I was a good customer of the Orange Public Library. Usually the first thing I’d do when I arrived was head over to the reference room and take Gray’s Anatomy off the shelf, then find a seat where no one could see what I was studying. It was the already ancient 1905 edition of Gray’s, all black-and-white hand-drawn, scrupulous and scary illustrations of the various parts of the human anatomy, especially the lady parts. It was a well-worn, thick book, and if you set it down on its spine, it would fall open automatically to the V’s.

The non-fiction, or what I thought of as the Dewey Decimal part of the library, was at the back of the building, spread over  three levels connected by metal stairs. The floors between levels were of heavy, translucent glass and as much as you might strain and imagine, you couldn’t see anything of the people walking on the level directly above your head except the bottom of their shoes.

The library had a collection of classical music on 33-and-a-third LP albums; symphonies and operas.  German/English side-by-side opera librettos were available, so I could sing along in my living room until someone came home. My mother had no interest in opera of any flavor, but on Saturday afternoons we’d listen to the Philharmonic radio broadcast on NBC together.

There seemed no limit to the information available in the library. Here I sought out the recipe for gunpowder, and while browsing randomly stumbled upon a book about witchcraft. When I took the book home, I found that one page contained about 20 hexagrams that could Make Things Happen. One of them, if stared at long enough, would turn the starer into a werewolf. That didn’t seem like such a great idea for anyone, so I averted my eyes and tore out the page. I balled it up and threw it into a sewer next day on my way to school. Just a small public service.

After I got interested in building models I stole a thin volume called “How to Make a Ship in a Bottle”. That might be the first thing I ever stole. When my brother saw me reading it, he said “How to take a shit in a bottle” and laughed, and I got mad. I never did make a ship in a bottle, it looked pretty complicated.

 

Stickler Memorial Library, Orange, NJ, early 1900s. It’s still there, kids