Summer Reading at the Orange County Public Library

Summer Reading went prehistoric in 2026. Unearth New Adventures centered on dinosaurs, archaeology, paleontology, nature, science and discovery, with separate challenges for kids, teens and adults. Children received a free book when they registered and earned weekly prizes for reading; teens could log both reading and volunteer time; adults worked their way through a Summer Reading Bingo card.

The season opened May 30 at River Park with the Summer Reading Kickoff and Community Resource Fair. Families moved among community organizations, face painters, balloon artists and Poetry Fox, typing poems to order, while a fossil dig in a sand-filled pool let children uncover their own small treasures beside specimen charts. Morehead Planetarium ran a booth, and by the Friends’ June meeting, library staff were reporting a large, energetic turnout.

Inside, the theme took over the buildings. The children’s area became a prehistoric jungle with a dinosaur-footprint path, readers added paper gems to a wall announcing that these gems are unearthing stories, and a Secret Dinosaur hid upstairs as an adult Bingo challenge. Both branches ran full slates, from a Dinosaur 13 screening and archaeology outings to Ayr Mount to Mesozoic Murder, a mystery-solving game in Carrboro.

The program ran through July 25, and the library’s season report says it out-read even 2025: 2,173 readers registered across the three tracks and 1,443,675 minutes were read, 1,502 of those readers kids, with teens volunteering 41,231 minutes besides. The library itself felt it: total visitors up 17 percent, Saturday visitors up 22.8 percent, circulation up 16.6 percent over the summer. Comparable state-series figures will follow when the annual report is filed.

From this summer

• A second slogan, Stomp Into Stories, ran beside Unearth New Adventures
• Adult raffle baskets: Made in Orange County; You’re a Gem; and Touch Grass, Respectfully
• Kids collected 5,407 weekly prizes; adults turned in 170 completed Bingo cards
• Balloon animals came in twelve varieties, brontosaurus and T-rex included
• Kids left the kickoff with Unearth a Story tote bags

Summer Reading grew substantially in 2025. A Rainbow of Possibilities opened June 7 at River Park with the first combined Summer Reading Kickoff and Community Resource Fair. Thirty-five community partners joined the library there, and children who signed up for Summer Reading received a free book.

The summer ended with several celebrations rather than a single finale. Children and families had a Rainbow Food Taste Off and a frozen-treat celebration, while the adult program concluded with Booked for Lunch, featuring Orange County authors Eryk Pruitt and Ellery Adams, catered by Hillsborough BBQ with Purple Crow Books selling on site.

It was also the first summer with two buildings. The Southern Branch in Carrboro ran its own slate, from a France-themed Global Books evening to a K–5 Paint-and-Snack, and its young readers painted a collaborative column of rainbow art for the branch.

The numbers made 2025 the largest summer in the state-reporting series: 1,572 people registered and readers logged 1,247,954 minutes, with 63 programs drawing 2,099 attendees. The Friends provided $7,480, the largest identifiable Summer Reading contribution in the organization’s records.

From this summer

• Poetry Fox typed custom poems at the kickoff
• The library’s own season report counted 1,393 kids, 144 teens and 486 adults, with teens volunteering 28,165 minutes alongside 347,366 read
• Adult raffle baskets were named Espresso Yourself; Sorry, I Have Other Plans; and Made In NC, with Bingo sheets accepted until August 1
• Adult programs ran from a Tiny Art Show to Cartooning with Keith Knight and Get Carded trivia nights

The adventure began outdoors. On June 8, StoryUp! Aerial Theater performed Aerial Aesop’s from a rig suspended among the trees at River Park. More than 250 people attended the half-hour kickoff, and every child from birth through age 18 who registered for Summer Reading received a free book.

The adventure theme continued inside the library all summer. Kids followed an “adventure path” to Youth Services and earned weekly prizes for reading. Teens had their own Find Adventure at Your Library identity, a map-themed reading and volunteering log, and programs including a library lock-in, a Hogwarts escape room, string art and tote-bag painting. Other programs ranged from Science Heroes and creative writing with John Claude Bemis to intergenerational storytime and three visits from Wild Tails NC.

By the end of the season, 1,046 readers had registered and logged 850,843 minutes. The Friends contributed $5,370: $3,770 for youth Summer Reading and $1,600 for the teen program.

From this summer

• Wild Tails NC brought Gumdrop the Kookaburra, Kismet the Arctic Fox, Simba the Burmese Python and Juniper the Porcupine
• The teen lock-in ran after hours on July 19, ending in games and pizza
• The season closed July 27 with free SnoBalls in the library parking lot

OCPL gave the national “All Together Now” idea a local twist in 2023: We All Bee-Long at the Library. The season began June 3 with Dana Hill’s magic show at Fairview Park, where families spread blankets and camp chairs across the field and library staff worked the crowd in yellow bee shirts and antennae.

