Hi!  This is Rachel Malay, director at the Port Library in Beloit.  

Story Port starts just one week from Monday. Story Port is the library’s after school reading and activity time for kids ages 5 through 5th grade on Monday afternoons from 3:14 to 4:15 pm. Call or stop by to sign your kids up. Sign ups also continue throughout the fall.  

Also, the Port Library is closed today for Labor Day. We’ll reopen at 10:00 am on Tuesday.

Arlington is a name known to almost every American as the national cemetery. But before it was populated with respectful memorials, monuments, and made a national park it was the family estate to the wife of Civil War general Robert E. Lee and known as the beautiful Acropolis of the United States. The story of how Arlington became the national cemetery is intimately and thoroughly recounted through first-hand quotes and photographs in the large print book, Mrs. Lee’s Rose Garden by Carlo DeVito. 

At the onset of the Civil War, Robert E. Lee made the decision to decline the position of general of the Union Army, but did accept the position in the Confederate Army. Fighting occurred near enough to Arlington that the Lee family vacated their home, but after the war Mrs. Lee was very reluctant to return home. 

Montgomery C. Meigs, a personal friend of Robert E. Lee, disagreed with Lee’s acceptance into the Confederate ranks and when Meigs’ son died, he had further reason to express his grief at the whole situation. Meigs began the authorization of burials in a new section of the national cemetery at the property line of Robert E. Lee’s home, well within view of the home. Soon the burials took over most of the property, and the nation embraced the idea of a national cemetery on the grounds of the highest ranking Confederate General’s estate. 

You can get the book reviewed here and more great titles to watch, read, listen to, or play with at the Port Library at 1718 N. Hersey in Beloit. This is director Rachel Malay, saying “Thanks for checking us out!”