The new book club at the Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center in Liberty gives participants a chance to discuss novels set in the world of museums, archives, and libraries in a unique setting that offers many opportunities to connect with local and regional history.

The Sam Houston Center Quarterly Book Club is halfway through its first year— the next meeting is Tuesday, August 27 at 6:00 p.m., when attendees will discuss The Lions of Fifth Avenue, a historical novel by Fiona Davis. The Lions of Fifth Avenue is set at the New York Public Library and involves the curator and her grandmother, missing library items, and a family story that spans decades. The book club meetings are open to everyone.

So far, the club has discussed The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes (based on the real-life story of the Packhorse Librarians of Kentucky, who delivered books on horseback to families in Appalachia during the Great Depression) and The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray. This historical novel is about J.P. Morgan’s personal librarian, Belle da Costa Greene, a Black woman who was forced to hide her true identity and pass as white as she becomes one of the most powerful people in the book world of the 1920s.

 Alana Inman, Manager of the Center, began the book club “so people could grow accustomed to attending an event regularly, and that would allow us to foster relationships with repeat visitors.” Inman chose the museum and archives theme for the club: “I wanted to ensure that it’s still related to what we do here at the Center as an archives and a museum, because we’re more of a special library than a public library.”

Inman said, “This focus might mean that the character is a librarian. The setting could be a museum, or the story may, you know, involve finding or saving a historic record. Whatever the connection, the story chosen always brings us back to learning more about the impact of libraries, archives, and museums and the people that work in them—librarians, archivists, conservators, and museum curators,” Inman said.

Sandy Pickett is a regular attendee of the book club, as well as a longtime volunteer at the Center and Vice President of the Atascosito Historical Society.

“I would say that the eagerness and enthusiasm of those who participated has really been terrific, and there’s a very genuine openness to the discussion,” Pickett said. “No one hesitates to give their opinion, and if it’s not the consensus of everyone in the group, it really doesn’t matter. Everybody is welcome to their own opinion and feels very free to give it. And I really like that. I’ve also enjoyed getting to know some of the people. I’ve lived in Liberty almost forever, and I thought, ‘I’ll know everybody who comes into this little gathering.’ Well, no, there were people I had not met. I’m getting to know those people, and most of them are going to reach out to their other friends to encourage them to join. Certainly, I have enjoyed the books that Alana has chosen.”

Finding personal connections to history

The Sam Houston Center is a component of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission and serves as the official regional historical resource depository for the 10 Southeast Texas counties of Chambers, Hardin, Jasper, Jefferson, Liberty, Newton, Orange, Polk, San Jacinto, and Tyler. The Center’s primary mission is to collect, preserve, and provide access to historically significant state and local government records and publications of the designated region and secondarily to serve as a library of Texana and genealogical resources.

Inman said one occurrence that surprises many visitors is when they find a personal connection to their own family histories when doing research at the Center. “Often visitors who come here are from the Southeast Texas area. They end up seeing historic objects from their hometowns and from their home counties, and frequently we have something that does connect directly to the visitor—we may have their high school yearbook, or we have their ancestor’s land records,” Inman said. “Personally, I’m from one of our counties—Newton County—and I came across my mother’s engagement photo in a newspaper here. So that is always fun when we’re able to surprise people with a piece of their own past when they come to see us.”

Added Pickett, “Each visitor is going to experience something new or wonderful in their own way. It could be in the museum, or it could be in the records. I’ve been out here a long time, and I’ve given a lot of tours as a volunteer, and it’s wonderful when someone comes and brings their children and says, ‘I haven’t been here since the fourth grade, but I wanted my child to see it.’ It’s exciting when that happens.”

The next meeting of the Sam Houston Center Book Club is Tuesday, August 27, at 6:00 p.m. in the Center’s main building at 650 FM 1011 in Liberty. The following meeting is November 26, when the club will be discussing The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles; in this book, a young librarian in Paris in 1939 joins the Resistance when the Nazis occupy Paris.

Interested participants may obtain a copy of the novels through their local library or favorite bookstore to prepare for the conversation. For more information, contact SHC staff at (936) 336-8821 or via email at SamHoustonCenter@tsl.texas.gov.

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