Barbara Moore, beloved children’s’ librarian at the Mattituck-Laurel Library, passed away last week after a battle with cancer. Her coworkers say that, although her loss left a “big hole,” in the library, her love of literature, children and learning will long live on at the institution.
“Barbara had the pulse of the community,” said Karen Letteriello, who managed the children’s department with Moore. “She knew what people wanted, what they needed and how to work with them to get it.”
Letteriello worked side-by-side with Moore for nearly 20 years at the library. Together, they built the children’s section of the library into the vibrant learning space it is today.
The pair attended meetings, workshops and conferences together to find the best ways to improve their library. “They were all over the place and I’d always have to drive — Barbara hated driving.”
But Moore was a lover of many things, Letteriello said, especially literature and spending time by the bay.
And, above all, she loved children.
“She just adored kids. Anytime there’s a baby in the room, that’s all she would see,” Letteriello said. “Anything with children and she was all about it. They were her number one priority.”
Moore was also an incredibly hard worker, Letteriello said, developing many programs at the library over the past two decades, including the Baby’s Rhyme Time program where parents bring children under 12-months-old to listen to nursery rhymes, read (and performed) by Moore.
“She didn’t like to sing, but always would anyway for the kids during Rhyme Time,” Letteriello recalled fondly.
Letteriello says some days, she hears Moore in the back of her mind. “I will be working on something and stop and think: wait, would Barbara like this?
“She was always focused on making sure our collection was stellar,” Letteriello said. She recalled last summer, when Pluto was reclassified to no longer be considered a planet. “Barbara couldn’t get the books calling it a planet off the shelves fast enough.”
Moore was a lifelong lover of literature, Letteriello said, remarking that her friend “didn’t even own a television.”
“She loved historical fiction, so now I’m trying learn more about that genre so if someone comes in with questions, I have answers,” Letteriello said. “I’m actually currently on one Barbara just finished reading and told me I just had to read it to get me into the genre.”
Moore got her diagnosis in February. By April, she knew she would be unable to return to work.
“She called to tell me that she wasn’t going to be able to come back to work,” Letteriello said. “And she seemed to me more upset that she wouldn’t be able to come back and continue the work we were doing than that she was battling cancer.”
Since then, the library has made some major changes in its departments — particularly merging the ‘Children and Parenting’ department with the ‘Teen’ department to become ‘Youth and Parenting.’
“Barbara was such a force here that when she left, we had to make a significant change,” Letteriello. “Because to leave things as they were would have been to difficult. She left a hole too big to fill.”
Friends of Moore took to the Mattituck-Laurel Library Facebook page to mourn, calling her passing a “loss to our community.”
Moore’s family will receive visitors on Friday, August 5 from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Hale & Lynch Funeral Home, 691 Middle Country Rd, Middle Island. A memorial service will be held at 10 a.m. on Monday, August 8 at the Old Steeple Community Church, 656 Main Rd., Aquebogue.
