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Remembering Katrina: Last of the ALA posts

The American Library Association show attracts a number of high profile, V.I.P speakers. That’s typical for the show, but what was different this year were the ongoing themes. Each speaker had to weigh in on their perspective being in New Orleans after Katrina. Two really stick out for me – Laura Bush and CNN’s Anderson Cooper.

The first lady had once been a school librarian herself, thus at the ALA show she was in some respects back on home turf. Because of her librarian background, Bush had a special place in her heart for ALA’s efforts to help Gulf Coast libraries rebuild. She gave a moving speech, and then a video presentation, full of stories from librarians in the affected regions against the backdrop of their devistated and molding collections of books.
The first lady told one story relayed to her by an elementry school librarian from Mississippi. This particular librarian was always impressing upon the children the need to take care of their library books. She must have done a good job because as their families were fleeing the storm, a number of the children insisted on bringing their library books along. These children carried their library books through hurricane shelters and temporary housing until finally, they returned home. As the school opened, it’s library was completely gutted. But here came the children to return their books, worried that by now the fines must be enormous. Today those few books are the only ones the school has in it’s library.

As the First Lady told this story, I couldn’t help but think what my mom would have said had I insisted on evacuating with my library books! The shelves would have been bare!

CNN’s Anderson Cooper was another big draw speaker. Cooper covered the aftermath of the storm. He walked through the stranded crowd at the convention center as the pictures of thirsty and hot people begging to be rescued came across our TV sets. Naturally, he was full of his own tales about the city and the storm. He talked about interviewing a man who’d brought his grandmother through the storm to the convention center, only to have her die once they arrived. The man was forced to leave her body parked in a wheelchair outside of the center. "She survived the storm, but she didn’t survive this convention center," he told the crowd.

Twice during his speech Anderson choaked up and had to stop momentarily to regain his composure. Finally, he stopped to apologise to the crowd. "I haven’t been back in this building since right after the storm," he explained, "It’s hard to see it looking so new and polished. I’m afraid that people will forget what happened here, and we can never forget."

I don’t think Anderson has to worry. I doubt there was a person in attendance who hadn’t walked up and down the newly carpeted corridors and tried to picture what it must have been like before. I felt a little bad for the city of New Orleans during Anderson’s talk. He’s right. We can’t forget. But time moves on. New Orleans has been through a lot in the last 10 months. They’ve worked hard to rebuild their city. They worked hard to host this show. The new walls and carpet aren’t simply a wallpapering of the past – they’re a sign of the resilliance of a city to overcome incredible odds and rise again.

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