular here at the time and a lot of people worked at the Sawmills.

>>MIKE GALLEGOS: Well everybody was employed.

I can't remember anybody who was unemployed.

It was a place that you could consider being prosperous in a small sense.

That it was economically stable.

People lived within their means, and it was a great village to be from.

>>ERNIE GIRON: There was a lot going on back then, but as you see now the baseball field is not there and it's pretty much died- died down.

But there's still a few people that are originally from here that are still here >>MIKE GALLEGOS: Well, I came from a family of 10 kids.

My father was a rancher, my mom was a housekeeper and she ran the family with an iron hand.

I was a prodigious reader in addition to being a hard-working kid.

My entertainment, because we didn't have any television or radio, was reading.

>>MARLENE FAHEY: Vallecitos is very small and has very few current residents, but it has this enormous number of people who have historic ties to Vallecitos, who grew up here or whose grandparents grew up here.

And they're very involved.

>> MIKE GALLEGOS: We were just walking down the lane by the old dance hall, when we came upon this house, you know the doors were wide open and broken windows, and we just walked into it.

>>AMANDA GALLEGOS: -and I'm very nosy, so I asked my husband to tell me about this building, this is a beautiful building, and he told me about the history of this place.

>>MIKE GALLEGOS: The house has incredible stories about buried treasure.

I started telling Amanda about some of these stories, and she said "well, this would be a waste if it just fell down," I mean it had beautiful two foot walls, adobe walls, so the vision came from Amanda saying "well, wouldn't it be great to have a library?"

To me, libraries resonate very well because I'm a reader.

>>AMANDA GALLEGOS: Before we knew it, we had partnered with other residents of Vallecitos and started to look into the possibility of restoring the building and possibly creating a library, and a community center.

And the vision was to have the community involved, and have a place for people to gather and to share stories, books -and also for the young people in Vallecitos to have a place to hook up to the internet.

And it just seemed like a crazy idea at the time, but here we are today.

>>MARLENE FAHEY: Vallecitos is a fairly remote community.

We're far from traditional services and the library has a telephone people can use.

Many people here do not have a telephone.

Many people here do not have electricity or even running water.

So they can come to the library, they can connect to Wi-Fi, they can make photocopies.

>>SHEL NEYMARK: So they found out one of the things they needed here in town was telephone service.

A lot of people can't afford to pay for cell phones.

There's not good cell service here, so they put a phone out here on this porch and people come by all day long just to use the telephone.

>>MARLENE FAHEY: During covid, things that people were used to doing in person like paying bills or going to motor vehicles became impossible to do and that may be fine for people who live in a place with cell phone access, you know, they can do it all on their cell phone.

But, up here, that meant these people were essentially cut off from the ability to do those things.

Unless, we at the library were able to help them do that.

>> : -and you're too little to remember when we used to wash our feet down by the river >>MARLENE FAHEY: Lately, we've started to do some projects on local history, and we have been all along collecting history materials in the library.

We are hoping that it will be a place where they feel that their local memories and culture can be preserved.

>> : I think that Vallecitos is one of the best places in Northern New Mexico.

>>ERNIE GIRON: Well it's not in- if you look at it in the map, you don't find it.

Most maps don't have Vallecitos.

>> : -I've noticed that.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: It's a 501c3 library, which means that it's a private non-profit library.

In New Mexico, most libraries are funded by municipalities.

But in unincorporated areas, new libraries have to be 501c3's.

This library has been incredible, besides as we saw today in this beautiful gathering.

They have people who can gather here.

Get to know each other, interact.

If one of your neighbors is sick, the library acts as a center and people find out and they take care of each other and the library is kind of a nexus for those things.

>> ERNIE GIRON: Well, this is their- kind of their connection to the world.

That's kind of what it needs, you know.

Because they got the computers and the phone and everything and so it means quite a bit.

>> MIKE GALLEGOS: It's a beautiful valley, still.

There's some beautiful people there.

I don't see it anymore as a village that's in decay, but I see it as a village that's coming back to life and it's regenerating.

