“A Behind the Scenes Look at the Hoover Library Renovation,” July 21

Thursday, July 21, 6 p.m.

Presented by the Davenport Public Library

With most presentations in the Davenport Public Library's 3rd Thursday at Hoover's Presidential Library & Museum series have focused on people, the virtual July 21 event will instead focus on a specific place, with participants invited to explore the possibilities that lie ahead in A Behind the Scenes Look at the Hoover Library Renovation.

The Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum is the presidential library and burial place of Herbert Clark Hoover, the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933. Located on the grounds of the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site in West Branch, Iowa, the library is one of 13 presidential libraries run by the National Archives and Records Administration. In 1954, a group of Hoover's friends incorporated the Herbert Hoover Birthplace Foundation to raise money for the preservation of his birthplace and the area around it, and to plan for improvements to the site. One of their ideas was to build a small museum, and with Hoover's approval, work began in the late 1950s. The architectural firm of Eggers and Higgins of New York drew the plans for the original building, a modest limestone structure of just over 4,000 square feet. While the museum at West Branch was still under construction, Hoover decided to expand it and to make it his Presidential Library, and it was officially dedicated and opened to the public on August 10, 1962, Hoover's 88th birthday.

The original Library and Museum building was expanded several times, with major additions being completed in 1964, 1971, 1974 and 1992. In that latter year, former President Ronald Reagan rededicated the Library and Museum, with the rededication the result of a renovation project that expanded the library to 47,169 square feet. Holding almost 300 collections, the Hoover's library is an important center for the study of conservative thought, agricultural economics, famine relief, commercial aviation, political journalism, government efficiency and reorganization, isolationism, and U.S. foreign policy. In addition to the papers of Herbert Hoover, the manuscript holdings include those of Lewis Strauss, Gerald P. Nye, Felix Morley, Clark Mollenhoff, Robert E. Wood, Westbrook Pegler, and Laura Ingalls Wilder, among others. The Library and Museum is located within the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site, which contains Hoover's birthplace, a reconstruction of Hoover's father's blacksmith shop, a one-room schoolhouse, a Quaker meeting house, and – on a hill overlooking the Library and Museum and Historic Site – the graves of Herbert and Lou Henry Hoover.

In addition to Hoover Presidential Foundation president & CEO Jerry Fleagle, the virtual A Behind the Scenes Look at the Hoover Library Renovation program will be o-presented by speaker Matt Solari, the vice president and creative director for BRC Imagination Arts in Burbank, California. The company is renowned for creating special exhibits that excite, entertain, and educate, and was particularly acclaimed for the work done on the Lincoln Presidential Museum in Springfield, Illinois.
A Behind the Scenes Look at the Hoover Library Renovation will be presented on July 21 at 6 p.m., participation in the virtual program is free, and more information is available by calling (563)326-7832 and visiting DavenportLibrary.com.