Starting with just a bagful of books, the Moose Pass Public Library is one of the oldest libraries in Alaska. Several members of the Moose Pass Sewing Club decided to establish an official community library and incorporated it in 1938 with the assistance of L. V. Ray, an attorney and longtime mayor of Seward. The library’s first books came with Ann Chisolm from a collection at the school on Latouche Island, where she taught before she came to Moose Pass. The library started with just seventeen cardholders.
The Moose Pass Sportsmen’s Club was organized in 1947 and was originally housed in a Quonset hut purchased for $200 from Fort Raymond in Seward, an army post that was deactivated after World War II. At the request of the library board, the Moose Pass Sportsmen’s Club had originally offered space for the library. However, the shed on school grounds became available for use, and plans to use the Quonset hut were scrapped. The Moose Pass Sportsmen’s Club eventually constructed a block building to serve as a permanent community center using volunteer labor and materials. The building was completed in 1961 and the library collection was moved into the new community building on November 18, 1961. For years the Moose Pass Sportsmen’s Club housed the library at one end of the building and the town’s fire truck at the other end. When Moose Pass received funds to build a new fire station, a major renovation to the Moose Pass Sportsmen’s Club – completed in 2018 – offered expanded space to house the library. Where a fire truck was once parked, the community now meets, works on computers, and checks out books.
From just a handful of books brought by Moose Pass’s first official schoolteacher, Ann Chisolm, to a fully modernized public resource, the Moose Pass Public library has become a much-loved hub of the community.
