Events Calendar

Join us in the Tabor Room every Monday! Newcomers welcome.

Want a special way to get ready for the holidays? Well, look no further! Join us for a wonderful Floral Workshop: Designing in Winter White
with Kerry Patel of The Flowery.  As the seasons shift from autumn to winter, nature provides us a serene, neutral landscape from which we we can draw inspiration. You will create a floral arrangement using both fresh and dried plant material that you can take home with you. All materials provided.
Kerry is a local Madison mom and entrepreneur. She is passionate about flowers and has an exquisite eye. Kerry believes that floral design is about more than putting stems in a vessel. She has learned how to connect to each stem, to each imperfect flower, to each design. She learned that meaningful and intentional floral design begins within. Not only is her description of flowers very poetic but so are her floral arrangements. You can learn more about Kerry at Kerry Patel Poetic Florals at kerrypatel.com


*This program is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*

Registration is limited so don't delay and sign up today. 

It’s a beautiful day! Let’s take a walk. Let’s take a ride. Let’s “visually” explore the Revolutionary War/Morristown, NJ/George Washington connection. (Something you’ve been meaning to do for as long as you can remember, right? So, LET’S DO IT!) 
Join us for this Zoom lecture hosted by Joel Farkas. 


*This program is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*

Come practice your Spanish with us! This program is intended for those who already have a foundation in the language.

Come prepared to talk about cookbooks you like and to share your favorite recipes!

Join us to discuss The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green. "The Anthropocene is the current geological age, in which human activity has profoundly shaped the planet and its biodiversity. In this remarkable symphony of essays adapted and expanded from his ground-breaking, critically acclaimed podcast, John Green reviews different facets of the human-centered planet - from the QWERTY keyboard and Halley's Comet to Penguins of Madagascar - on a five-star scale." --Provided by the publisher

Newcomers welcome. Must be 18 years or older due to mature content.
Current Book: Beta Testing the Apocalypse by Tom Kaczynski 

"Beta Testing includes approximately 10 short stories. Kaczynski takes abstract ideas: capitalism, communism, or utopianism and makes them tangible. He depicts and meditates on the immense political and technological structures and spaces we inhabit that subtly affect and define the limits of who we are and the freedom we as Americans presume to enjoy." --Provided by the publisher.

Join us in the Tabor Room every Monday! Newcomers welcome.

Join us for a live, virtual journey through history, as Museum docents or curators answer your questions and walk you through a slideshow of objects and imagery via Zoom. 
Experience the natural beauty of the United States through the eyes of artists in New-York Historical's collection. Discover how an evolving understanding of science and the emergence of early conservation movements shaped the 19th-century work of naturalist John James Audubon and the landscape painters of the Hudson River School.
*Sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*

Emma Gatewood told her family she was going on a walk and left her small Ohio hometown with a change of clothes and less than two hundred dollars. The next anybody heard from her, this genteel, farm-reared, sixty-seven-year-old great-grandmother had walked 800 miles along the 2,050-mile Appalachian Trail. By September 1955 she stood atop Maine’s Mount Katahdin, sang “America, the Beautiful,” and proclaimed, “I said I’ll do it, and I’ve done it.”
Driven by a painful marriage, Grandma Gatewood not only hiked the trail alone, she was the first person—man or woman—to walk it twice and three times. At age seventy-one, she hiked the 2,000-mile Oregon Trail. Gatewood became a hiking celebrity, and appeared on TV with Groucho Marx and Art Linkletter. The public attention she brought to the trail was unprecedented. Her vocal criticism of the lousy, difficult stretches led to bolstered maintenance, and very likely saved the trail from extinction.
Author Ben Montgomery interviewed surviving family members and hikers Gatewood met along the trail, unearthed historic newspaper and magazine articles, and was given full access to Gatewood’s own diaries, trail journals, and correspondence. Grandma Gatewood’s Walk shines a fresh light on one of America’s most celebrated hikers.

