LAST CALL AT COOGAN’S Author Letter + Sweepstakes

Fellow librarian and author of LAST CALL AT COOGAN’S: The Life and Death of a Neighborhood Bar, Jon Michaud, joins us today with not just a sweepstakes, but also a letter to librarians exploring his time spent working in libraries and the way that both libraries and neighborhood bars shape their communities.

Click here to view for your chance to win an advance copy of LAST CALL AT COOGAN’S.

Available for download on Edelweiss know more. LibraryReads votes due by May 1st.

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My Dear Colleagues,

Five and a half years ago I left full time corporate library work in New York City to take a part time job at a public library near my home in New Jersey. I wanted to be closer to my family and I wanted to feel that I was contributing something to my community. I also hoped the change would allow me to spend more time writing. It did. Less than a year after making the switch, I started researching and reporting a nonfiction book about a neighborhood bar named Coogan’s, a place where my wife and I had dined when we were dating. What I never could have anticipated when I began writing my book was how similar those two institutions—the public library and the local saloon—would turn out to be.

As you know, public libraries are adaptable, versatile spaces where all are welcome. Good libraries shape-shift into whatever their patrons need, becoming recital rooms, study halls, gaming nooks, schools for citizenship, hangouts for families, and refuges for the lonely and isolated. In short, a good library is the heart of its community.

Coogan’s performed many of the same functions in its New York City neighborhood, Washington Heights. Opened in 1985, during the worst years of the crack epidemic, it was a haven in a part of the city that lacked fundamental services. The owners, who had been reared in the tradition of Irish hospitality, listened carefully to what their customers needed. Coogan’s became an art gallery, a theater, a venue for poetry readings and musical performances. The bar hosted fundraisers for local nonprofit organizations and staged a 5K race that took back the streets from the drug dealers—at least for a day. But first and foremost, Coogan’s provided a safe place for people from all walks of life to gather. “Once people feel safe, they can make room for joy,” the bar’s owners liked to say. “And once you have joy, anything can happen.”

I hope that some of the stories in my book will resonate with your experiences as librarians. Such community spaces are often undervalued and frequently under threat. I wrote Last Call at Coogan’s to remind readers—and myself—just how much we need places where we can connect and build communities, places like libraries and neighborhood bars.

Warmest regards,
Jon Michaud 

LAST CALL AT COOGAN’S: The Life and Death of a Neighborhood Bar by Jon Michaud; 9781250221780; 6/6/23