Our library is expanding

in montreal we have many libraries, of all different sizes, the main ones has a million books or so

I have neve heard of him. I have however heard of camels (giggle). My local library expanded a bit about 2 years ago. The children's section now takes up the entire basement area, and they expanded the media area. It really doesn't seem like they made it that much bigger though although they did, but I think that added more meeting room space and administrative areas. Because of the expansion they have not had their annual book sale for a couple of years now. I do hope they will start doing that again now that everything is done, and everyone is now comfortable with the new layout.

GardenGerty I never heard of this person before. We do have a great library here where I live. It has a childrens and an adult section. There are five computers in the childrens section and in the adults section. You can also rent movies.

Well, in the 10th century that was a LOT of books! After all, the printing press had not been invented yet! WOW!

OH, Gerty we have so many books and every time we had to move they all had to have special handling. Now when we are at the stage in life where we always dreamed we would be able to just sit around and read them, we are so active doing other fun things, that they just sit there, alas. Where were all those camels when we needed them? Wikipedia never heard of him either. Clearly there were viziers in Persian-ruled Turkey during the Muslim period, but somewhat I recall having read somewhere that putting Grand before the name originated with the Ottomans in the 13th century. The author could have been mistaken, however, and I certainly know very little about that period of history, which in Europe was called the Dark Ages. The story is told over and over o the internet, but I have yet to see a source cited. Do you thing there ever was such a real person? Since the "books" would have been scrolls and a camel could easily carry around 300 scrolls, it makes a pretty story.

I think it's wonderful. We always had a library when I was a kid. I want to have a really nice one one day. Hopefully it will include titles by me. :-)

We have fantastic libraries where I live. Each neighborhood has one, plus we have the main library. Each library is well stocked with books, tapes, C.D.'s, DVD's, etc. Also each library has several computers that anyone can use. I have never heard of the person you are talking about, it does sound like his books were important to him.

My room has three shelves but it is not enough for my books. I have a room which is dedicated for the rest of the books. © ronaldinu 2008

I have never heard of him before, however this is a very interesting story. That would be amazing and if they have a show on him on the history channel , I would like to see it. I am very interested in history and especialy very old history. Truth is stranger then fiction!

I think the caels could be a really big help LOL. I have never heard of Abdul Ismael either. Our library is very small.

Any library expanding is good news :):):) I have never heard of Abdul kassem, but the story doesn't surprise me. I've heard similar ones. I'm sure that they would be quite helpful in any more LOL

That's funny, Gerty. How exciting to be getting a revamped library. I have actually heard of Abdul Kassem Ismael before. Only recently I read about him in a book review of the book Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader.

With the Internet available our Library has been able to cut back on many reference books. This is a very costly item since even basic information is changing all the time. Things we thought were true 10 years ago prove not to be or need to be qualified. All-our Libraries have Internet capabilities.We had to shut down all our Libraries due to lack of funds this lasted for about 6 mos, until we could get more taxes to reopen them. We all missed them.

The late Philippine dictator, Ferdinand E. Marcos was known to have a photographic memory and a wide array of books he all read. Documented or not, history tells about his brilliant mind.

Gee, I don't think I ever heard of Abdul, but it's a fascinating piece of history. I had no idea that camels could be trained like that. Sure was a unique idea for the day and age! Your library sounds great, nice that it's expansion will give more room. Our town's library has grown over the years too. When I was a teen (too many moons ago lol) it was a very small library, just one big room over the police station. Then they built a whole new library, and I think now it's had it's third addition. What I really like about our library is the fact we can get inter-library loans of books from the huge Cleveland Public Library. It's really great to be able to get volumes that are not available at our library on loan like that. I have loved going to the library ever since I was a kid!

It hasn't been all that long ago when they re-did our library. I think it's pretty awesome. Sad thing is that I really don't use the library like I used to. We have so many books here on the huge bookshelf that we probably will never get to all of them. I only hit the library for the book sale twice a year. Marsha

Hey there. I've never heard this story before but I love it! I live in a very small community, even smaller than McPherson if you can believe that! But, we have a fabulous new library that my daughters & I frequent. In fact we'll be going there Tuesday. We love to go online and pick out our books then pick them up. We don't have to whisper so long (they are still pretty young) and we can take our time picking them up. Got to love the Internet! Again, great story!