This week’s blog topic was a total and complete non-brainer for me. Some of my favorite childhood memories revolve entirely around the Defiance Public Library and the beautiful books that it holds. I remember skipping up the steps of that building and just being washed in the library smell. I’ll be honest, it wasn’t a great smell. It was books and mildew and probably some kind of industrial cleaner that all combined to be the trigger of all kinds of childhood memories. None of that mattered, it was the library, and all good things happened in the library. I would run up the internal steps, past the gorgeous circulation desk where we would pick up my weekly Picture Pages to take home and use along with the show. I remember absolutely nothing about this show. I mean, the internet has told me that it was a part of the Captain Kangaroo show and that at some point it was hosted by Bill Cosby. I’m assuming that the internet is not lying about that, but there is not a single thing in my memory that would point to this being accurate. All I remember is that I loved, I mean LOVED picking up the Picture Pages from the library and doing them at home to the show. It was a highlight of my week and little cutie Carrie was all over that mess, likely driving her mom nuts by talking about it non-stop and exhibiting far too much energy over it.
After the vital Picture Pages was secured (and safely passed off to my mom, I was onward and upward) the rest of the epic journey that was the library could commence. The kids section of the library was to the right and off I would run. I would hunt around for just the perfect books to take home to be engrossed in before returning for the next week’s excitement. I don’t remember much of what I liked to read at this age, I can only imagine it was picture books. I’m going to assume that “Caps for Sale” and “Snowy Day” featured prominently as they are two favorites I remember to this day.
What I really remember is as I got older and discovered the excitement of a mystery. The first of these that I discovered was none other than one “Encyclopedia Brown”. In case you haven’t had the joy to read one of these incredibly detailed, tough to figure out, hide who did it till the end; stories - prepare for disappointment. These are kids books, people! It is about a very smart boy, Leroy Brown who’s dad is chief of police and his bestie, Sally who is no slouch. They would find the crime, investigate and inevitably figure out who done it. Part of why I loved these books is that it also had an Answer section in the back where it would go through all the clues that had been used to figure out this head scratcher of a case. And let me tell you that I was OFTEN impressed with the genius of this duo. I remember, to this day, that the big reveal of one of his stories indicated that our boy Encyclopedia figured out the case because the guilty party faked cryed. How did Encyclopedia know he was faking? Are you ready to be wowed by the knowledge that one pre-teen boy carried around in his little developing brain? He knew that the first tear that you shed does not fall from your inner eye, as our bad guy in the book would lead him to believe, but instead falls from the outer eye. Have you ever even heard of such genius??? Turns out, it’s likely not true. In an effort to only record the most accurate information here on my opinion filled blog, I scoured the internet to verify this with no such luck. Maybe tears just fall where they fall.
Thank you, Wikipedia!
After reading every “Encyclopedia Brown” the library had to offer I had no option but to move on and I was not done with the mystery genre. I turned to my most favorite book of all child time, Nancy Drew. It turns out that my Aunt Cindi also loved Nancy Drew as a child and she had saved her collection and was willing to share them with me. Score! I had a box of yellow bound nirvana.
https://www.wendyheuvel.com/6-reasons-we-love-nancy-drew-books/
I worked my way lovingly through each of these. First organizing them into numerical order and then carefully reading them from first to last subsidizing all of those that I didn’t have by whatever the public library carried. This clearly was not the start of my OCD behavior! I don’t know how long it took to get through them all but I do know that it was not near long enough. I could not have fallen in love with a set of characters more than I did those to be found in those books and mostly Ms. Drew, herself. She was everything that a grown woman should be; smart, friendly, polite and conscientious. She also had beautiful clothes and a rocking convertible. That might have been what sold me on her. Regardless, she kicked the Hardy Boys booties, and I liked that too!