When Dan Pelzer died last month at the age of 92, he left his family and friends an incredible gift: a 109-page handwritten list of all the books he’d read since 1962. And now it can be viewed by the world.
With a grant from the American Library Association, a small library in rural New Hampshire created accessible and inclusive spaces for its youngest patrons.
In the almost 15 years since the first Death Café was held in the UK, they have sprouted all over the world. And libraries are often the gathering spots.
Help protect libraries and win your way to the American Library Association’s (ALA) 2026 Annual Conference in Chicago!
Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Libraries in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, created a program to encourage Native individuals living in the region to consider running for non-Tribal elected offices themselves to help ensure that diverse perspectives are part of community conversations and policy decisions. They used resources provided by the American Library Association’s 2024 Peggy Barber Tribute Grant to facilitate the initiative.
Congratulations to librarian Mychal Threets for being named to the Time100 Creators: Most Influential Digital Voices list for 2025, Time’s inaugural celebration of the digital creators who have emerged to shape our culture. “They are changing what we watch, how we spend our time, what we buy, and how we vote,” says the magazine.
The library world—and Americans in general—received bad news late today when a federal judge declined to block the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The ruling, issued in ALA v. Sonderling, will allow the administration’s cuts at the independent agency while the case proceeds.
The international library community is rallying around its peers and colleagues in the United States as they endure challenging times that have seen the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) under attack by President Trump and Dr. Carla Hayden fired as the Librarian of Congress.
Alexis Chanthachack, assistant director of Beals Memorial Library in Winchendon, Massachusetts, knows how difficult it can be to find activities and events—especially in rural areas—that are welcoming to autistic youth. That immediacy led the mother of two sons diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder to become the driving force behind the library’s accessibility work—work that led the library to receive a Libraries Transforming Communities Accessible Small and Rural Communities grant from the American Library Association to enhance accessibility for patrons on the autism spectrum.
Miriam Tuliao, senior library marketing manager at Penguin Random House and an adjunct library science instructor at Queens College, City University of New York and Indiana University–Purdue University Indianapolis, will run 18 miles on Global Running Day (June 4) to raise funds for the American Library Association’s Spectrum Scholarship Program. This is her 18th consecutive year organizing an athletic fundraiser for the program.
