Beyond books: makerspaces, streamed pictures, books by mail, and the talking-book route

as published, November 2026 · the services at documented size

The maker rooms: The library's published list of its own services carries, beside public computers and the online collections, makerspaces — working rooms in the system's buildings where the programming is making: the library's June 2023 newsletter runs a Summer Reading Challenge kickoff whose stations include "Donut Decorating (Makerspace)," and its 2026 program photography shows the maker-space rooms in ordinary use for craft, food and building programs for children. The service is printed here at the size the system's own publications give it — named rooms, programmed in the monthly newsletters — and no equipment inventory or square footage for them stands in the record reached.

Television, film and music, by stream: The library runs no broadcast station — no radio or television station is licensed to Mishawaka, a negative this history's broadcast record establishes whole — and its screen and sound services are streamed, at sizes its Long Range Plan 2023–27 states in its own words: comic books and TV/movies through hoopla; music downloads and streaming through Freegal; magazines and newspapers through PressReader; and, from 2022, the Indiana Digital Library's OverDrive consortium (the Libby app) for e-books and e-audiobooks, joined against the longer waits of the system's own copies. Sixteen purchased databases stand beside the state's INSPIRE set in the same plan's count. The "television service" of this library is a cardholder's stream, and it is printed as exactly that.

Reading for those who cannot come, or cannot hold a book: Two services carry the collection past the buildings' doors, and both are documented at working size. Books by Mail selects and delivers reading materials by mail at no cost to patrons of Penn and Harris townships who are unable to visit the library due to disability or infirmity — books in regular and large print, audiobooks and magazines, up to four items a shipment in a canvas bag with a reversible shipping label, loaned six weeks without renewal; the program is headed by Kathryn Cullison, the Harris Branch's Adult Services team leader, who states its size in the library's own video: "We average around 20 to 25 patrons at a time." The talking-book route runs through the state: residents of Indiana who are blind or have limited vision, or who are unable to hold a book, are eligible for the Indiana Talking Book and Braille Library at the Indiana State Library — large-print books, digital audiobooks and players, and Braille materials mailed from Indianapolis with free return postage — and MPHPL assists its patrons with the application, or the State Library takes it directly at 1-800-622-4970. The local library's part in the national talking-book service is the doorway, and the doorway is staffed: that is the documented size of reading services for the blind in this district, printed as the system's own page prints it.

Sources:

1. Mishawaka-Penn-Harris Public Library, services and spaces listings (mphpl.org), read November 2026 — public computers, the online resources, and makerspaces among the system's published services.
2. Mishawaka-Penn-Harris Public Library, newsletter, June 2023 (LibraryAware) — the Makerspace station in the Summer Reading Challenge kickoff program.
3. Mishawaka-Penn-Harris Public Library, Long Range Plan 2023–27 (mphpl.org) — hoopla (comic books, TV/movies), Freegal (music), PressReader (magazines and newspapers), the 2022 joining of the Indiana Digital Library OverDrive consortium, INSPIRE and the 16 purchased databases.
4. Mishawaka-Penn-Harris Public Library, "Books by Mail" (mphpl.org), read November 2026 — the service's terms whole (eligibility, four items, six-week loans, the reversible label), Kathryn Cullison heading the program, and her stated average of 20 to 25 patrons at a time; the Indiana Talking Book and Braille Library paragraph — eligibility, the materials and players, free return postage, MPHPL's application assistance, and the State Library's 1-800-622-4970.
5. This history's broadcast record — no radio or television station licensed to Mishawaka, the negative that bounds this entry's broadcast test.