BAYLISS, Calif. — Surrounded by a sea of Glenn County farmland is the little community of Bayliss. The nearest city, Chico, is about 20 miles away.
It's so rural the county simply named the roads numbers or letters, so when giving directions, locals use landmarks like "the old red barn" or "the house with toilet flower planters." At the center of this community is the Bayliss Library.
“It was even harder to miss when the speed limit was 35. You know your town is gone when they take the speed limit signs down,” said long-time resident Wally Cramer.
It’s true. Other than a few cattle dairies, the town of Bayliss is gone. Cramer says the school and the old store closed down long ago but the community couldn't let go of the library.
“For all the reasons you want a library, it's here and it's our one thing that is still standing,” said Cramer.
The little white stucco-covered building is modest but it's among the last of its kind.
“Historically it is the smallest library that Carnegie funded. It was also among the last. He was at the end of his life and had built well over 2,000 libraries,” said Cramer.
Carnegie libraries were gifts from Pennsylvania philanthropist and steel mill mogul Andrew Carnegie. He granted money to communities all over the world to expand free education.
“This is the only library that Carnegie funded that wasn’t a part of a town,” said Cramer.
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Getting a Carnegie library grant was difficult and the first attempt at getting a grant for the Bayliss library failed.
“They didn’t have enough people that Carnegie thought would utilize a library,” said Cramer.
So they tried again, this time inflating their population a bit.
“They went out as far as Colusa to get names of people that might use the library,” he said.
The grant was accepted and the Bayliss Library doors were opened in 1917. The library was instantly popular and became part of a book reading frenzy in Glenn County.
“At one time Glenn County had over 30 libraries," said library director Jody Meza.
She is a firm believer libraries play a much bigger role than just being a building to house books in a rural county of fewer than 30,000 people.
"A place for everyone to connect, to get together. You have that in church but the other main place to do that was to come to the library,” said Meza.
And connect they did. The people of Bayliss used their library as meeting place, a place to get information and a place to cool down during the hot summers.
“We would come in here during the summer and stand in front of the swamp cooler,” said Cramer.
When the county fell on hard times and threatened to close the library because of budget issues, the Bayliss community took the keys and started running it themselves. It caught the attention of travel host Huell Howser.
Then, in 2017, the community banded together and fully restored the building just in time to celebrate its 100th birthday.
“A lot of government officials came out, so it was a wonderful celebration of the community, of the hard work everyone has done to keep the library open,” said Meza.
Of the 142 Carnegie Libraries in California, only 36 operate as actual libraries and Bayliss is one of them. In a sea of farmland, the Bayliss Library is more than just a landmark, it’s a part of a rural community and its identity.
MORE LITERATURE ON THE BACKROADS: Visit the 'Pig Palace' and other oddities of legendary American author Jack London, who was more than a writer and an adventurer, he was also a farmer.