There was plenty beyond reading logs. Children planted gardens and explored pollinators, Donna Washington brought storytelling to the library, Beverly Scarlett led a Black and Indigenous history walking tour, and other programs ranged from sewing to tabletop roleplaying and live animals. Teens earned entries for both reading and volunteering, while adults had Book Bingo and community donation drives. The summer closed with a Pelican’s SnoBall send-off at the Main Library.

The Friends provided $5,600, covering performers, giveaway books, weekly prizes, raffle baskets, the Juneteenth celebration and activities for teens and adults. The library reported more than 900 free books given away.

The library went underwater for Oceans of Possibilities. Staff transformed the building with a paper-chain octopus, kelp and coral, fish in the windows and seaweed wrapped around the columns outside. Children added their favorite summer books to a growing school of paper fish on the wall.

The five-week program began June 6. Dana Hill opened the season with an outdoor magic show at Fairview Park, where families could also register and pick up a free book. Kids logged minutes for prizes and a raffle; teens had weekly drawings for books of their choice. Adults participated through Read to Give Back: for every 30 minutes they read, a book would be donated. It was a new version of an idea that had appeared much earlier in Summer Reading through Book Bucks.

By the end of the summer, 606 readers had registered and logged 309,180 minutes. More than 550 books had already been distributed by the library’s mid-summer report.

Tails and Tales was a transitional summer. The library had reopened some services, but Summer Learning still operated largely under pandemic restrictions. Registration began June 7, with families picking up books curbside, and for the first time readers could track their progress online through ReadSquared.

A small piece of the program returned outdoors. On June 20, Mr. Keith led a socially distanced Summertime Storytime at Carrboro Town Commons, with registration limited to ten families. In Hillsborough, families could follow a paper map through downtown for a bilingual Book Walk featuring Aliens Love Underpants / A Los Marcianos les Encantan los Calzondillos. Much of the rest remained virtual: Ms. Heather hosted Zoom storytimes, Mr. Keith appeared on YouTube, and the library maintained a “Watch Again” collection of storytimes and summer challenges.

The unusual format shows in the numbers: 169 readers registered, 63,247 minutes were logged, and 27 programs drew 268 attendees.

From this summer

• Prize baskets held LEGO sets and bubble kits, drawn in two age groups
• The season’s theme cards carried the Friends’ logo beside the library’s

The library had planned an ordinary kickoff and summer finale for 2020. Then the building closed.

Instead, OCPL created Grow With Us!, a largely online Summer Learning program beginning June 20. Children received a printed game board and found new challenges online each Friday, with storytimes, Pantry Science, STEM activities and family performances appearing on Facebook, YouTube and Zoom. Teens had their own reading challenge and virtual programs, including Princeton Review test-prep sessions. Adults could take part in Book Bingo and online book clubs.

The numbers capture how unusual the year was. Registration fell to 94, but the library still recorded 54 programs and 1,692 program attendances, along with 106,533 minutes read. Summer Learning looked very different, but it never disappeared.

In 2019, the library turned A Universe of Stories into something readers could watch grow. The children’s progress wall advanced through levels until hundreds of paper rockets streamed toward a foil moon. The space theme extended beyond the reading challenge to movies about going to the moon and a June 1 kickoff with games, crafts and snow cones.

Adults had their own Grown-Up Edition, a three-level challenge in which each level offered 12 different tasks. Participants completed at least seven to move on and collected a prize along the way. The adult program proved popular enough to continue well after the kids’ and teen programs ended, with the final Kindle Fire raffle drawn in August.

The summer drew 977 registrants, who logged 602,010 minutes. Sixty-nine Summer Learning programs recorded 2,442 attendances.

From this summer

• Level prizes included an OCPL tote bag
• Puppet Show Inc. returned for a third straight summer with The Little Red Hen
• Level One tasks included following the library and the Friends on Facebook

Libraries Rock! may have been the year the theme took over most completely. Children created their own posters before the program even began, and inside the library a “Be a Reading Rockstar” wall filled oversized musical notes with stars as readers completed each level. Programs included puppets, magic, terrarium building, button making, movement and dance, and outdoor concerts.

The program also looked beyond children’s reading. Teens divided into middle- and high-school teams and tracked both minutes read and minutes spent in the community. Adults tackled the first documented Grown-Up Edition, with three levels of reading and library activities. Book Bucks was still going too: children could give up a prize and instead donate a book to Fairview Child and Family Center.

One reader took the challenge particularly far: Henry set out to read 1,000 books over the summer and reached his goal. Altogether, 935 people registered and logged 644,628 minutes.

From this summer

• One book could count toward several tasks on the adult log sheet, and staff initialed each completed level
• The library tagged qualifying books in the catalog so challenge titles could be searched
• A Friends summer book sale ran August 17 to 19

2017 brought a change larger than its annual theme: Summer Reading became Summer Learning.

