The Ray Bradbury Waukegan Carnegie Library, Inc.
Mission
To honor and promote Ray Bradbury’s artistic achievement.
To honor and promote Ray Bradbury’s transformative influence on the culture of the United States.
To honor and promote the influence of the Carnegie Libraries on Waukegan, Illinois, America, and the entire world.
Purpose
“The library was the great watering place where the animals, large and small, came from the night to drink and smile at each other across the green-glass-shadowed glades between the book-mountains…. And there was always that special moment when, at the big doors, you paused before you opened them out and went in among all those lives…”
The Ray Bradbury Waukegan Carnegie Library, Inc. (RBWCL) celebrates the creativity of world famous author Ray Bradbury, a native son of Waukegan, and his literary legacy by establishing the Bradbury Playhouse of the Mind in the historic Waukegan Carnegie Library building at 1 North Sheridan Road, Waukegan, IL 60085.
The Ray Bradbury Waukegan Carnegie Library, Inc. was incorporated in early 2015.
The group’s aim: to connect present and future generations to the themes and ideas from Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine, The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes and other works—some of which were set in Waukegan. The Waukegan Carnegie Library building, constructed in the Classic Revival architecture style, now stands empty on the bluff overlooking Lake Michigan at 1 N. Sheridan Road in Waukegan.
The RBWCL board determined that no other location is a better place for a Bradbury center than the landmarked library where Bradbury as a youth fed his “hungry imagination” day after day. The building is and always has been “Ray Bradbury’s Library.” Where else can people from all over the world experience Bradbury’s transformational works, his love of life, and connect with the brilliance of his imagination than in the library that fueled his imagination?
To design the building space in an adaptive reuse as a center dedicated to Ray Bradbury, the RBWCL is working with experts in historic renovation, architecture, marketing, programming, as well as authors and academics who are experts in the Bradbury literary legacy. They are involving a wide range of local and regional community, business, and governmental organizations, as well as individuals, who will provide resources that will ensure the success of their purpose.
About the Quote Above
Bradbury biographer Jonathan R. Eller knew Bradbury well. In Becoming Ray Bradbury he said that this feeling “recaptures Bradbury’s own early childhood perspective. Bradbury maintained his library regimen for decades, and considered these excursions to be the true source of his education.”