Leesville Leader, November 22, 1956 Mrs. Nelva Cryer of Route 2, Leesville, was the first registered borrower at the Leesville Branch of the newly opened Vernon Parish Library Demonstration, while little Miss Rose Fay Pressley, second grader at the Evans School, holds that honor at the Bookmobile Branch Margie Lynch, Librarian, announced, today. Joseph H. Walker and Miss Carney Jean Sellers were close second and third registrations in Leesville, where a total of 43 adults and 29 children were registered by 5:30 p.m. when the branch closed for the day. A total of 131 books were circulated from the Bookmobile with adults preferring the nonfiction titles. Among the children Davy Crokett is still “king of the wild frontier” and three titles about him were loaned the first day. Most popular books were those about cowboys and horses with those about animals coming next. Adults borrowed every kind from Billy Graham’s, “Secret of Happiness” to Schoor’s, “Jack Dempsey Story.” Special requests were made for a book on making draperies, a Bible dictionary, and material on marine boilers. Several books on business and office practice were checked out by borrowers in the Leesville Branch: Gregg’s, “Applied Secretarial Practice”; Kelly’s, “How To Organize and Operate A Small Business”; and Butterfield’s, “Goodwill Letters That Build Business”: But the most popular non-fiction were the gardening and interior decorating books. Mysteries, westerns, historical novels, and “just good stories” were among the fiction titles chosen. True books of science and science-fiction vied with horse stories and fairy tales for popularity among the younger set in Leesville. Animal stories and mysteries capture many eyes. Special requests were taken for books on shorthand, on cancer, on drying flowers, and several for particular titles, which will be borrowed for local use from the Louisiana State Library. This is a regular service of the parish library.
