The Brigadier General Charles E. McGee Library, formerly the Silver Spring Library, is part of the Montgomery County Public Libraries System. It opened to the public in 1931 and is currently located at 900 Wayne Avenue in Silver Spring, Maryland.
The library is named for Charles E. McGee, a Tuskegee Airman who had lived in Montgomery County.
History
Early locations
Silver Spring Library began service in 1931 at East Silver Spring Elementary School.[2]
In 1934, the library moved to Jesup Blair Community House, also known as "The Moorings."[3] Architect Howard Wright Cutler remodeled the building to serve as a library,[3][4] and his work earned the building a nomination for placement on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.[4] The library operated out of the Jesup Blair House for 23 years.
The 1957 Silver Spring Library building
Colesville Road (1957–2015)
The library opened a building of its own at 8901 Colesville Road in 1957, on land donated by the Hecht Company. At this location, the library occupied a building dedicated exclusively for the library's use for the first time.
Ellsworth Urban Park was created in an area covering 3.6 acres (1.5 ha) beside the library in 1979. The park has two playground areas where parents can take their children to play, and a tennis court.
In 1990, Marcia Billig's sculpture Lion and the Mouse was installed in the grass of the library.[5][6]
A celebration of 58 years of service was held on March 15, 2015, the last day of service at the Colesville Road location.[2]
Current location (2015–present)
The 2015 building from the corner of Wayne and Fenton
The current library location at 900 Wayne Avenue in Silver Spring was opened on June 20, 2015.[7] The facility was built for $64 million, including the acquisition of 1.46 acres (0.59 ha) of land, preparation of the site, design, construction, furniture, equipment and funds to improve the collection.[8] Construction was to cost $23 million, but $3 million was taken to renovate the Fillmore, a music venue nearby in downtown Silver Spring. The ground floor of the seven-story building has a coffee shop and a platform for the future Purple Line light rail station.[9] In 2022, the library was renamed for Brigadier GeneralCharles E. McGee, a Tuskegee Airman who had lived in Montgomery County.[10][11]
1st and 2nd floors: Drop-off window, cafe, county offices, meeting rooms, and artists studios.
3rd floor: Customer service, movies, teen books, conference room, meeting rooms, Mac lab (teens), study rooms, pick-up area, drop off area.
4th floor: Books, audiobooks, CDs, newspapers and magazines room, conference and study rooms, computer rooms.
5th floor: Children's floor.
Collection
The library has a collection of 90,000 books, magazines, downloadable music, e-books, and a World Language Collection in Amharic, Chinese, French, Spanish, and Vietnamese, organized in the following way:
Teens collection (third floor)
Pick up holds section
DVD 7 days express
DVD TV series
Express DVD section
New fiction for children
Books for teens: Fiction, non fiction, graphic novels, manga.
Library cards: Free for Montgomery County and D.C. area residents and students and are valid for 1 year. Money can be added to library cards to be used for printing of documents.
Each user can borrow up 100 books and magazines for 3 weeks, that can be renewed up to 3 times.
Each user can borrow up to 20 movies every week and most of them can be renewed up to 3 times.
Each user can borrow audiobooks and ebooks for up to 3 weeks.[12]
Each user can borrow e-books from 3M dispenser machines with 3M book readers and on-line using Overdrive and 3M applications for PC, Kindletablets, Nook tablets, and so forth. e-books can also be downloaded to a computer, and using Adobe Digital Editions software, these books can be uploaded to classic versions of Kindle and Nook.[13][14][15][16]
Hold lockers where users can pick up 24/7 books that were reserved.
Drop off area available 24/7, where users can return books that were borrowed with. The use of RFID technology allow to return books to the system automatically.
Automated borrowing: Spots with RFID scanners were users can borrow books by themselves.
Mango Languages: Online language learning website for Montgomery County Public Libraries users.[17]
Muzzy Online: An interactive language learning website for children with animations and games, free for Montgomery County Public Libraries users.[18]
LibXtoolbar: Allow to search from Montgomery County Public Libraries catalog from a toolbar on your web browser. Available for Firefox and Chrome.[19]
Study rooms
The library has 14 study rooms with space for up to 8 people. Study rooms can be reserved online every week, and can be used once a day for up to 2 hours every day.[20]
Printers and scanners
The library has four multi-function printers that can be used with a library card. Scanning of documents is free and can be stored via USB flash drives. Documents can be printed from any computer in the library and have a cost of 15 cents per black-and-white page and $1 per color page.
BookMine:[21] An application to search on Montgomery County Public Library catalog that also can be used to manage Montgomery County Public Library card accounts. Available for iOS and Android.
3M Cloud Library: Application to download e-books on EPUB format.[22][23] Available for iOS, Android and Android for Kindle.
OverDrive Media Console: Application to download e-books using Montgomery County Public Library accounts.[24][25][26] Available for iOS, Android, Android for Kindle, Blackberry. and Windows phone.
Freegal Music: Application to download 5 free songs every week.[27] Available for iOS, Android and Android for Kindle (via SlideMe).
Zinio: Free collection of more than 5,000 full color digital magazines.[28] Available for iOS, Android and Android for Kindle.
Flipster: Application to read free digital magazine provided from your library.[29]
OnceClickDigital: Application where can be downloaded audiobooks and e-books with MCPL library cards. Available for iOS, Android, Android for kindle.[30]
Mango Languages: An onlinelanguage learning resource free for library users where can be learn more than 70 languages. Available for iOS, Android and Android for Kindle.
Reference USA for iPad: Search tool for business and residential information, used also for job searching.[31]
Access My Library: Tool that helps to look for libraries by market and distance, and also allow to search items on library catalogs, read biographies, articles, journals, etc.[32] Available for iOS and Android.
EBSCOhost: Tool that helps to search on libraries databases organizing them by date or relevance.[33] Available for iOS and Android.
Kanopy: It is an on-demand streaming video platform for public libraries and universities[36] that offers films and documentaries.[37] All the users have access to the Kanopy kids subdivision.
Courtesy charging stations
Three courtesy charging stations are available, with connectors, where visitors can charge cellphones and tablets.
This list is incomplete. Prior to the 2010 census, Four Corners was classified by the U.S. Census Bureau as being part of its for statistical purposes only, census-designated place (CDP) of Silver Spring, and Montgomery Blair High is in the Four Corners CDP.