A quiet and reserved man who lived for his art, Frederic Chopin appeared only in a little over two dozen public concerts. His music is filled with moments of intense depth and anguish. However, despite being in physical and mental agony for most of his life, his playing was graceful, poignant, and delicate. 

Delve into the life of contrast of this 19th century musical prodigy who preferred the darkness when the world so longed for his light.

This program is presented by Dan Lupo of From A to G Music.

*Sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*

Join us in the Tabor Room every Monday! Newcomers welcome.

Despite the Middle Ages still sometimes being called the Dark Ages, people in that era often enjoyed good times, especially at
the table. Through art and archaeology, learn about medieval foods and their preparation—including a recipe for roast unicorn!--
in late-medieval feasts, as well as the rules and ceremonies under which these sumptuous foods were presented and the types of entertainment guests might enjoy. Works from the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Met's Cloisters Museum will highlight
this talk.

*This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Library*

Join us in the Tabor Room every Monday! Newcomers welcome.

Join Sylvia Laudien-Meo, and NYC tour guide and arts aficionado, for a  presentation & discussion about Yayoi Kusama, a contemporary artist who focuses on quirky sculpture and other art mediums. 

*Sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*

From the White House and the silver screen, to Olympic podiums and equality marches, these women changed the world — blazing the trail while battling adversity. Without each one of their contributions, our world wouldn't be the what it is today. In honor of Women's History Month, we take a look at these fierce, empowering, and inspiring ladies. Throughout history, numerous women have pushed for societal change and influenced the lives of many, allowing women and girls globally to live a life that's free from stereotypes and patriarchal restraints and, most of all, encouraging girls to dream bigger.

*This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Library*

In The Bank War: Andrew Jackson, Nicholas Biddle, and the Fight for American Finance, historian Paul Kahan explores one of the most important and dramatic events in American political and economic history, from the idea of centralized banking and the First Bank of the United States to Jackson’s triumph, the era of “free banking,” and the creation of the Federal Reserve System. Relying on a range of primary and secondary source material, the book also shows how the Bank War was a manifestation of the debates that were sparked at the Constitutional Convention—the role of the executive branch and the role of the federal government in American society—debates that endure to this day as philosophical differences that often divide the United States.

Author Paul Kahan will be lecturing on his book, The Bank War. 


*This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Library*

Join us in the Tabor Room every Monday! Newcomers welcome.

The Great Gatsby, has become synonymous with the lifestyle of the rich and famous on Long Island. But what if the origins of Gatsby are in Westport, Connecticut? Spend an evening with the director of Gatsby in Connecticut: The Untold Story to learn more. William’s presentation will take you back to that wild summer in 1920 when Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald spent their Honeymoon months in Westport. Learn about how the Fitzgerald’s time not only influenced Gatsby but Zelda’s art too.

 

"Gatsby in Connecticut" features Sam Waterston and was narrated by Keir Dullea. The documentary was selected as one of The New Yorker's Best Movies of 2020. It also won Best New England Film from the Mystic Film Festival. During the presentation, Williams will show clips from his film.

 

Robert Steven Williams is an award-winning filmmaker and novelist. He’s also a musician and entrepreneur. For the past twenty years he has been writing stories and making short films and videos for not-for-profits including the Paul Newman founded Safe Water Network, and the Dublin-based, Concern Worldwide. Nominated for a Harvey as executive producer and a writer on the CBGB Comic Book Series, Robert is a former senior executive at the EMI Music Group and is a graduate of Harvard Business School. He is currently in pre-production on a documentary about the Elman Sports Club’s peace efforts in Somalia.


*This event is sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Library*

Join Sylvia Laudien-Meo, and NYC tour guide and arts aficionado, for a  presentation & discussion of this interesting and surprisingly relevant exhibition on Dorothea Lange’s photography  and their relationship to language – found in the environment, but also added in various publications, to “extend, buttress, illuminate, and explain the photograph”.
​
On a shared screen we will be able to look at Lange’s photographs, learn about the stories behind them and discuss her work as a group.

*Sponsored by the Friends of the Madison Public Library*