There is a new face at the Blanco Library as of June 2. Lynne Loeffler has been hired as the Administrative Assistant. The board plans for her to become Director of Library Services when the current director, Jan Redmond, retires. A native of Oklahoma City, Lynne headed east at the age of 17 to attend college at Duke University. Further schooling included law school at SMU, a degree in nursing from El Centro College of Nursing in Dallas, and a degree in midwifery from the University of Texas-Southwestern School of Nurse-Midwifery.

Lynne and her husband, local architect Jay West, moved to Blanco in 1996. They have two daughters—Kelly, a photographer for the Austin American-Statesman; and Kate, an office manager and massage therapist, who plans to be married in November and move to London with her new husband. Lynne credits daughter Kate with her family’s first Blanco Library volunteering, throughout her high school years. After Kate went off to college, Lynne took her place.

Lynne’s love of books goes way back. At the age of four, her mother taught her to read from McGuffey’s First Eclectic Reader. Lynne confesses that as a child she would read illicitly under the covers after everyone else in the house was in bed. Currently her favorite recreational reading includes mysteries, especially those by San Marcos author Susan Wittig Albert and the early mysteries of Patricia Cornwell. She also does a great deal of research online and is grateful for the internet, especially in an area like Blanco.

Lynne, who joins Director Jan Redmond, Children’s Librarian Christine Bailey and Assistant Librarian Dorothy Trimble on the library staff, says that the community is, in her words, “very fortunate to have this library.” She feels that the role of libraries is changing, playing a bigger and bigger role in the lives of people throughout the life span. She is “looking forward to building on the good work that’s been done by so many people and implementing the vision the board has for the future of the library, which is exciting and ambitious.