[MUSIC] >> ARCENIO TAFOYA: There you go, yours truly in the late Jerry Star, Angels from Heaven.

All right coming up next is a tune with Jerry Atencio from here in Dixon, living now in San Antonio, Texas.

>> RACHEL EXPOSITO: We have a community run radio station.

We have a heritage apple orchard.

A pollinator Garden.

A food co-op, oh- we have a thrift store, which raises money for the library and also serves the community in pretty amazing ways.

This library was established in 1992, I think it was in someone's house with a bunch of donated books so volunteers in the community, it's a real grassroots effort to make the library happen.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: The library started out in this old house, but it was immediately apparent that it would be too small for us it was always filled with people, overcrowded uh -too many books to put on the shelves >> RACHEL EXPOSITO: -and over time, we ended up in this amazing space which the community also fundraised for and built.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: Part of the purpose of the library is to have a place that belongs to everybody in the community, and a place where everybody feels a sense of ownership.

>> RACHEL EXPOSITO: One of the really important aspects of the library's mission is this idea of providing "Resolana".

What that means is that we're providing space for both formal and informal gathering and coming together of community members.

>> MICHAEL GARCIA: This is really the heart of Dixon.

This is the heart.

It beats strong too.

It doesn't matter anyone can come here, any age, any -anyone, English-speaking, Spanish-speaking, it doesn't matter.

If this wasn't here, I don't feel like Dixon would be what it is right now that's how important it is.

>> WINSTON WOODS: This library means so much to the community.

In the daytime you see the traffic that's coming in and out, and it's kind of like a meeting place.

The library here provides the internet and you can see people parking here late at night under cars right outside picking up the signal.

>> RACHEL EXPOSITO: Some people come to the library because they want- they're looking for community.

Like in our caterpillar Club you know, that's when parents really get to meet each other and develop relationships and have conversations.

Some people really, really appreciate that.

>> KAYO MULLER: I am coordinating the early literacy program every Wednesday it's called the Caterpillar Club and we do a lot of different games, different songs, to motivate and to help the children to just get used to reading books, get used to words, getting used to numbers and letters and the sounds of things, and it's really fun.

>> MICHAEL GARCIA: We decided that we would Implement music into early literacy.

We feel like music is so important.

Our kids are musicians.

We play music every day and why not just bring it into the community?

And they seem to be very very receptive to it.

>> KAYO MULLER: I feel like it's important for the community, it's important for the kids, it's important for the parents to be connected to one another, it's important for- everyone actually because it's just beautiful to have a place where we can all meet we can all read books together, we can all sing together and we can all get to know each other, and create this connection with each other.

>> RACHEL EXPOSITO: This is not a card catalog, this is a seed library.

It helps to support local culture, food traditions, landrace, varieties of chili and beans and other crops that have been grown in the Embudo Valley for generations, so in that way it helps to keep those traditions alive and those varieties thriving and it also supports biodiversity.

>> EMILY ARASIM-BELTRAN: It's dig down okay?

Good description!

Who else can add to what acequia is?

>> EMILY ARASIM-BELTRAN: We're here at the Embudo Valley library.

Their "oceans of possibility" theme, which is all about water.

So, today we're doing some activities with the youth about our most precious water source here in New Mexico, which is our acequias.

Our traditional ditches that we use for irrigating our fields and crops.

That's the water that's our lifeblood and lifeline here in New Mexico.

So, we're going to be doing a treasure hunt to help the youth learn to remember some of the important vocabulary of the different parts of acequia and also some of the important medicinal and food, plants and trees that grow out in the orchard here.

But our acequias are not natural, our acequias were not made by the Earth, they were made by your great, great, great grandparent.

Your ancestors.

We didn't have electricity, we didn't have tractors,all we had was the power of our muscles, our pallas, which is Spanish for shovel and the power of working together as a community.

>> MICHAEL GARCIA: If you're not at the library more than likely you're at the co-op.

>> CLARK CASE: The Cooperative rents the building from the library, they're our next door neighbor.

