As the new and improved Wenatchee Valley Museum & Cultural Center (in Wenatchee, Washington) takes shape, the genealogy library inside the building’s Annex is in search of its next home.
Run by a group of volunteers from the Wenatchee Area Genealogical Society, or WAGS, they lend their expertise to help people research family history or genealogy. The group recently put out an urgent call on social media for help finding a new space.
“They are going through a huge construction project,” WAGS Board Vice President Kari Strain said about the museum. “So we have been asked to find a new location.”
Inside the Annex, the library fills 1,400 square feet with bookshelves full of local history.
“We do get people outside the area who send us notes and want to know, ‘When did my parents live here? What was their address? I know they were here in 1933,’ and we look them up in the directory and we can find their addresses,” WAGS librarian Diane Gundersen said. “Sometimes we find the name of the orchard they owned or something like that and then that gives that person another avenue to research.”
The library holds items like Wenatchee World and Wenatchee Daily World obituaries dating back to the 1890s and city directories from as early as the 1930s. There are also school yearbooks, phone books and materials from other counties and countries — all for people to use to track down family history.
“The dream is to maintain similar service, but recognizing we may have limited options and we’ll have to be flexible at what is available,” Strain said.
The genealogy library has been in the Annex since 1979. Along with the research materials for people to use when tracking down family history, WAGS offers monthly programs for members and nonmembers. During the move, the events will be a partnership between WAGS and the Wenatchee Public Library, where the group can use a conference room to continue hosting programs, presentations and workshops.
“That’s one piece of the puzzle taken off, but we would love to keep a public access space so we could keep the library open,” Strain said. “And digitizing is another huge piece of the work that we do, and so we need workspace for volunteers to come in and archive those records.”
Strain said it’s not yet known if the move will be temporary or permanent, but the library will be spending at least a year or two in another location. The group needs to leave by the end of the year, though for the next six months they are still open at the museum and ready to help.
“If you’re looking into your family history and you’ve run into a roadblock, come visit us,” Gundersen said.
The genealogy library is open Tuesday through Saturday from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.The group can be contacted at info@wags-web.org.