Marblehead Peninsula Branch Library

The Ida Rupp Public Library and Ida Rupp Public Library Board of Trustees are pleased to announce that a building has been purchased for the new branch.

The Marblehead Peninsula Branch Library will be located at 710 West Main Street in Marblehead.

James Widmer, President of the Ida Rupp Board of Trustees commented, “This new opportunity for library patrons and residents of the library district is a direct result of the 2014 passage of the 0.8 mil operating levy. The Board is excited about extending and expanding library services to the Marblehead Peninsula. Together with the Main Library and the Erie Islands library branch at Put-in-Bay, Ida Rupp now provides convenient library services to the entire library district.”

The library will likely consist of children, teen, and adult popular collections; a reading area; public computers; and a meeting room. The meeting room will also be used for library story time, book discussions, and other programs.

Construction for inside the library will start spring of 2016. It is hoped that the branch will open in early 2017.

We will be posting updates about a community survey, construction, and other relevant branch news as they happen on our website, social media pages, at Ex Libris, and at Ida Rupp Public Library. To stay up to date, please join our e-newsletter by emailing idarupp@seolibraries.org.

The Ida Rupp Public Library and Ida Rupp Public Library Board of Trustees would like to thank Ex Libris, for their commitment and support of this project.

The Ida Rupp Public Library and Ida Rupp Public Library Board of Trustees would like to thank Mark Mulligan, County Prosecutor and statutory council for the Library, who helped complete the complex commercial real estate transaction.

He noted, “The purchase required a property split approval from the Marblehead Planning Commission. Once approved, leases had to be amended, easements extinguished, and new easements created with parking lot maintenance issues negotiated.” “It has been a long process to reduce all these issues to written documents agreeable to all,” Mulligan related. “And, of course,” Mulligan continued, “all of these special conditions had to be anticipated for inclusion in the purchase contract which was also a lengthy negotiating and drafting process.”

Throughout the process Tim Hagen, Director; James Widmer, President of the Board of Trustees; and the rest of the board remained committed to establishing a first-rate library to serve the Marblehead area.