In Part of Our Lives : a people's history of  the American public library author Wayne Wiegand traces the history of the public library

Assignments, essays and exams on the horizon -- enough to make you wonder WHAT is sucking the life out of the students, is there some evil out there beyond the usual evils of school work? 

Celebrate public libraries with great children's books!  Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen, illustrated by Kevin Hawkes tells the story of a librarian who learns to accept a storytime lovin' lion in the library -- and that while there are rules in the library,  sometimes there are good reasons to break the rules.