The library does so many important functions in this community and one of them is providing this space for food distribution in our town, without the capacity to have this place we would have no grocery in town, and Dixon is one of those small towns that is outlying from from any large enough City, that we would have to drive 30 miles one way just to get a gallon of milk.

It's crucial for the sustenance of the people who live here.

We sell a lot of local goods.

We sell local produce encouraging farmers to keep growing here.

We sell a lot of local crafts people's work.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: -and it provides a place where people hang out in front of the co-op and gossip.

It's a place where people see each other and connect with each other.

>> KAYO MULLER: This whole little center here is very important for the community.

It's a place of connection for sure.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: It's a community that has a library and generally does better than communities that don't.

That money gets spent in the community.

So, it's been- the library has really been an economic generator.

>> CLARK CASE: we employ about 20 people part-time, full-time, and last year we actually paid over $300,000 in wages to the town of Dixon.

Everybody who works here, lives here.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: Funding Librarians funds economic development.

Because Librarians help people get jobs, they help them write resumes, they help in so many ways.

>> CLARK CASE: The importance of the library can't be overstated.

Especially, you know, we have a little community that has needs of a lot of services that aren't met without the library.

It stores knowledge, it stores culture, its stored- it not only stores, it but it shares it with the people who live here.

It's an essential part of a rural community, it builds the community to be a place that people want to live.

>> ARCENIO TAFOYA: The library here has been very influential and keeping the culture of the area.

There's a lot of history in this community.

We are all siblings of the library.

[MUSIC] >> SHEL NEYMARK: So, I got involved with starting the library in 1990 and we started meeting with other libraries in Rio Arriba County.

There were five non-profit libraries there and every one of us had this issue of that we had no funding.

Essentially, we had to raise our entire budget from fundraisers and grant writing.

And I thought about the state level is where it needed to be dealt with and thought about an endowment that could furnish funds every year so there'd be a reliable funding stream every year for these small libraries.

[MUSIC] >> : We have to drive at least an hour to get normal supplies.

So, a lot of our community members spend a lot of time on the road.

>> OWEN LORENTZEN: I had read a book by Frank Lloyd Wright that said "if you're a city person and you're thinking of moving to a rural area, go twice as far as you think you should and you might end up in the right place."

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: Most people in our community are hermits.

They moved here because they like staying home and they love the peace and quiet.

And so Wayne is one of those who just loves to stay home and work on his cars and his trucks.

But, he loves to read so, since he's not super comfortable coming into the library I bring the books he loves to read to his home.

>>LYNN: So this is book two in the series, book three.

>> WAYNE GILBERT: oh wow, my favorites!

... [Laughter] >> JUDY TRUETT: I've lived here in Glenwood over 30 years.

When I first moved here there was a split in the community, versus the old time people, the ranchers had been here forever, and the people who moved here uh- then and then more recently.

That split is now gone, because of the library and especially under the leadership of Lynn.

It has incorporated the entire community and everyone feels free to come here and either check out books or talk or whatever.

>> MICHAEL ROSE: We're a rather spread out little community, so you don't always get a chance to meet your neighbors even.

The library is one of the places- not the only place but one, of two, or three places in Glenwood where people can hang out and talk and bring their kids.

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: We don't have any schools here.

They all closed down for the lack of children.

All the children in this community don't have a school library.

They have to be bussed at least 30 miles away.

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: To me, that meant we really needed to have a fantastic Library here for those children who still live here.

I want the library to be a fun place to come to.

We just finished a summer reading program on the theme of the ocean, "Ocean of Possibilities" and that was really fun for the kids, because living out here in the desert so many of them have never been to the ocean.

We saw that our little patrons who attended it, that's all they wanted to keep checking out, books about the ocean.

So, they were really excited about whales and sharks.

One thing very special about the summer reading program is that a lot of our children in this rural area are isolated and so the socialization that they experience in our program is very valuable.

So, this is the family that lives over half an hour away.

When they're coming through town, the mom texts me and I only live about four blocks from here.

So, I come over and meet them and open up the library.

>> LYNN TALKING TO GIRL: - So are you in 4-H?

What kind of animals do you work with?

