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MILLBROOK — A volunteer read from Billie Jean King’s “A Kids Book About Equality” during Alden Place Elementary’s fifth grade field trip to their local library on Friday, Feb. 2.
A teacher accompanying the students felt that the book, which included discussions of gender identity and the word “non-binary,” was inappropriate for children. (Teachers and staff have said that they were not made aware of the content before the reading.)
The teacher also noticed other books that they felt might be questionable for children of that age.
That afternoon, School Superintendent Caroline Hernandez Pidala alerted parents of the teacher’s concerns in a letter, letting them know that King’s “Book About Equality” had been read at the library. She then advised that parents talk to the teachers or the Alden Place Principal Thomas Libka if they had questions or concerns.
On Feb. 3, a petition to remove the books was put up on Change.org. It read:
“As a concerned parent and resident of Millbrook, NY, I am deeply troubled by the presence of gender ideology books and symbols in the children’s section of our local library.” It continued:
“We believe that discussions on gender ideology should be had with family and left for when they’re older and more capable of understanding these concepts fully.”
“Gender ideology” is a term used in far right circles to describe and discredit the acknowledgement of trans, non-binary and other gender non-conforming people.
The petition asked that the Millbrook Library management consider this plea:
“Please remove all gender ideology books and symbols from the children’s section in our library.”
At a board meeting held on February 20, Millbrook library agreed that some of the material was not where it should have been, and yes, some of it shouldn’t have been in the children’s section.
The offending literature was removed from the children’s section of the library.
A total of 4,240 book titles were marked for restriction or removal in 2023, in schools and libraries across America. School libraries saw an increase of 11% in challenges, while public libraries reported a 92% increase of challenges to specific books.
According to the American Library Association (ALA), from 2022 to 2023, the banned books with unique titles list grew by 65%. About 47% of these books were about the LGBTQ community or people of color, or both.
The petition to move books in the Millbrook Library had been written by Kay Vanderlyn of Millbrook, who has five children, none of whom attend Alden Elementary.
Her petition stated that “while it’s crucial to teach our children about diversity and acceptance, introducing such complex topics at an early age may lead to confusion or distress.
“Our request isn’t about censorship or denying access to information. It’s about ensuring age-appropriate materials for our children.”
The letter also explained that “our community is home to many young minds that are still developing their understanding of the world. It is our responsibility as parents and guardians to guide them through this process.”
The Millbrook Library Board, and Library Board President Jodi Fernandes, responded to the petition with a letter that was made public via the library web site.
They acknowledged the incident, and noted that a library staff member had also raised concerns that a new book on display about reproduction, ‘It’s So Amazing’ by Robie H. Harris, was inappropriate.
They said that one of the books cited had been miscatalogued and had already been moved to the Young Adult section, prior to the petition’s release.
The letter went on to note that the petition had asked that all material and symbols related to “gender ideology” cited books and images of rainbow-colored items on display in the Children’s and Young Adult section of the library.
The Board noted that they had been serving the Millbrook public for 125 years through its mission to empower the community to be resilient, informed and equitable through leadership and collaboration.
They also noted that by providing free information, educational programs and services, they hope to encourage each community member to feel seen, heard and valued.
They agreed that some materials should be left to the parent or guardian to discuss with the child; therefore, they say, they have put a new procedure into place meant to ensure that all field trips, when parents or guardians are not present, will have the content pre-selected by the visiting school in advance “to align with specific needs of classes and studies.”
“In terms of content selection and removal, we have an established Collection Development Policy that exists to help guide the staff in the selection of materials to support the community,” it continues.
“Should anyone in the community wish to have books within the library reconsidered for circulation, we have a policy in place to do so,” they stated, and noted that there is a link on the library website for that purpose.
The letter also made clear that families in the community had recently requested age-appropriate books on themes of gender identity and inclusivity.
“All these materials have been vetted through the Collection Development Policy. We appreciate that there are many different perspectives in a healthy and thriving community, and that is what makes a community great — the ability to share varying points of view and information through passionate discourse.”
The letter from the Library Board finishes by thanking everyone who has reached out to them, in person, over the phone, through email and in writing to share their perspectives on the library’s collections, and encouraged the public to continue to share ideas, concerns and wishes with the library staff.
COPAKE — Bradley Pitts, Chair of the Town of Copake’s newly established Mohican Allyship Committee, opened the lecture “Mohican Heritage: Past Present, and Future” at the Roeliff Jansen Historical society in Copake Falls on Sunday, March 17 with the question, “What is land acknowledgement?”
Patty Krawec, author of “Becoming Kin” and a member of the Anishnaabe people, has written:
“Land acknowledgements are a moment to pause and reflect on the relationship that exists between the current residents and those who were displaced.” She asks, “What does it mean to live on stolen land? You may not be guilty of the act of dispossession, but it is a relationship you have inherited.”
The recent history of the Mohicans (The People of the Waters that Are Never Still) is one of repeated displacement and dispossession by European settlers.
