By Cathy Spaulding
Oklahoma School for the Blind librarian Sandi Hilbern recalls buying Henry the Library Bear for $2 at a garage sale.
“The kids come up and hug it,” she said. “That’s why I go to garage sales. I don’t buy things for myself. I buy for the kids.”
Hilbern has been doing things for the kids since long before she became the school’s librarian in 1998.
She said she plans to keep doing things for the kids after she retires as librarian Friday.
Although not blind herself, Hilbern said she can identify with vision-impaired children.
“I’’ve been one-eyed since birth,” she said. “It’s never been a problem, but I’ve always had a problem with depth perception. I had a crossed-eye, and I was always teased as a child.”
Hilbern said experiences prompted her to seek a career to help the blind. Hilbern was a vocational rehabilitation counselor for 23 years, working mainly with people who were blind or deaf and blind. She spent 18 years as counselor at OSB before retiring for the first time, in 1998.
“They offered me a temporary position at the library,” she said. “I didn’t know anything about libraries, but I did know about blindness. I got a scholarship from Northeastern State University. They gave me a waiver to teach. I completed the 20 hours to be certified in libraries in a year.”
Under Hilbern’s direction, the OSB library has become an entirely different and busier place.
“When I first got here, there were two tables and stiff chairs in the reading area,” she said.
Now the area has a pile of beanbag chairs, a row of computers — and Henry.
The library also has grown to have the largest collection of Braille literature in Oklahoma, Hilbern said.
“The collection has really increased and now we’re about to run out of space,” she said.
More people have gotten involved in helping the library grow, she said. “We now have a library committee with 10 people. We have $4,000 to $5,000 raised each year — that’s a lot to raise.
Hilbern said she will continue to lead fundraising after retiring from the library. Hilbern said she must retire for health reasons.
“I had five surgeries and I have diabetes,” she said. “My doctor says I need more rest and less stress.”
Jeanne Myers, a volunteer, will supervise the library until a permanent librarian is found, she said.
“God sent her to me,” said Hilbern, who moves around in a motorized chair. “She volunteers here eight hours a day. I’ve gotten to where I couldn’t do shelving. I can’t go low and I can’t go high.”