>> LITTLE GIRL: um- goats, sheep, heifers,--- >> LYNN TALKING TO GIRL: - and you raise those yourself on your property?

>> LITTLE GIRL: um- kind of, so our heifers are born on our property, for sheep and goat we normally buy them.

>> MACKENZIE BALDRIDGE: This library has a librarian that knows us so personally.

She'll text me and suggest books for my kids.

She'll have things kind of ready for us whenever we get here.

We don't always make it through when they're open, so she'll come and open up for us and either you know before hours or after hours she'll stay late.

That's really great too!

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: One of the most important key members of this library is Michael Rose.

He has two PhDs and he volunteers his time twice a week to catalog our collection.

>> MICHAEL ROSE: We have a continual influx of items into the library and once we've decided what needs adding to the collection, I catalog them.

We need to keep track of what we've got, and where it is.

We can't add new items to the library, if we don't have room for them.

So, there's a continual de-accessioning of objects to leave room for the new items coming in.

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: He's created a classic collection not only in books, but we also have a classic movie collection.

>> MICHAEL ROSE: These are books we feel every library worth its name should have in the collection.

um- and encourage people to take them out, although they may not be taken out as frequently as best sellers.

>> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: What I love is the challenge of bringing together the various community members, being the ranchers and the environmentalists, who normally would be in two different worlds, opposing each other.

A problem I saw was that a lot of the ranchers were not utilizing our library.

And they make up a large part of our population here and so I thought "well, how can I get them to utilize our library?"

so then I thought "well, you know maybe a book club would be a good thing."

[BOOK CLUB CONVERSATION] >> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: - and so the book club I feel has been a successful format for the conservative ranchers and the liberals to come together, and really enjoy each other's company.

>> BOOK CLUB LADY 1: I really enjoy all the members of the book club and just hearing different people's perspectives and stories.

>> BOOK CLUB LADY 2: -and I really enjoy the diversity in everybody's opinions and what they bring to the table.

And we all feel safe here.

We express ourselves and we're not afraid that somebody's going to judge us if we say something a little different from what they believe, and it just kind of pulls us all together.

>> BOOK CLUB LADY 1: It's like that old saying: what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, what happens in the library doesn't leave the library.

today I'm going to make a delivery to >> LYNN NEIDERMAYER: One of our patrons, she works full- time.

She also lost her partner and so she is alone now.

I thought it'd be fun for her if she comes home from work and finds a bag of a new movie or an audiobook.

>> LYNN TALKING TO MARY ROETHLE: - and I didn't know if you needed any more audio books.

This author, James Harrowood- There's either this one or you can have them both.

Anyone is welcome into the library.

and it's a place of refuge.

It has been for us in the past and entertainment, education, - yeah...

Need I say more??

[WALKING SOUNDS] [MUSIC] >> ROXANNE VIGIL: I really think it's important that we don't lose our language.

Especially at a young age.

So, that's why we teach them at a young age from babies, onto as far as a teenager.

They're being taught the Towa language.

I'm gonna be calling the students one by one to introduce themselves in our language.

>> KIDS: [INTRODUCING THEMSELVES IN TOWA] >> ROXANNE VIGIL: The introductions that they did are all in Towa.

They introduced their Indian name that were given to them when they were small children and where they're from, where they go to school and their mowati group and where they live.

>>BOY: [INTRODUCING HIMSELF IN TOWA] [ROXANNE READING IN TOWA] >> ROXANNE VIGIL: I usually do that with them every Tuesday.

Read them a book and translate it into our language, the Towa language and then I asked them questions so they respond back.

I usually ask them what the book is about and what happened in there.

[SPEAKING IN TOWA] >> KID 1: We keep our language alive for our ancestors- they wanted us to keep our culture and language alive, so we don't lose our- culture.

>> ROXANNE VIGIL: They're still gonna talk English, but when they come home it is important that they speak our language when they come back to our Pueblo and also our elders and our parents are the ones that are responsible to teach us the language.

If they don't teach us the language then we would lose it.

But now, we have these classes.

