Jubilant Activist Leads Dedication of Namesake Library

The dedication of a building became a celebration of community activism Saturday as ribbons were cut at the Alma Reaves Woods--Watts Branch Library, named for a local volunteer after scores of residents protested a city policy reserving such honors for donors of $1 million or more.

“As we open up the flagship, the crown jewel, of the libraries of Los Angeles, it was only appropriate that we name it after the crown jewel of our community,” Councilman Rudy Svorinich Jr. told a crowd of nearly 1,000 gathered for the gala.

“She is the symbol of our hope. The symbol of our dreams. The symbol of our perseverance. The symbol of not being able to be stopped where so many roadblocks were placed in her way,” said Svorinich, who led the charge last week to make an exception to the million-dollar policy in honor of Woods.

“Watts is not the name of a 31-year-old riot,” he said. “It’s the name of a proud community, a proud people that is taking the city of Los Angeles into the 21st century.”

The 71-year-old Woods, known in the community as “the lady who built the library,” emceed the two-hour ceremony, collecting two bouquets of roses, proclamations from Congress, the governor of Utah and the mayor of Salt Lake City--where her eldest son lives--and a special plaque from the Friends of the Watts Branch fund-raising group, which she heads.

“It didn’t cost a million dollars, but it cost something,” said Friends member Ann Miller, who lobbied the Library Commission and then the City Council to name the new branch for Woods. “It cost some blood and sweat.”

Woods spent decades lugging books from the local library to pass out to children at the Nickerson Gardens housing project, then knocked on countless doors campaigning for the bond issue to build the branch.

As the doors of the $3-million facility were open to the public for the first time, Woods’ name shone on the front of the building in silver letters, added quickly after Tuesday’s City Council action honoring her efforts. The council’s vote to yank jurisdiction from the Library Commission--which had refused to make an exception to the million-dollar policy until a thorough review of the naming guidelines is completed later this summer--followed a Times article profiling Woods and a flood of 500 phone calls to the mayor’s office from people outraged about the policy.

“We are gathered here today to show the whole world what it means to celebrate in the ‘hood,” Woods said to an audience that included her 89-year-old mother, who came in a wheelchair from a convalescent home. “Those of you who’ve known Alma Reaves Woods for as long as three hours have never seen her almost speechless. But guess what? Now I’m almost speechless. I am ecstatic.”

Later, after she snipped the ribbon with a giant pair of scissors, Woods added: “They talk about heaven and the great beyond. It can’t be any more glorious than this.”

Led by a marching band and color guard, Woods and other dignitaries launched the ceremony with a parade from the cramped old library, which could hold just 35 people and 14,000 books, to the gleaming new facility that is triple the size and boasts computer terminals, a language laboratory, special skylights and air conditioning.

“This is a dream that came true. Thirty-some years you wanted this,” Louis Brown, who grew up in Nickerson Gardens in the 1960s, told Woods as he hugged her after the ceremony. “Here it is.”