The new name arrived with the national Build a Better World theme and an expanded kickoff. The morning began on Riverwalk with a 5K and fun run before more than 600 people gathered for the registration party. There was origami, Jenga, face painting, live music, Pelican’s SnoBalls, a fire truck, popcorn, balloon animals and children decorating pots and planting seeds.

A week later, OCPL held its first separate Summer Learning kickoff in Carrboro, at the branch then located in McDougle Middle School. The Friends provided $3,900 for Summer Learning and another $1,700 for shirts; surviving photographs show the Friends and library logos together on both the shirts and the summer banner.

The 2016 theme was all about movement, run under the tagline Healthy Brains. Healthy Bodies. The June 11 kickoff began with a 5K and fun run along Riverwalk at 8 a.m., then a sign-up party at the Main Library: the Orange County Jammers at 9:30, family yoga at 9:40, a healthy-bike demonstration at 10:15, Zumba at 11, with a bounce house, cornhole, face painting, Wii games and Pelican’s Sno-balls running all morning.

The ambitions grew too. The library set a library-wide goal of 10,000 reading hours, nearly double the previous summer’s target, kept Book Bingo running for adults, and let readers pay down fines with reading time. Hours counted until August 20, and in mid-August the library reported being almost at goal. An Ice Cream Social closed the season, with a Kindle Fire drawing courtesy of the Friends.

The Friends approved $1,750 for the kickoff, with additional support coming from the Triangle Community Foundation and library operating funds.

That summer also saw the Friends support a related effort to keep children reading when school was out. Working with Book Harvest and the Family Success Alliance, FOCPL provided $5,627.80 for a Books on Break pilot at New Hope Elementary. It was separate from the library’s Summer Reading Program, but built around the same problem: making sure children had books available through the summer.

From this summer

• Beyond Barriers sponsored the bounce house; six downtown businesses put up gift-certificate prizes
• Chris & Neal’s Rock Star Magic played July 6, Flow Circus juggled June 24, and John Claude Bemis taught rising 3rd to 6th graders on June 21
• A stuffed-animal sleepover on July 15 sent buddies home the next morning after a light breakfast

For Every Hero Has a Story, the library filled the summer with superheroes of several kinds. The June 6 kickoff featured storytellers, face painting, bubbles, magic, members of the Society for Creative Anachronism and free SnoBalls. About 300 people attended, with 137 children registering that day.

Inside, children could pose in capes over a cityscape photo booth, tackle a hero-training course, make masks and add their names to a wall of heraldic shields. Another wall tracked progress toward a 5,500-hour reading goal, five hundred hours higher than the previous summer. Later programs included Chris & Neal’s Rockstar Magic, a “Hero Showdown” and a “Who Is Your Hero?” writing and art contest.

The season offered more than 75 free reading-related activities. The Friends contributed $1,000, including support for Summer Reading prizes and the kickoff.

From this summer

• The kickoff duck pond stocked rubber ducks in capes and masks
• Magician Steve Somers headlined a ticketed kickoff show, first come, first served
• Free snow cones went out at noon, while supplies lasted

2014 brought a science theme, and what appears to be the first full Summer Reading kickoff celebration in the surviving record.

More than 350 people came to the library driveway on June 14 for music, carnival games, crafts, face painting and prizes. Photographs show a wonderfully homemade event: a Plinko board, lollipop ring toss, sidewalk chalk, children adding handprints to an Orange County Main Library banner, musicians playing under tents, a packed magic show and even the cast of Seussical. One surviving chalk message simply reads, “Thanks to the Friends of the Library!!!”

All summer, children watched a beaker-shaped chart fill toward a goal of 5,000 reading hours. They reached it on July 30, one day before the deadline. More than 850 children registered, and over 200 books were donated to Fairview Child and Family Center through Book Bucks.

From this summer

• Performers included Amazing Steve, Judy Woodall, a string band and the Seussical cast in Cat in the Hat hats
• The Friends ran a membership table and a small book sale under the tents

Dig Into Reading opened June 1 with books and authors at the center. Piedmont Laureate John Claude Bemis led a panel with children’s authors Clay Carmichael, Frances O’Roark Dowell, Kelly Starling Lyons and Cate Tiernan, while Purple Crow Books handled book sales.

More than 800 children registered, and 26 programs recorded over 1,650 attendances. Teens could “dig in” through rock-themed craft programs, including message stones and found-rock art. Adults entered a weekly prize drawing for every book they finished, while A.J. Mayhew’s The Dry Grass of August served as the summer’s Reading Together selection.

The giving side of Summer Reading remained strong too: more than 100 children chose the “Read to Give” option, donating a book instead of taking their own prize. The Friends supplied $757.04 for prizes, stickers and two Kindle Fires.