We have we still have a lot of elders around that we go to and also we speak it here at the library at their schools.

So, that's why it is important that we keep our language alive and that we speak it every day and teach our young children.

[MUSIC] >> : In rural communities, in many of these one-room, two- room libraries.

It is the librarian who is the director, the manager, the heart and the person looking for the future.

>> IVY STOVER: So, the first two rooms were built in 1888 and it was the old train depot.

My desk over here is where the station master sat .The train depot was built first for the mines and that's why the train came to Magdalena.

Magdalena is called the "Trail's End", because it was just a spur line from Socorro.

So, the train tracks went from Socorro to here and then that was it.

The train pulled up on either side of the building; the train would go further past the building to the Stockyards.

The back room was added sometime between 1907 and 1915.

The mines kept going until the 50's.

Kelly mines they're about 5-10 miles southeast of Magdalena.

Once the mines closed, people started leaving so they moved the houses down the hill here to Magdalena.

The train kept going because in that time, the cattle drive had picked up and they established an official cattle drive from Springersville, Arizona here to Magdalena >> CYNTHIA REARDON PHILLIPS: Ivy Stover, who is the library director.

Worked very hard to get her Masters in library and information science.

Ivy has been so instrumental in creating an environment at the library where children and adults can come and have a safe place where they can learn new things and Participate together.

So, she's not just a leader in the library, but she has really made the effort to become a leader in our community.

>> IVY STOVER: So, I am the library director, I am the catalog librarian, I am the children's librarian, and the reference librarian and the adult librarian.

I am in charge of all programs like setting them up making them happen, -um yeah.

>> IVY STOVER: So, Code Club is a weekly club that we teach kids the basics of computer coding and it's things like game development, website development, making videos in a way that's easier for the kids to work with, so that way they can really understand the concepts even if they're reading or typing skills are not quite there yet.

[TALKING] >> IVY STOVER: Normal computer code is written with lots of texts and specific characters, like if you put a colon instead of a semicolon you break your code.

That's really frustrating for adults, let alone kids who are still learning to read, or still learning to type.

So instead we use a program called "Scratch" it's a free online program from MIT and the coding language is represented as colorful blocks instead.

>> IVY STOVER TO STUDENT: Once you've added the bedroom one- you're gonna, do you see these blocks right here honey?

You are going to make those.

Okay?

>> IVY STOVER: Like we are a small tiny - tiny village but people really care about the library.

I believe that libraries provide intrinsic value to their communities.

I hear it all the time when people come in, "oh wow, I didn't know Magdalena had a library" or "wow!

so big for such a small community."

it really feels like having a library in a rural community provides a sense of legitimacy.

We're not just an area people happen to live, we're a community and we're one of the pillars of a community, one of the institutions you expect to see.

[HAMMERING] >> RICHARD RUMPF: Rural libraries, libraries in general, are extremely important.

Even in this day and age of all the electronic gizmos and your notebooks and all that, it's still comforting to be able to pick up a book and hold it in your hand.

Each library is a little different, a lot of them have historic documents for their communities.

It's a great meeting place.

Bump into your neighbors maybe, that's the only place you see them, is at a library.

It's a vital part of a community, people moving into a community will look and see if there is a library or where's the closest library.

>> IVY STOVER: Rural libraries in New Mexico are just like rural libraries anywhere.

People who want to move to a rural community, no matter where they are in the country, they want to move there for the same reasons.

They like having a good sense of community.

More than that, you have a city where there's so many people it's hard to know everyone.

You know, getting to know you speaking to you instead of just serving you.

So, when somebody comes up I'm not just check in, check out the book, I talk to them and say "hey, how are you doing?

How's your family?"

and that really ties into social well-being that's what people really look forward to and one of the things that they like about rural communities and drives people to them.

All the graffiti in the back room was done by the workers for the train depot.

While they were waiting for the train to come, or when they were loading and unloading stuff.

Several locals whose families worked here at the train depot, have found their family's initials or sometimes the full names in the back.

The oldest date that I've seen written out is from 1923, so it'll be 100 years old next year.

