2020-2021 Winner: Sharon Meade
Sharon Meade, Curator and Community Services Liaison for the Outer Banks Center for Wildlife Education, is the recipient of the 2021 Grace Austin Award!
The Grace Austin Award is given each year to a member of the community who provides special service to the Currituck County Library. Sharon is one of the most active, creative and dedicated library contributors. For the better part of a decade Sharon has shared her expertise and enthusiasm with library patrons of all ages through her special programming on local wildlife and regional history.
Young library patrons have grown up learning about bears, bats, owls, snakes and more through Sharon's lively and educational presentations each year during Summer Reading Programs at the Barco, Corolla and Moyock libraries. She also makes herself available for library special events including Harvest Hullabaloo and the annual Holiday Make It & Take It Craft Workshop where she generously gives of her time and resources. Her painted decoy craft offerings are always patron favorites.
Sharon's vast knowledge of regional history and her collection of local memorabilia delighted a full room of adult patrons in February of 2020 who attended her presentation titled Hunt Clubs of Currituck County. In her presentation, Sharon recounted the impact of the 50-year period from the 1870s to the 1920s during which more than 100 gunning clubs and lodges were established in a 100-mile-long area of Back Bay and Currituck Sound and how this change created a cottage industry and altered the lives, laws, education, and people.
The Currituck County Public Library system is fortunate to benefit from and proud to recognize Sharon Meade's love and knowledge of the area–its history, heritage and habitats–and her support of the Currituck County Public Library System.
12-09-2021