Monday, DECEMBER 8, 2025 |
Photo – Interim Library Director Jenita Calton – by Matt Copeland Bigfoot99
Despite ongoing budget challenges, the library system celebrated its centennial anniversary in Medicine Bow. December 1st, 2025, marked the 100th anniversary of the Carbon County Library System. What began as a small reading room in a Rawlins basement has expanded into seven branches serving nearly every community in the county.
Thanks to funding from the Carbon County Library Foundation, every branch is hosting a centennial event, complete with cake and a plaque dedication. On Thursday, the Medicine Bow Library hosted its celebration.
Interim Library Director Jenita Calton, speaking to a handful of attendees, presented a history of Carbon County, Wyoming.
Interim Library Director Calton said that in 1911, Wyoming’s six original counties were redrawn into the 23 that exist today. More than a decade later, six Rawlins women joined forces to lay the groundwork for the first public library in Carbon County.
Three months later, the women opened a free reading room in the basement of the Osborn Building in Rawlins. As the collection grew, the books were moved into the Furguson Building.
At the time, the Board of Carbon County Commissioners pledged to fund a public library once a permanent location was found to house the collection. Interim Director Calton said a century ago, residents had to fight to secure a library, a spirit that lives on in Carbon County today.
An arrangement between the Rawlins Public Library, as it was known at the time, and the County Commissioners was reached on December 1st, 1925, and the Carbon County Public Library was born. The following year, the collection was moved into the newly constructed high school before eventually finding its permanent home in the Carbon Building.
Calton said 100 years later, the Carbon County Library System is the largest in the state.
Calton also shared trivia about the history of the Carbon County Library System, noting that a new Chevrolet was raffled off in 1923 during a snowstorm to help fund the library, and that the original Elk Mountain Library, founded in 1976, was located in an old jailhouse. Additionally, the interim library director recalled a local story about a woman who once brought a gun into the library after finding her husband with his mistress in the Westerns section.
The Carbon County Library Foundation began in 1979 to protect the system’s assets. A year later, Rawlins Job’s Daughters members carried the library’s books from the Courthouse to the Carbon Building. In 1995, Director Bess Sheller earned the Wyoming Library Association’s Librarian of the Year award.
The Medicine Bow branch became part of the Carbon County Library System in 1958. Calton said the existence of the library system depends on people using and supporting its services.
Recent property tax relief measures have slashed the amount of funding local governments received this fiscal year. According to numbers provided by the Board of Carbon County Commissioners, the Library System requested $300,000 from the county. However, due to the decreased property tax revenue, the county was only able to provide $164,000.
The budget deficit has led the Carbon County Public Library Board to reduce operating hours at all seven branches and propose closing the Hanna and Medicine Bow libraries. Speaking at Thursday’s Medicine Bow Library centennial celebration, Interim Director Calton said the board has received more than $28,000 in donations to keep those branches open.
Even with the donations, the Medicine Bow Library is not off the chopping block. Bigfoot99 spoke to Anna Weaver, a mother of three who takes her family to the library at least once a week. Weaver said closing the branch would eliminate one of the last remaining sources of family entertainment in town.
Bigfoot99 also spoke with Medicine Bow Elementary teacher Lauren Culligan about the role the local library plays in her routine. In addition to borrowing books and movies, Culligan said she brings her kindergarten and 1st grade classes to the weekly craft activities offered at the branch.
Culligan said shutting down the Medicine Bow Library would take away a favorite activity for her students.
The Carbon County Library Board has stated that the Hanna and Medicine Bow branches are funded through January 1st. After that, their future is uncertain.
The main library branch in Rawlins marked its centennial Friday with a book signing by Longmire author Craig Johnson and a 1920s costume contest. Elk Mountain, Little Snake River Valley, Saratoga, and Hanna will host their own celebrations this week. For details on each event, visit carbonlibraries.org.
