On Tuesday evening, April 11, the Beacon Hill Women’s Forum (BHWF) welcomes Vivian Spiro, Chairman of the Board of the Associates of the Boston Public Library, and a key leader in mustering financial support for the ongoing digitization of the BPL’s Special Collections. If you haven’t visited our Boston Public Library on Copley Square since its grand re-opening last summer, you must go, and take your out-of-town visitors, too. With a gorgeous new children’s library, eye-popping colors, a cool teen center, on top of its well-known architectural and artistic treasures, it’s a worthy destination, and still earns its nineteenth-century moniker as Boston’s “Palace of the People.”
The BPL recently underwent a $78 million renovation, with beautiful new interior spaces, external landscaping, and new digital resources available to the public, including DigitalCommonwealth.org. The latter is key to putting the BPL on the cutting edge of library services; and that is where Ms. Spiro comes in, having served for the past sixteen years successfully establishing new Funds for cataloguing, conserving, and digitizing the vast resources of the BPL for public consumption. She has spearheaded a writer-in-residence program, scholarly presentations on conservation of the Special Collections, and the all-important “Literary Lights” fundraiser dinner honoring writers from the Northeast. A graduate of Tufts University, Ms. Spiro previously served in various capacities at the MFA, the Athenaeum, and Beth Israel Hospital, and also worked on the 1987 award-winning Civil Rights documentary, “Eyes on the Prize.”
This Forum will meet from 6 to 8 p.m. at Hampshire House on Beacon Street, with socializing and a cash bar at 6, and Ms. Spiro’s presentation beginning promptly at 6:45. BHWF was established with the goal of encouraging local women to “connect, inspire and enjoy. In addition to the monthly forum, there are dinners out, a mother’s group, cooking adventures, a writer’s support group, the annual fashion show, and other activities. For information about how to join, or if you would like to purchase a ticket to attend a single event, go to www.beaconhillwomensforum.org.