The Weekly AdirondackFamily members of Lauriene “Sparky” Ehrensbeck recently donated two beautiful bookcases to the Old Forge Library in her memory, one for the adult fiction collection and one for large type books.
Sparky, who passed away in September 2010, was an avid reader and a lifelong patron of the library.
“She loved to read and she would read anything—from the dictionary to historic,” said her daughter, Ingrid Ehrensbeck Hanley.
“Mom was happiest if she was sitting in the recliner that all of us kids bought for her, reading one of her many books.”
Ingrid said when her mom started reading large type books, she began sending them to her and her sister Eva.
“We were both working all day and she thought that the large print books would not be as much strain on our eyes, but the cutest thing she did was when she loaned out a book—especially if it was one she wanted back so she could read it again—she would put her address label on the back of it. That was her mark. If it had an address label, you knew it was good enough for a second read,” Ingrid said.
“Reading was truly her passion,” said Ingrid, “and a lot of people don’t know that it was her dream to teach illiterate adults to read. She always said that if she had not gone into nursing, her second career choice would have been to teach illiterate adults.”
Sparky’s husband Jim agreed.
“She lived for reading. If there was anything on the ground, she’d pick it up and read it. I don’t know anybody that read more things than she did,” Jim said.
Ingrid said that seeing her mother’s name engraved on the Memorial Plaques on the book cases was very moving and brought tears to her eyes.
“It made me cry because I know the passion she had in her heart for the written word,” she said.
