This summer, the National Book Foundation hits the road for NBF Presents: Summer with the National Book Awards, bringing National Book Awards-honored authors to libraries across the country. Join the National Book Foundation and the Sarasota County Libraries for a conversation with poet Diana Khoi Nguyen (Ghost Of, National Book Award Finalist) and novelist Margaret Wilkerson Sexton (A Kind of Freedom, National Book Award Longlister) on survivor stories—writing on family exile and segregation from Saigon to New Orleans.
Tired of running into pay walls? We can help with that. At the request of our patrons, Sarasota County Library cardholders have access to hoopla®. hoopla is a digital service that offers a suite of free media such as streaming movies and TV shows, e-books, audiobooks, and read-a-long books. Each patron is entitled to loan eight items from hoopla per month. For parents, hoopla features a “Kids Mode” that helps filter appropriate content for youngsters. Doing some summer traveling? Rock your road trip with hoopla’s vast collection of music. As an added incentive, hoopla allows you to download your loans locally so you can binge bandwidth-free.
INSIDE THE ARCHIVE
As of July 10th, the Guptill House has joined a prestigious list of historically designated properties in Sarasota County! What’s more, the Guptill House is not only locally designated. It has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1975. It remains a beautiful and rare example of Queen Anne architecture in Sarasota County and has deep ties to our local history.
Let us tell you its story:
Frank Guptill was born in 1848 in Maine. In 1872, he met John Webb and his family (pioneer homesteaders in Osprey). Guptill went on to make a homestead claim for 83 acres at South Creek (about one mile south of Spanish Point) and, in 1877, he became a family man after marrying one of the Webb family’s daughters. By 1901, construction on the Guptill House had begun on 20 acres of land given to him by John Webb, but his ties to the Webb family did not end there. As a master carpenter and boat builder, Guptill built the boats that were used to transport citrus and other produce grown by the Webb family to markets in Cedar Key and Key West.
In 1910, Bertha Palmer arrived and purchased the property. Over time, she expanded the Osprey property into a winter residence complete with formal gardens, but kept the Guptill House unchanged for use as a guest cottage. Although Mrs. Palmer died in 1918, her legacy is preserved as part of today’s Historic Spanish Point. In 1982, the Guptill House underwent restoration and was one of the first projects at Historic Spanish Point. Ever since, it has been open to the public as a historic site and remains an vital component of this historic property and our county.