The Big Piney Library was 48 years old before it had a building of its own. It opened in autumn 1926 in a church. Later it moved to a small building near a grocery store, and after that to the back room of the old bank building that is still Big Piney's Town Hall. Only in 1974 did it move into a building constructed for it.
Today the library at 106 S Fish St. is the one lending space. It offers free study rooms, a community room with a kitchen, a statewide park pass you can check out, and a staff member who will sit down with you and your phone. Any longtime Big Piney resident knows the building. Fewer know how long the library spent living as somebody else's guest, and that history explains a lot about how the place works now.
The library marked its centennial on Saturday, Oct. 3, with its Fall Festival. According to the Pinedale Roundup, the festival brought in more than 50 vendors, carnival games, bounce houses, museum tours, food trucks, and the book sale that no Sublette County Library event goes without. The Roundup reported that the library has hosted the festival for 11 years, pausing only for the COVID-19 pandemic and a recent move, and that it always falls on the same day as Big Piney's Homecoming and Hall of Fame inductions.
Nearly fifty years in other people's rooms
The first library came from a small group of residents who decided in fall 1926 that Big Piney needed one. They worked with Reverend Archibald Best to keep and lend the books from the Community Congregational Church. Oscar Piper built glass doors to protect the books. Mr. Anderson, the school's shop teacher, built the shelves with his students. The collection began with 400 books, and nine went out on the first day.
The first hired librarian was Miss Jesse Bird. The library's own history says a paid position turned out to cost too much, so volunteers took over. That pattern of community labor filling in where money ran short kept the library open through its first three decades.
In 1957, residents set out to revive it. A group from Pinedale set up a bookkeeping system, the records were updated, and new books arrived. The library hired staff again, first June Wassenberg and then Allen Harper.
The next year brought the library's second home and its first formal tie to the county. In 1958 it moved into a small building near Burney and Company's Grocery Store, which got gas heat and lighting. That same year the County Commissioners created the Sublette County Library Board and appointed Reta Carr as librarian. By then the collection held about 2,800 books and 305 registered borrowers, and the library started offering interlibrary loan.
The third move was in 1963, to a larger space at the back of the former bank building, which was serving as Town Hall then and still does. Within four years the collection and the patron count had both doubled. A summer reading program and story hour began, and hours grew longer. Beth Bray was hired as an assistant, and starting in 1969 she served as librarian for 23 years.
| Years | Where the library lived | What changed there |
|---|---|---|
| 1926 to 1950s | Community Congregational Church | 400 books, volunteer staff after the first paid librarian |
| 1958 to 1963 | Small building near Burney and Company's Grocery Store | County library board formed, interlibrary loan began |
| 1963 to 1974 | Back of the former bank building, today's Town Hall | Collection and patrons doubled, story hour and summer reading started |
| 1974 until the Fish Street move | New building across the street at the old Post Office site | First building designed for the library, expanded in 1991 |
| Today | 106 S Fish St. | Current library, renovated and reopened in December 2022 |
1974: a building of its own, built by a familiar name
The library's stay at Town Hall ended in 1974, when a new library went up across the street on the old Post Office site. Kellog and Kellog Architects designed it, and Superior Lumber Company built it. Superior Lumber had also built the Sublette County Library in Pinedale in 1969, so both of the county's libraries came from the same builder.
An addition was finished in 1991, the same year Carrie Anderson became librarian. Under Anderson the library got its first computers, barcodes on its books, and new library cards. Circulation moved to electronic records, the catalog went online, and patrons could request interlibrary loans online.
Debi Morley, the first person to hold the title of Big Piney Library manager, oversaw the planning and construction of the current library on Fish Street. Tawnya Miller became manager in August 2019.
The building's latest chapter sent the library back to the borrowed-room arrangement it started with. A ten-month interior renovation began in 2021, and during it most of the library's books, services, and programs ran out of the Big Piney Recreation Center. The renovated space opened to the public in December 2022.
Now the library is the one lending the room
After decades of depending on space that churches, grocers, and the town provided, the Fish Street library now gives space away. Its study rooms are free to reserve, hold groups of four or six, and include Wi-Fi, outlets, and a smart TV. The Big Piney Community Room seats up to 49 and comes with a kitchen and AV equipment. It is free for public events, and other uses may carry a fee.
You can also borrow things that aren't books. The county system's Library of Things includes state park passes and a park backpack, craft tools like a sewing machine and a Cricut EasyPress, and home tools like a toolkit, a drill, and a stud finder. The list covers the whole system, so ask at the Big Piney desk what is on the shelf there or what can be sent down from Pinedale.
Interlibrary loan, which started here in 1958, is still offered to patrons in good standing. The library notes that return postage usually runs about $5 to $6, and some lending libraries add fees of their own.
Miller described the library's current role to the Pinedale Roundup ahead of the centennial. The paper reported that a technology specialist on staff spends a lot of time in one-on-one sessions helping patrons with their phones and computers, and that the library also handles copying, faxing, scanning, and emailing.
"Obviously the library started with a collection of books. But we offer so much more than that now. ... We're sort of the heart of the community down here."
The winter week at 106 S Fish St.
The branch is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. It is closed Sunday. The current branch calendar lists these regular programs:
- Friday storytime for ages 0 to 5
- S'cool Kids Club, weekly, for elementary-age children
- Beyond the Books, a weekly craft session for sixth grade and up
- Teen Dungeons & Dragons Club, listed on Pinedale Online's county calendar for Oct. 14
- Beginner crochet on select Mondays, with registration required
- Not Your Mother's Book Club on the last Monday of the month
- Hook & Purl, monthly
- Yoga for Kids & Teens on Nov. 6, with separate times for tots, kids, and teens
- Yoga Friday with Rebecca, 11:30 a.m. to noon on dates listed from November through May, running through the 2026 to 2027 school year
The library also travels. On selected Wednesdays, Big Piney staff visit the Southwest Sublette County Pioneers Senior Center in Marbleton with books, magazines, audiobooks, and DVDs. They handle checkouts, holds, new library cards, and help with devices. The system also delivers for free to homebound patrons and says it will try to accommodate people who live outside Pinedale or Big Piney.
One date is still unconfirmed. Pinedale Online's calendar lists a Pop Up Market at the Big Piney Library on Saturday, Oct. 17, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., described as shopping and crafting. The library's own event calendar shows nothing at the branch that day, so call the desk before you plan your Saturday around it.
The church shelves that Mr. Anderson's students built held 400 books. A century later, the library on Fish Street lends drills, park passes, and a 49-seat room with a kitchen to anyone in town with a reason to gather.
Janelle Villalba works with homeowners in Big Piney and Marbleton, the same streets the library has moved around for a hundred years. If you own a home in town and want to know what it would bring today, she's glad to help. Start Building Your Legacy: Get a Free Home Valuation.
