Library Events

Visit the library during April to view a traveling exhibit on artist Herb Block's environmentalism cartoons! This display is on loan from the Herb Block Foundation for the entire month of April. Earth Day is Monday, April 22nd, but you can learn about environmental topics all month long at the library. Visit our gallery space to check it out! 

This Display offers an inside look at Herb Block’s powerful cartoons about the environment, a subject he began addressing during the Twenties and the Great Depression. Herblock cared deeply about the environment.

His work on issues about wildlife, wilderness and natural resources are as relevant today, as they were in the past. Many of his cartoons on the world’s most fragile and precious treasures, were produced shortly before his death at age 91 in September 2001.

Registration & Information Link: https://libraryc.org/westbpl/45703

Virtually step into the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History with Curator Paula Johnson as she discusses the book Smithsonian American Table: The Foods, People, and Innovations That Feed Us.

American Table is a sweeping history of food and culture that summons everyone to the table for a fresh look at some of the people, ingredients, events, and movements that have shaped how and what we eat.

Johnson, curator and project director of the American Food History Project, will discuss several stories featured in the volume, with an emphasis on those that intersect most directly with the Smithsonian’s research, collecting, and programming around food history.

During this event, Johnson will engage viewers in discovering the connections between food and American history:

• How immigration and migration has shaped (and continues to shape) American tables,
• How food companies have influenced home cooks through advertising, from Jell-O salads to Crock-pots.
• How individuals from Brownie Wise to James Beard and Julia Child inspired generations of cooks and eaters across the United States.
• And show viewers how uniting in the kitchen can change the shape of our collective futures, specifically highlighting growers and chefs who are reclaiming and reinventing regional and cultural traditions, including Indigenous ingredients and cooking techniques.

After this enlightening, enriching, and entertaining webinar, you can cook your way through the recipes that are featured in the volume that reflect American history and culture.   Hungry for more? Register now!

About the Speaker

Paula Johnson is a Curator in the Division of Work and Industry at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History and is responsible for strengthening and maintaining the food history and marine resources collections. She is also the Project Director for the Smithsonian's multi-faceted American Food History Project and director and co-curator for the exhibition, FOOD: Transforming the American Table, which opened in 2012; a refresh of the exhibition was completed in 2019. As one of the curators who collected Julia Child’s home kitchen in 2001, she was also on the team that developed the exhibition Bon Appetit! Julia Child’s Kitchen at the Smithsonian, on view from 2002 to 2012. Over more than three decades at the Smithsonian, Johnson has collected a wide range of artifacts and archives reflecting the work and experiences of diverse Americans and communities.

Johnson has published books and articles on the Chesapeake Bay, maritime communities, and material culture, and has lectured widely on these and topics related to American food and wine history, field research, oral history recording, and community-based documentation. She is an inaugural member of the editorial collective for Gastronomica: The Journal for Food History and received the 2020 Smithsonian Distinguished Scholar in the Humanities Award. Johnson is working on a book about Julia Child’s home kitchen for publication in Fall 2024.

Zoom discussion with Dick Ellis, investigator on the Gardner Heist team. Attend from home or visit the Bridgewater Senior Center for a "watch party". Zoom link and info:       

Topic: One Book One Community: Dick Ellis, investigator of the Gardner Heist

Time: Apr 3, 2024 12:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting:

https://bridgew.zoom.us/j/99536092569?pwd=b3JuRUN5dmVuVXgwYm1acEQvUnVwUT09

Meeting ID: 995 3609 2569
Passcode: 614763

No registration needed.

Please register at westbpl.org

A total solar eclipse will be visible from many parts of the US on April 8, 2024. While no location in Massachusetts will experience totality, some parts of the state will see over 95% coverage of the sun if weather permits.

The eclipse will begin shortly after 2 PM ET and will last about 2 and a half hours until about 4:30 PM ET.

Come visit the library to learn more about solar eclipses through activities and stories, and then receive your eclipse glasses to watch the event safely.

Registration & Information Link: https://libraryc.org/westbpl/45704

Join us for a one-of-a-kind conversation with National Book Award-winner Colum McCann as he is joined by Diane Foley, the inspiration behind the heartrending book American Mother.

American Mother is the story of a mother who, in the course of confronting her son’s killer, gets to the elemental heart of violence and forgiveness. Diane Foley is the mother of Jim, a freelance journalist captured and beheaded by ISIS in 2014, an image that became one of the most iconic of the 21st century. Seven years later, Diane gets the chance to spend three days with the murderer of her son in a Virginia courthouse, inspiring her to tell her life story. What unfolds is one of the most compelling narratives in recent literary history, channeled into searing reality by New York Times bestselling author Colum McCann, who brings us on a journey of strength, resilience, and radical empathy. You are sure to be moved by McCann's writing and Foley’s uncompromising love, register now! 