>> CYNTHIA REARDON PHILLIPS: Small libraries around the United States are the last bastion of safe zones for people to come find out new things, research, get additional information, meet your neighbors, work with children- >> SHEL NEYMARK: Rural library directors and librarians are making between 12 and 15 dollars an hour, not all of them, but a great deal of them.

And it's just not a living wage.

They're mostly women and so I think that it is a gender equality issue.

The endowment will address that issue.

year, it would address the underpaid librarians.

[MUSIC] >> LINN KENNEDY: This is an old forest service cabin that the forest fighters used.

The Baldwin family originally owned this land, and they sold it to the forest Service as a lookout and to fight fires and then in 1999 it became a library.

We started cleaning in 1998 and we opened I think May 2nd to a snowstorm!

We've been open three days a week since then.

We really wanted year-round access to reading.

Whatever the community, the direction they go in, we try to follow.

So, then people explain to us because you drive so far here they would really like audio books.

So, we got into audiobooks, large print, because we're all going there with needing it, so.

That's how we've grown.

When people ask us about books we often find ourselves in a position where we're teaching them, because they're not used to using a card catalog.

But yet, that's what we have because we've never computerized.

We've resisted adding Wi-Fi, computer services, the board continues to not want to modernize and spend the money also.

We're self- supporting.

Most people drive 45 minutes or more to come here.

We serve Horse Springs, old and new Horse Springs, Pie Town doesn't have a library nor does Quemado.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: I'm headed to the State Legislature to lobby for the rural Library Initiative.

The Rural Library Endowment was started in 2019 with a goal of 50 million dollars.

Right now, there's 13 million dollars in it and I'm going to ask the legislature for more money.

>> SHEL NEYMARK SPEAKING AT ROUNDHOUSE: I have about 40 brochures here to hand out to representatives and Senators and people so if you're going to be advocating for rural libraries, if you would take a few and pass them out.

That's great.

It tells- there's a lot of information here, a lot of good talking points and which communities are impacted.

>> DORIS FIELDS, Ph.D.: So, today what we wanted to do, I was wanted to get a collection of people from Placetas to come and speak with the legislators and advocate for increased funding for an endowment for ural libraries.

Rural libraries serve our communities in ways no other organization really does.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: These appointments are tentative, hopefully we'll get to see these people.

I'd love people advocating for rural libraries to come with me.

Senator Worth at 9:30.

Nathan Small at 10 to 10:30.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: We found an advocate in Senator Jerry Ortiz Y Pino.

He put forth the original Rural Library Endowment Bill.

The endowment passed the legislature in 2019.

Right now there's 13 million dollars in the fund.

Which if the fund makes five percent interest each community will get about twelve thousand dollars.

This year only 15 million has been proposed so it's a big uphill battle to try to get full funding for the endowment.

>> SHEL NEYMARK: Thank you so much, I really appreciate it!

>> DORIS FIELDS, Ph.D.: I'm supporting kids who don't have internet and need to have internet.

For example, I was just reminded during the pandemic, especially, we have had- and even since then, we have a little girl who comes and does her cello lessons online outside the library because she doesn't have access at home.

[MUSIC] >> DEBBIE B. CARRILLO: You know, for a very, very long time this Library did not exist.

There was nothing like this here.

Culture here in Abiquiu, in this little surrounding areas is not even viewed as culture because, guess what?

We live the culture.

So to us it's just as natural as it is.

[MUSIC] >> : It's in our blood, both sides, and it's in our oral history traditions.

>> : Abiquiu was kind of like a melting pot of different types of Indians that came over here.

We just got this told by word of mouth.

>> : Then we make the penance of walking in prayer or bringing horses into the Pueblo, it's continuing a pride.

it's showing a pride to our kids.

it's asking them to continue the tradition.

and letting them stand out instead of being held down.

>> DELILAH TRUJILLO: I am Genizaro from Abiquiu, New Mexico.

My grandparents, great-grandparents, all the way back have lived here in the Pueblo.

My grandfather was the drummer, he passed that on to my uncle Dexter.

