A few Springfield-Greene County Library branches offer an unusual item for checkout, and it’s proven to be very highly sought after.
About a year ago, a new program was launched at four Springfield-Greene County Library branches. The district, in partnership with the Springfield Astronomical Society, began offering six telescope to check out that are made specifically for library circulation.
"It does not require a tripod, so it has its own little built-in stand that acts as a tripod," said Katy Hopkins, planning and development librarian with Springfield-Greene County Libraries. "It's portable. It's lightweight. It's pretty tough."
When Hopkins was a child, her grandmother bought her a telescope and taught her about constellations. So when she was approached by the Springfield Astronomical Society, she was immediately interested. She spent about a year working to develop the program and received a grant from Bass Pro Shops to purchase six telescopes. The grant required an educational component related to conservation, so the library added information about the impacts of light pollution on the night sky and on local ecosystems in user manuals that go out with the telescopes.
The telescopes are available on a first-come, first-served basis and have proven to be very popular.
"The good problem we have is that they're gone all the time," said Hopkins, "and we immediately knew — I mean, we immediately knew within weeks that we were going to need more telescopes."
Unfortunately, four days after they launched the telescope program, the company that produced them went out of business overnight. But another company has planning to begin producing more this fall. Hopkins wants to purchase more, but they’re looking for funding.
According to Hopkins, the program is ideal for people who are interested in astronomy but don’t want to invest a lot of money upfront "but can pick up one of these telescopes, learn about how to use it, learn a little bit about light pollution and the impact that that has on the night sky and our ecosystems and just have that experience that they may not be able to have otherwise."
The cost per telescope, Hopkins said, is about $400. She said anyone who would like to donate money to help the library purchase more may reach out to her at 417-616-0554.
