OLA Celebrates the Oklahoma Centennial

The ladies of said club had the intentions of forming a public
library if and when they could provide a place to house it. The club held
studies in Latin, held pie suppers and many other fund raising events in
order to provide the monies needed.
In 1902 Judge Frank Warren who later became a Senator, offered to provide
two rooms above his offices downtown for the purpose of providing a space
for the much needed Library. A former resident of Oklahoma began the book collection by giving 100 books of his own collection to the ladies.
The library soon outgrew the two rooms and a proposal went before Mayor
Davis to build a new library in 1934. The land for the new library would
be located at 9th and Oak Streets. The land donated by Judge and Mrs.
Frank Warren which at first was a park and on which the city water tower
stood. A new water tower was built and the old one donated to Atoka. The
WPA began constructing the new library from native stones removed from the
old city water works. The library was in operation by August 27, 1934. The little library had grown to over 1000 books in its collection. On
June 18, 1929 Mayor Fred Treadwell and the city Council accepted the
project from the Association creating a Public Library in a perment
location. A resolution was passed and approved for a one mill levy for
the library, which was provided by a Tax fund of $2,800 for it's first
year. Mayor Treadwell appointed as members of the Library Board, Chas. L.
Orr, Lanson D. Mitchell, H. W. Bass, Binas Hostettler, Mrs. Frank L.
Warren, and Mrs. Marie Hillis. The First Librarian of Holdenville was
Miss Hardwick. At this time the library was housed at the city hall.
Librarians serving the library are as follows, Miss Hardwick, Mrs. Paul
Srudevent, Miss Florencce Shan Culver, Mrs. Lavon Bennett, Mrs. Ruth
Deshields, Ms. Jeanette Slaughter for six months, Ms. Debbie Thionnett for
six months, and lastly Mrs. Fran Cook for 25 years.
In 1989 with the help of Oklahoma Department of Libraries, the citizens of
Holdenville, and T. Boone Pickens, a native son, the realization of a new
addition to the library was soon realized. The new name of the library
became the Grace M. Pickens Public Library in honor of T. Boone Pickens
mother. Mr. Pickens contributed $62,000.00 to the project and also
contributed several times in lesser amounts to the library. A trust for
20 years by Mr. Pickens was established and the interest helps provide
children's books until the 20 years are up and then the $20,000.00 will go
to a new roof and carpet of the existing library.
After the construction the Library Director, Fran Cook saw the need to
renew the interior, computerize it and see that the old out of date
material was replaced. With writing of many grants on a borrowed
computer. To date over one Million dollars of grants have been won and
put into the construction of sidewalks, drives, ramps, computers, books,
handicapped facilities, and various other needed areas. Our patrons can
now access the World Wide Web via a grant given by the Bill Gates
Foundation and the dreams of the Library Director have been realized one
by one with the final step that she had set with distance learning from
the library computers. A goal she set for herself when she began her
journey as Director of the Grace M. Pickens Public Library was to leave a
permanent footprint in Holdenville that the generations to come.
Top