This library is a very important part of the community, it does so much for everyone who lives here and around here.

>> ISABEL W. TRUJILLO: We're the only open doors here in the Pueblo and so when somebody needs something that they feel is out of their reach, they come over here to ask how to get it.

And we have a lot of information that we hold, because our doors are open and so we receive all this information.

We were just recently part of a rural development study where it was nationwide and in the interviews and in the summary at the end it was found to be how much libraries address social issues in the community.

So, we're kind of a facilitator or mediation site and also community space, you know for after hours, meeting place and in the times of high gas costs, saving a trip into town to get a notary signature here to get a fax, or receive a fax, so many different things.

>> DELILAH TRUJILLO: The library opened when I was really young in elementary, I started coming to tutoring classes here, right after school.

So, they'd help me get my homework done, help me learn a lot.

>> ISABEL W. TRUJILLO: Our kids here in the community, not being taught about their ancestry in school, that's for sure.

A lot of oral histories that do happen at home or photos or artifacts or anything like that, they become valid when the kids come in and read something like the youth book club that we have right now reading Dunbar's Indigenous U.S history.

It talks about the past coming in from the East but arriving here and a lot of that evidence remaining and our kids because they're involved in traditional feast days.

A lot of times don't make that connection with world history coming in from the East and arriving here.

We hope that they gain a pride and they do their own investigations through some of the projects that we have ongoing.

They do participate in all our programming.

>> ISABEL W. TRUJILLO TALKING WITH STUDENTS: They don't know anything about reservation status, they don't know anything about U.S government so they just feel forced and they're fighting back.

>> CHAVELA TRUJILLO: Growing up in the Pueblo, we always understood that we had both a Spanish and Native side and that's very important to the term Genizaro.

I knew my background, I knew where I was from, it does give you a sense of pride in a good way to be proud of where you came from and your people and your community.

We have very deep ties in our community to all of our neighbors and those around us especially here in the Pueblo.

>> THERESA JARAMILLO: We knew that we had some Genizaro, you know in their blood from the Natives from around this area.

But other than that, we didn't know before that, we knew it by word of mouth only, because our mother always taught us this because her grandfather was a captive Indian.

>> SOPHIE N. GARCIA: In the library about two years ago, they had a grant to do the genealogy for people that had were born and raised here in Abiquiu, so my husband came and had his done.

They found that he was 33% Native American and his ancestry traced back to Jemez Pueblo.

I was amazed that I have 30%.

I don't know where or what tribe I belong to but I always knew that I had Native American blood.

>> ISABEL W. TRUJILLO: What we found out about the DNA was that, yes, the community was right, people were right, they knew that they had indigenous blood.

They never doubted it to begin with.

But, the study as a whole showed that there was more DNA blood here.

The percentage was so much higher.

>> DELILAH TRUJILLO: This Library provides a lot of opportunity for our Pueblo.

We were able to do an archaeological dig here in the Pueblo where again, the kids were able to use all the senses of LiDAR data and really technological tools to then tie that back into the history of our Pueblo and actually depict outlines of old buildings.

>> DELILAH TRUJILLO: The library has provided a lot of contacts too for the Youth.

It brings in just very knowledgeable people like Debbie Carrillo.

They're doing a pottery project right now.

>> DEBBIE B. CARRILLO: My role here is to help the Abiquiu library, which happens to be the hub of Abiquiu for the children, more than anybody else.

They have different projects and they ask me to do a project on pottery, and so I'm supposed to go and talk to these children about my cases utilitarian pottery.

Explaining to them that utilitarian means that you're going to use the piece and how you're going to use it and how you fashion it and how they were made.

Micaceous utilitarian pottery was used for cooking and trading a lot, you know, and it has no embellishment but yes, it does have a historical value they used to use these potteries for cooking.

We don't know that we're living in the culture, but we are.

and that's how it gets preserved and the library being the library that it is now is bringing that to light.

Well, it boils down to trouble stems from ignorance.

Productivity stems from knowledge, and you leave your ignorance here and take knowledge.

Somebody took the trouble to write it down.

You need to read it.

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