Friends of the Library to hold lecture
Cache Valley has a rich and unique history with the community this week with its annual fall lecture.
Kenneth Godfrey, a renowned author and historian, will give a lecture titled “An Identity All Its Own: 25 Pivotal Events That Changed Cache Valley’s History.” He will highlight important events in Cache Valley’s past.
His lecture comes from a recently published book called “A History of Cache County: Towns, Families, and Commerce and Organizations.” The book includes histories of each town in the valley, prominent businesses and more than 200 family histories. Godfrey wrote the preface of the book, the histories of each town and the sections, “Cache Valley before the Mormons” and “The Mormons Come to Cache Valley.”
“We were looking for an author who would have a regional appeal,” said Blythe Ahlstrom, chairman of the Friends of the Merrill-Cazier Library, noting Godfrey’s book has that appeal.
At the lecture, Godfrey will talk about the Native Americans who inhabited the valley before the LDS Church members came here, and what happened once they arrived.
“A lot of people don’t realize that it was not an empty valley when they got here,” he said.
Godfrey will tell about the coming of sports to the valley, and tell the story of six Idaho basketball players called the Weston Wonders, who won all of their games and even went on to beat a team in Chicago.
He will also talk about the changes brought by the arrival of the railroad and the radio, the coming of politics to the valley and prominent women in Cache Valley who made a difference.
And of course, he couldn’t leave out the history of Utah State University.
Godfrey, who has written or contributed to 32 books and has written more than 200 scholarly articles, has a strong connection to the area. He grew up in Cache Valley and received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in history and political science from USU. He received his doctorate in history of religion from Brigham Young University.
He was a teacher and administrator for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for 37 years, including serving as the director of the Logan LDS Institute.
For six years, he wrote a column in the religion section of The Herald Journal, and contributed several articles to the Cache Citizen, a publication that is not longer in circulation.
He has served as president of the Mormon History Association and is currently on the board of directors for the Leonard J. Arrington Foundation, as well as the Friends of the Merrill-Cazier Library.
His wife, Audrey, is also a historian and they have written several books together. Currently, they are working on a history of the LDS Church Education System. The project came as an official mission call from the LDS Church and will last for two years.
“We’re the only members of the mission,” he said. “My father wondered if were going to have a reunion,” he said, noting he expects to complete the book sometime in 2008.
Godfrey is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Friends of The Merrill-Cazier Library, the group who is sponsoring the lecture. The Friends is an organization that provides support and contributions to the library.
“In essence, our reason for being is to try to spotlight the library and its collections,”
Godfrey said.
There are around 500 members of the Friends group; made up of anyone who makes a donation of more than $25 to the library. Most of these donors are alumni, and these group members are located all over the country. There are 12 members on the Board of Directors and most of them are located in the area of Cache Valley. Because the members are spread out across the country, the group often goes unnoticed.
“In a sense, it’s an invisible organization,” said Ahlstrom.
The Friends most often uses its funds to buy books and materials for the library, said Ahlstrom. He doesn’t believe that the library has enough materials to meet the standards of a research library, and they want to change that.
“We’re primarily concerned with adding to the collection,” he said. Most recently, they helped the library obtain and put together a New York Times index.
The group recently had a special fundraiser to raise $20,000 to create a new book lounge on the second floor. It will be called, The Friends of the Merrill-Cazier Library Reading Lounge and will include plaques with all the names of the donors on them.
Along with all of these projects, the Friends are there to support and provide fresh ideas for the library. Randy Williams, the folklore curator in Special Collections and former chairman said that the Friends are there to make the library known to everyone. She believes they allow people “to have a sense of ownership and community in the library.”
They also support and promote the activities that the library puts on for students and community, as well as sponsoring their own activities. They do two lectures a year featuring authors who talk about their own books, of which Godfrey’s is the first.
The lecture will be held on Thursday, Sept. 28, at 7 p.m. in Room 101 of the Merrill-Cazier Library. It is free and open to anyone who would like to attend.
-kathrynkemp@cc.usu.edu