Dreaming Big Library Dreams

I'm afraid you'll have to grant me a little grace and forgive my nostalgia in this week's post.  As you know from my last post, I've just returned from a week spent with much-cherished family in the history-abundant St. Simon's Island.  While I was there, we explored their historical locations like Fort Frederica and Christ Church cemetery.  The result of this was learning about a local author Eugenia Price that I mentioned last week.  And now I have devoured her first book in her St. Simons Island historical fiction trilogy titled Lighthouse.  If you haven't read it, I highly recommend you do.  I have been unable to put it down. 

Around 1961, Eugenia Price decided to visit the island of St. Simons with another author friend of hers.  While there, she too began to explore the history of the island and fell in love with the rich history of the island.  While roaming the Christ Church cemetery, she grew curious about the names and more importantly the intoxicating stories behind the names and dates carefully chiseled into the cold slab stones.

EXCITING NEWS before I go on!!  I'm getting ready to launch some free video lessons on beginning your Library design in the next few weeks.  I'll also be announcing the dates for my Fall Session of Off the Shelf Library Design Academy.  If you want don't want to miss those free lessons, click on the link HERE and get connected today!  I hope to see you there.

She eventually came across the family of James Gould and threw herself into the timely research of James and his descendants.  Hours upon hours and days upon days spent in the local Library pouring through death notices, birth records and everything in between to begin weaving a beautiful tale.  She actually wrote the trilogy from end to beginning.  She said the reason for writing it this way was because that's how she discovered the history.  So book 1 is actually the last one she penned.  

Many lessons can be gleaned from Lighthouse, but the one that I want to bring to you this week is the precious value that comes in the process of waiting.  I promise I'll tie this all back in to your Library design before I'm finished, but for now, I want you to spend a little time with me in the end of the 18th century and the beginnings of the 19th century with the Gould family.

James Gould was a very determined and hard working member of a farming family in Granville, Massachusetts.  He joined Shay's Rebellion and managed to avoid imprisonment for his part in the fight but in doing so returned home to find his war-injured father had died and he was now the head of the house.  He worked the farm and chopped wood for the fires to keep them all warm.  He sold the goods produced on their land and did whatever it took to keep his family taken care of and provided for.  

But James was a dreamer.  He had hopes and aspirations to build a Lighthouse.  And not just any lighthouse, but one that would work better than all the others (though there weren't many just yet) that had been constructed to date.

He worked on plans for his dream lighthouse and carried them with him everywhere he went, constantly improving on them along the way.  But little to his knowledge, this dream was not to take place for nearly two decades.  He had a passion for building and was eventually given the opportunity to travel to Bangor Massachusetts where he began overseeing a lumber mill for Captain James Budge which gave him the tools and time he needed to begin constructing homes for local prominent families.  He drew up detailed plans and ordered the much-needed lumber and became a builder with great care and detail to his homes.  

The story goes on to tell of his first love, Jessie that he met while in Bangor and how once he could afford to move his family to his new home, it was his younger brother who came in and won the heart of his beloved due to his carefree personality while James was much too serious for her.  The heartbreak was more than he could bear.  So he decided to make his move South where he had often dreamed of going.  Winters were especially hard up North and he longed for the warmth and ease of Southern summers.  

So he landed in St. Simons Island where he struck up a life-long friendship with Mr. John Couper.  Here he began working for the government to fell trees, specifically live oaks, to begin the commission of building the first U.S. Naval ships.  This was granted by President George Washington and James took his job very seriously.  He learned the lay of the land and knew a great deal about lumber, so he was perfect for the job.  

Once his commission had ended, he bided his time by building more homes and well-crafted furniture.  As time progressed, and with his dream for building a lighthouse resting firmly in his mind, he was presented with an offer he felt he couldn't refuse.  He was presented with the opportunity to lease a lumber milling property in Eastern Florida, which was then owned by Spain.  It was rough country and he was firmly warned of the troubles he would undoubtedly encounter there.  

The Creek Indians were partial to the Spanish that had inhabited those lands and were therefore not pleased with anyone from Georgia.  So precautions had to be taken and "Don Juan McQueen" had to request special permissions from the Creek Indians to keep James and his hired hands safe from death and destruction.

He achieved great success here and remained head of the mill for years on end without sustaining any rewarding relationships in the meantime.  On occasion he travelled to Savannah or St. Simons Island to conduct banking business or to visit with the Couper family.  But mostly he sent money to his remaining family up North and saved until he required considerable wealth.

Over time, he began to realize his loneliness.  And on an impulse after hearing a harrowing tale of a single young lady from Savannah from an old sailor he met on a nearby harbor, he decided instantly he wanted to marry her.  He visited her hometown of Savannah, officially courted her and proposed marriage.  Interesting trivia - his bride was Jane Harris who was directly related to the then-mayor of Savannah, Georgia.  He was Charles Harris who was British-born and practiced as an attorney in the states.

Against his better judgment, he eventually brought Janie to live with him in the dangerous Eastern Florida saw mill where they had one son and lived a few contented years in a comfortable home he built for them.  However, eventually on one fateful night, the Creek Indians decided they were finished honoring their agreement to stay away from the mill and they attacked a local family that lived nearby.  So James and his family gathered everything they had as quickly as possible and made their way by boat to St. Mary's Harbor for safety.

Once there they eventually made their way to Savannah where her family remained.  It was there that James' dream of building his lighthouse finally begin to take shape.  He discovered a newspaper with a request for building proposals for the new lighthouse to be built by the federal government on the shores of St. Simons Island.  He knew this was finally his moment.

So he made his proposal and with the loving support of his wife Janie as well as from his old friend John Couper, he received the commission and built that lighthouse.  He used brick and tabby from the ruins of the homes of Fort Frederica.  It was a phenomenal lighthouse; superior to all others that had been constructed before it.  His dream was finally his reality.  But the waiting was also his reality.  The waiting was where he grew and became the builder he always knew he could be.

It seems like we're always waiting on something when building.  You wait for permits.  You wait for funding.  These days you wait for products and ever-changing lead times.  But you also wait for the pieces to come together, for the vision to finally take shape.  You dream up ideas and visit other Libraries to see what's working and what isn't.  Creating the perfect space for your community becomes a bit of an obsession and you want to see it completed.  It can create an impatience in you and your staff that you may not have expected.  The design process can be slow and tedious.

But what I want to tell you, from someone who has experienced the design process countless times, is to truly embrace it.  Enjoy it and learn everything you can from it.  Know that when it's all behind you, the work you're putting into it will all be worth it.  There will be hiccups and setbacks. That goes without saying on every single project.  But remember that in all the hard work of waiting, this is when the dreaming happens.  And the dreaming is where you grow.  The dreaming is how you learn the true potential of your future Library.  

One of my favorite things to do in my line of work is to dream with my clients.  I hope you'll open up your Library world and let me dream with you too.  Tell me your vision for your Library.  I want to know what your hopes and plans are.  Join me on my DIY Library Design group on Facebook below and share your thoughts.  Ask me any questions you may have, comment on my recent email topic and learn all about my upcoming design courses as well. 

Join the Conversations Today - DIY Library Design Facebook Group

 Have a wonderful week and KEEP DREAMING!!