In 1609, when Henry Hudson sailed up the Hudson, the Mohican lands stretched “across six states from Southwest Vermont, the entire Hudson River Valley of New York, from Lake Champlain to Manhattan, western Massachusetts up to the Connecticut River Valley, northwest Connecticut, and portions of Pennsylvania and New Jersey,” writes Dorothy Davids her “Brief History of the Mohican Nation.”
Pitts stressed that for Indigenous people, land ownership is a European settler concept and is far different from how Indigenous people regard the land. When 17th- or 18th-century Mohicans they signed a deed or sold land, they did not expect to never be allowed to return to it. They expected it to be shared as land had always been shared, that they could still hunt, fish, and travel through it. Instead, they were pushed into smaller and smaller territories while the European settlers built houses, farms, and towns on the lands they had once cared for.
In the 1660s, as the colonies grew, the Mohicans were being “squeezed from east and west.”
By 1734, many Mohicans were located near the Housatonic River in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. They allowed missionaries to build a church and school, but after the Revolutionary War, which Mohicans faught alongside the colonists, they returned to find that their lands near the Housatonic had been taken through “debt and mortgage and often fraudulent means” and also that “plans had already been made to remove them from Stockbridge.”
In the 1780s, many moved to New Stockbridge, New York, at the invitation of the Oneidas. They again settled and built homes and planted crops, and after several years, European immigrants again moved north, claimed the land, and forced further displacement.
This scenario played out again and again with the Mohicans. By the 1820s, much of the tribe had moved to Kaukauna, Wisconsin; by the 1840s, to land near Lake Winnebago.
In 1856, they signed a treaty with the Menominee Nation for access to the land where they remain today, which is located in Shawano County, Wisconsin. Today, nown as the Stockbridge-Munsee Community, there are “approximately 1500 enrolled Tribal members, about a third of whom live on the Wisconsin Reservation.”
Another concept that sometimes means different things to settlers’ inheritors and Indigenous people is the concept of “land back.”
An example of Land Back took place in 2023 on Monument Mountain, where 351 acres of land were returned to the Mohican people. This was made possible by the Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Program (MVP), which, explained Pitts, “provides local communities with funding and technical assistance to implement climate resilience projects.”
Shannon Holsey, Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans President, has explained that the Land Back movement is not “trying to reclaim land from ownership in a Western colonial way of thinking about it.”
The Stockbridge Munsee people, she continued, are interested in reclaiming “ways of being, which were never based on money.” The meaning of ancestral land, she said, exceeds capitalist concepts of ownership; land back is about “reclamation of our kinship systems, our governance systems, our ceremony and spirituality, our language, our culture, and our food and medicinal systems,” all of which “are based on our relationships to the land.”
She emphasized that the movement is also about stewardship, and “making sure that we do whatever we can in a collaborative way to protect it for future generations.”
The Indigenous ways of land management and stewardship that will be used on Monument Mountain will benefit the environment, and is believed that such stewardship practices could also help combat global warming.
Patty Krawec wrote about Land Back in “Becoming Kin”: “We cannot talk about restoring our relationship to the land without talking about restoring the land to relationship with the people from whom it was taken. […] Unable to imagine any scenario other than what settler colonialism unleashed on us, people assume that Land Back means evictions, relocations, and elimination. […] But wholesale eviction was never what we intended. Remember, from the earliest treaties, we offered a way to live together in peace, friendship, and respect.”
Letters to the Editor - 3-28-24
Where can I go! To get excellent medical care, It was a question that many of us thought about. About 4 years ago I moved to Sharon, Connecticut. It’s a beautiful small town with lovely scenery and great people. And an outstanding hospital, I had the pleasure of being there a week from a tick bite. However about 3 months ago I had a terrible pain in my left hip and went to see my doctor in Amenia Dr. Dweck and he sent me to Sharon Hospital to get an x-ray. And to my shock the X-ray was not what I expected. I needed a new hip! I did not know where I could turn, so I called my family and they told me to go to a New York city hospital to have the replacement. They felt that I can get the best care there. However I know that you can get excellent surgeons but I am not too sure about the care. So I decided to call Sharon hospital and I was told to see doctor John Mullens in Sharon. He is an Orthopedic Specialist. I was skeptical so I made an appointment. When I met Doctor Mullens I was very impressed with his bedside manner I said to him what hospital will you perform the surgery and he said Sharon hospital. I was delighted because I love Sharon Hospital and I know I will get the best care there. The surgery was in February and they were very careful with me because of my heart condition and Doctor Mullens was especially careful to keep me infection free. I will always be grateful to Doctor Mullens and the staff at Sharon Hospital for the great care I received and one last thing: the food at Sharon hospital was fantastic.
Angelo Prunella
Sharon, CT
Anticipation
The ‘billionaire’ is so broke
Now we see through the smoke
The con man was exposed today
I’ll wait before I say hooray
The day will come for me to cheer
And toast the jailer with a beer
Then follow with a bourbon shot
What will he do? What has he got?
Michael Kahler
Lakeville