ABOUT THE LIBRARY

Meet Our Sponsors & Partners

The Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library recognizes that without the support and generosity of its sponsors and partners, the following programs and events would not be possible.

Call-a-Story

A 24-hour, seven-days-a-week story line that provides children in Central Indiana access to stories anytime they would like to hear one.

AT&T

Central Library Patent Workstations

Central Library receives frequent use by attorneys and inventors searching PubWest, an extensive database of information on patents issued from 1920 to the present.  In the past, these databases were accessible only through the Library’s general purpose public computers, which offered little privacy and insufficient workspace for patent researchers.  Thanks to a generous gift from the patent law firm of Woodard, Emhardt, Moriarty, McNett & Henry LLP, the Library is now able to offer five dedicated patent research workstations. These computers will allow the Library to offer patent-related programming and better facilities for those wishing to do research in the future.
Woodard, Emhardt, Moriarty, McNett & Henry LLP

East Thirty-Eighth Street Wetland Project

The East Thirty-Eighth Street Branch has a natural wetland on its property. With major support from United Water and other generous donors, the Library enhanced this special area with a boardwalk, landscaping, and interpretive signage. These amenities will enhance the wetland’s capacity for programming designed to promote environmental awareness and lifelong learning.
United Water Suez

Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award

Each year, this award will recognize the literary contributions of three authors with strong ties to Indiana. The award will be presented to one nationally known author, one author who is well known regionally, and one emerging author. Each winner will receive a cash prize, as well as a grant to support their hometown Indiana public library. The program will culminate with a full day of festivities held at Central Library, followed by an Award Dinner/fundraiser benefiting the Library Foundation. Major funding for this program is provided by The Glick Fund, a fund of Central Indiana Community Foundation, with additional support from Barnes & Thornburg and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.


Glick Fund
btlaw.com Wiley.com

Live Homework Help

Access to this service powered by tutor.com provided to library card holders for free. It connects students to tutors in a windows-based chat environment for real-time help.
The Library Fund, a found of the Indianapolis Foundation, a CICF affiliate

iLibrary Online Databases

iLibrary is the starting point for information from reference databases made available for public use by paid subscriptions from the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library and other library funding agents. Links from this site lead to sources purchased by the library community in electronic form which are comparable to the print subscriptions held within our libraries.

The Library Fund, a found of the Indianapolis Foundation, a CICF affiliate INSPIRE

Marian McFadden Memorial Lecture

This yearly lecture was established after the Library Foundation received a gift from the estate of Marian McFadden, Director of Public Libraries from 1945-1956. The lecture typically occurs in the Spring and has been offered free to the public since 1978. It has featured such literary greats as: Saul Bellow, Maurice Sendak, David McCullough, Gary Paulsen, and Nicholas Sparks. The 2010 Lecture will take place on Friday, April 16 at North Central High School, and the speaker is acclaimed author Neil Gaiman. Some of Mr. Gaiman’s best known works include The Graveyard Book (2009 Newbery Award Winner), Coraline, Stardust, The Sandman Series and American Gods.

This year, the Library Foundation is proud to receive additional support from the estates of Jack A. and Edith L. Hunter, whose gifts were made in memory of Edith’s sisters, Elizabeth I. Evans and Gladys Evans Grandy, teachers whose working lives were devoted to the Indianapolis Public Elementary Schools.


Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library Foundation

Digital Library: Museum Artifacts Collection

The Museum Artifacts Collection is comprised of 1,000 artifacts from The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. The artifacts were digitized with a grant from The Library Fund, a fund of The Indianapolis Foundation.
CICF

Ready to Read

Ready to Read is a multi-year Library initiative designed to help children under the age of five develop the early literacy skills needed for a successful start in reading. Important components of Ready to Read include:

  • Expansion of "On the Road to Reading," a service that brings story times and Bunny Bags full of books to preschool children at licensed home daycares in low-to-moderate-income neighborhoods.
  • Enhancement of in-branch story times with the PNC Digital Littles Mobile Lab and incentive-based reading programs, as well as the development of new partnerships with other organizations serving early learners and caregivers.
  • An increase in technology-based learning experiences through the addition of child-friendly computers with reading instruction software and an interactive Web site for young children and their caregivers.
  • Extended staff training and enhanced outcomes-based evaluation of major early childhood literacy programs to continually assess and improve them.

Spanish-Language Computer Training

A gift from KeyBank has enabled the Library to continue to offer Spanish-language computer classes at Central Library and to expand the classes to two additional branches later this year.
KeyBank

Young Hoosier Book Award

Each year, thousands of students throughout the state of Indiana cast their votes for the winners of the Young Hoosier Book Award. This program of the Indiana Library Federation invites K-8th grade students to participate by reading books from lists compiled by teachers, librarians, and other media specialists, and then vote for their favorites. In order to participate, schools must be able to ensure that at least 12 of the 20 books from each category are available to their students. Since many schools have limited budgets that prevent them from providing the books, the Library purchases multiple copies of each book to meet the needs of the 6,800 students in Indianapolis who participate in the program. Support for this program is provided by The Library Fund, a fund of The Indianapolis Foundation.
The Library Fund