Westport Public Library
Located at 3 Spring Street in Westport.
History
It’s hard to believe that the ‘house of books” now located at 3 Spring Street was originally housed in an abandoned butcher shop, lacking electricity and indoor plumbing.
With a nucleus of interested and dedicated people along with strong community involvement the butcher shop was transformed into a small library stocked with one set of encyclopedia donated by the Lions Club, discards from the Toronto and Kingston libraries, as well as private donations. A Public Library Board was established, and the doors opened on February 18, 1947.
Growth was so rapid that by 1950 The Board was seeking a new home. A back section of the post office lot was acquired by The Town Council, and a new library was soon a reality.
In 1971 the library joined The County Library System. In 1975 the Dewey Decimal System of cataloguing was introduced, and in 1977 a telephone was installed.
In 1982 the library had once again outgrown its home. It was decided to construct a new building at the same location. It opened in 1987. The former building is now located at the local airfield.
In 1991 a Friends of the Library was formed to assist in volunteer staffing and fundraising. A used bookshop was also generated.
The library now functions as a venue for community programs, and in 1997 came on-line agreeing to become a community access terminal.
After 60 years of careful planning and hard work, tireless volunteers have made the Westport Public Library what it is today.
Hours of Operation
| Weekday | July to August | September to June |
| MONDAY | 1pm-5pm | 1pm-5pm |
| TUESDAY | 10am-4pm | 10am-2pm |
| WEDNESDAY | CLOSED | CLOSED |
| THURSDAY | 10am-12pm & 2pm-5pm | 2pm-5pm |
| FRIDAY | 1pm-5pm | 1pm-5pm |
| SATURDAY | 10am-2pm | 10am-2pm |
| SUNDAY | CLOSED | CLOSED |
Contact
For more information please contact the Librarian at 613-273-3223 or email: library@rideau.net
Online Resources
Online Fun For Kids!
The TumbleBookLibrary is a collection of TumbleBooks (animated, talking picture books) with fiction, non-fiction and foreign language titles, Read-Alongs (chapter books with sentence highlighting and narration but no animation) TumbleTV which consists of pre-set playlists of a sequence of books, and Tumble Puzzles and Games.
TumbleTalkingBooks is a collection of online streaming audio books.
TumbleReadables is a collection of online read-along titles in categories such as Early Readers, Chapter Books, Teen Fiction, Classics and Drama/Poetry.
Acknowledgment:
