Bookends

Sunday News

May 23, 2009 23:53 EST

By STAFF

Hershey Co. fills literacy prescription
Young patients seen in six Lancaster County medical clinics are among those who will benefit from a $10,000 donation that The Hershey Co. recently made to the Reach Out and Read, an early literacy program.

ROR trains volunteer doctors and nurses to encourage parents to read aloud to their young children. It also provides new, age-appropriate books for each child to take home from every checkup from 6 months to 5 years.

"Far too many of our state's children are arriving at school unprepared to read and unprepared to learn," said Dr. William Fife, medical director at SouthEast Lancaster Health Services, an ROR site. "More than 40 percent of our state's parents are not reading to their young children every day," he noted.

"Reach Out and Read .... help[s] parents understand the critical importance of reading aloud and gives them practical tips on how to make it fun for the whole family," he said, thanking The Hershey Co. for its support of the program.

ROR serves children at 90 locations in the state, reaching more than 65,000 children and distributing more than 121,000 new books each year. Nationally, 6 million new books will be given to 3.8 million families at 4,535 health-care sites.


Library plans move
Christiana's Moores Memorial Library will move next year from Bridge Street to the former Wachovia Bank building at 9 Slocum Ave., the library board announced last week.

Trustee President LaVerne "Bud" Rettew said the 1,200-square-foot library will initially double in size by using the ground floor of the building, and it has the potential to double again if the lower level is utilized.

The initial relocation and expansion will require $1.9 million. Forty percent already has been obtained in grants; the rest is dependent on a community fundraising effort headed by Jack Assetto.

Usage of the library, measured in circulation of its materials, has tripled in the past 20 years.


2 pen autobiographies
William Cliff Bard, of Lancaster, has published his autobiography, "One Common Man, One Uncommon Life." It includes memories from his youth on Cabbage Hill and in Bird in Hand and Smoketown, right up to the present.

The East Lampeter Township High School graduate served as a U.S. Army investigator during World War II, and the book includes anecdotes from many of the 33 different occupations Bard counts having had over the years. There are also chapters on 9/11, UFOs and a few favorite recipes tucked in too.

The hardcover includes photographs, and its prose is interspersed with Bard's original, award-winning poetry. The book is priced at $40 and is available from the author at 392-0004.

• Wallace J. Gordon, also of Lancaster, has completed the ninth volume in his autobiographical saga. This entry is titled "Madison Avenue South 1964 — Writing My Way Through the Cola Wars."

The former advertising copywriter sums it up neatly: "Once upon a time there was Coca-Cola. Then there was Pepsi-Cola, Royal Crown Cola and half-a-hundred other colas, all nipping hungrily at the heels of the big guy. There was a lot of money involved and pretty soon it became a dogfight." Personal battle scenes follow.

The 485-page paperback is available at the AuthorHouse.com Web site for $15.20.


Church book sale
New Holland United Methodist Church will hold a used-book sale 8 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday, June 6, at the church, 120 W. Main St. Hardcovers will sell for $3, paperbacks and audiobooks for $2, and children's books for $1 and $2. Donations of books for the sale may be brought to the church weekday mornings until May 29.


Book discussions set
Ephrata Public Library hosts the Mystery Book Discussion Group at 6 p.m. Tuesday, May 26, featuring "Death Swatch," by Laura Childs.

During the Friends Open House at 6 p.m. Thursday, May 28, at the library, Ephrata author Larry Alexander will discuss and sign his latest World War II history "Shadows in the Jungle."

• Disciples United Community Church is sponsoring "A Theologian Looks at Emerging Christianity: Part Two" at 4:45 p.m. Saturday, May 30. Co-pastor Bruce Epperly will lecture and lead a discussion of Brian McLaren's "A Generous Orthodoxy." DUCC meets in Friends Meetinghouse, 110 Tulane Terrace.