History
The DeWitt Library was established in 1934 by Mrs.
P. J. (Mildred) Carris when she called the members of
the now defunct DeWitt Civic Club together and asked
if they would donate books they could spare, both juvenile
and adult, so that she could catalog them and form them
into a library.
Mrs. Carris, her husband, and two daughters had come
to DeWitt from Detroit, where she taught in the secondary
schools. Mr. Carris, a veteran of World War One, was
a pharmacist and had purchased the Brooks Drug Store
in DeWitt and moved his family there.
The first home of the library was a back room in the
old post office building in the one hundred block of
West Main Street. Mrs. Carris worked without pay, building
a fire in a wood stove, doing dusting and other janitorial
work along with library work. The Civic Club took the
library as a project and earned money for new books
and shelving.
The library was incorporated as a non-profit on May
3, 1946. In March of 1962, the DeWitt City Council adopted
a resolution to establish and support the DeWitt District
Library - a resolution also adopted by DeWitt Township
on June 3, 1963. A letter dated June 7, 1963, certified
DPL by the Michigan State Library as "... a legally
established district public library eligible to participate
in the penal fine distribution in 1963."
The library had been housed in the upstairs of the
old fire barn in the one hundred block of South Bridge
Street and moved to the Memorial Building at 206 West
Washington Street in 1949. Mr. & Mrs. William Rogerson
had given the land for a library but agreed to a community
building, as long as it housed a library.
Librarians besides Mrs. Carris have been: Gladys Walker,
Dorothy Miller, Mamie Archer, and Rhoda Pierson. Faye
Hanson held the position from 1958-1984, Judy Gerred
from 1984 -1998, Michael Lamb from 1999-2003, Rene Prado
from 2004-2008, and Jennifer Balcom from 2009 to current.
The library changed its name to the Faye Hanson Public
Library in 1982. The name reverted back
to the DeWitt Public Library in the mid-1990's.
A branch was opened at the old Valley Farms School
at 4700 Brook Road, Lansing, in 1981 and closed May
1, 1988.
In 1998 the library moved to 13101 Schavey Road.
On August 9, 2005, the portions of Watertown Township
in the DeWitt, St. Johns, and Lansing school districts
joined the DeWitt Public Library district.
A Community Center Satellite was opened in September
2007 to better serve residents in the southern part
of the library district.
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