About the Authors

Colum McCann is the author of seven novels, three collections of stories and two works of non-fiction. Born and raised in Dublin, Ireland, he has been the recipient of many international honors, including the U.S National Book Award, the International Dublin Literary Prize, a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres from the French government, election to the Irish Arts Academy, several European awards, the 2010 Best Foreign Novel Award in China, and an Oscar nomination. In 2017 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts.  His work has been published in over 40 languages.  He is the President and co-founder of the non-profit global story exchange organization, Narrative 4. He is the Thomas Hunter Writer in Residence in Hunter College, in New York, where he lives with his wife Allison and their family.  His most recent novel, Apeirogon, became an immediate New York Times best-seller and won several major international awards.  His first major non-fiction book, American Mother, will be published in March 2024.

Diane M. Foley is the mother of five children, including American freelance conflict journalist James W. Foley. She founded the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation in September 2014, less than a month after his public execution. Diane is currently serving as the President and Executive Director of JWFLF. Since 2014, she has led JWFLF efforts to fund the start of Hostage US and the International Alliance for a Culture of Safety, ACOS. In 2015, she actively participated in the National Counterterrorism Center hostage review which culminated in the Presidential Policy Directive-30. This directive re-organized US efforts on behalf of Americans taken hostage abroad into an interagency Hostage Recovery Fusion Cell, Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs and a Hostage Recovery Group at the White House. Previously, Diane worked first as a community health nurse and then as a family nurse practitioner for 18 years. She received both her undergraduate and master’s degrees from the University of New Hampshire in Durham, NH.

Are you and your family looking for some meaningful volunteer work? Dress A Girl Around the World is presenting a  non-sewing workshop

Tuesday April 9th  at the WEST BRIDGEWATER library from 6-7 pm. At this workshop we will be measuring and bagging dresses for upcoming delivery. This is a fun and meaningful volunteer activity.

Come in any time between 10 and noon to visit 5 self-guided story stations. Each station presents a book, an activity and a craft.  Great for ages 3-6.

This program repeats on Saturday.

Come in any time between 10 and noon to visit 5 self-guided story stations. Each station presents a book, an activity and a craft.  Great for ages 3-6.

This program is led by Therapy Gardens of Brockton and is generously sponsored by the West Bridgewater Cultural Council. 

Did you know that fermented pickles are loaded with vitamins and minerals? They also help with digestion and can relieve muscle cramps. Come make your own old-fashioned fermented pickles using water, salt, and spices. A variety of additional pickling techniques will also be presented, including vinegar pickles, bread-and-butter pickles, as well as lower-sodium options. Participants will make their own pickles at the session.

PLEASE REGISTER at Westbpl.org. Space is limited. 

This program is best for ages 15 and up.

Please register online.

Please register at westbpl.org

Registration and Information Link: https://libraryc.org/westbpl/45705

We cannot wait for you to join us as we chat with award-winning and bestselling author Xochitl Gonzalez about her newest novel Anita de Monte Laughs Last. 

Anita de Monte Laughs Last is a propulsive, witty examination of power, love, and art, daring to ask who gets to be remembered and who is left behind in the rarefied world of the elite. In 1985. Anita de Monte, a rising star in the art world, is found dead in New York City; her tragic death is the talk of the town. Until it isn’t. By 1998 Anita’s name had been all but forgotten―certainly by the time Raquel, a third-year art history student was preparing her final thesis. On College Hill, surrounded by privileged students whose futures are already paved out for them, Raquel feels like an outsider. Students of color, like her, are the minority there, and the pressure to work twice as hard for the same opportunities is no secret. But when Raquel becomes romantically involved with a well-connected older art student, she finds herself unexpectedly rising up the social ranks. As she attempts to straddle both worlds, she stumbles upon Anita’s story, raising questions about the dynamics of her own relationship, which eerily mirrors that of the forgotten artist.

Moving back and forth through time and told from the perspectives of both Anita and Raquel, this is sure a novel (and a conversation) that you don’t want to miss. Register now!

About the Author: Xochitl Gonzalez is the New York Times bestselling author of Olga Dies Dreaming. Named a Best of 2022 by The New York Times, TIME, Kirkus, Washington Post, and NPR, Olga Dies Dreaming was the winner of the Brooklyn Public Library Book Prize in Fiction and The New York City Book Awards. A Reese’s Book Club Pick, her new novel, Anita de Monte Laughs Last, was published on March 2024 with Flatiron Books. As a staff writer for The Atlantic, she was recognized as a 2023 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Commentary. A native Brooklynite and proud public school graduate, Gonzalez holds a BA from Brown University and an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

In Our Party Era

Please register at westbpl.org