From childhood through college — and sometimes even beyond — there’s often a struggle as people try to determine what they want to do when they grow up.

That was not the case for Julie Klineline. She knew for certain during her formative years what adulthood held for her.

“From a young age, I knew that I loved libraries,” Klineline remembers. “In fact, when I was in sixth grade, that’s what I said I was going to be, was a librarian.”

Turns out she was right.

Well, after a brief change of heart, anyway.

“Then later on, in high school, an English teacher got me into journalism, and I started a little humor column there in the newspaper,” she recalls. “And then I kind of changed my mind. I thought, well, maybe I’m going to be a journalist.”

Klilneline, who was born in California before her family moved back to Oklahoma in 1980 when she was about 11 years old — “my parents said I became an Okie as soon as we crossed the state line” — was in the second class of students who were part of Carl Albert Junior College’s scholar center residence, a competitive scholarship program for academically strong and leadership-capable students that continues at Carl Albert State College.

“I had been the editor for the school paper two years and went on to Northeastern [State University] — I was still planning on doing journalism,” Klineline says.

But once on the newspaper staff at NSU, she discovered, “I don’t think my skin is quite thick enough to be a journalist.” But she finished her journalism coursework and graduated with a double major in mass communications and English.

Then when Klineline was ready for a career, she found the path that led her to where she is today — shared branch manager for Stanley Tubbs Memorial Library in Sallisaw and the Muldrow Public Library.

“My first official job after college was at the Fort Smith Public Library, and I rediscovered my love of libraries, and it just went from there,” Klineline says. She worked at the Fort Smith library for nine years, finishing as circulation manager.

But in addition to her love for libraries, was her love for her children, and her desire to stay home, first with her son, and then with her daughter. But raising a family in Fort Smith was not what Klineline wanted.

“My husband graduated from Sallisaw, and I graduated from Stigler High School, and neither one of us wanted our son to go to such a big school in Fort Smith. We wanted him to have that small-town experience. We wanted to know his teachers. So we made the decision [in 2000] to move to Sallisaw when he was in preschool,” Klineline says of moving back to Oklahoma. “And then my daughter came along, and about a year later, I decided that I wanted to stay home with her. So I left the Fort Smith Public Library.”

But, Klineline admits, there was a struggle between being a stay-athome mom and returning to her library career.

About that same time, a search was conducted for the manager position at the Tubbs library, and Klineline applied. But she rescinded her application when her maternal instincts won out.

But, as luck would have it, about the same time her daughter began attending all-day pre-K, there was a job opening at the Sallisaw library.

“They had an opening come up for a children’s clerk — do the story time and also work at the front desk — and so I applied for it, and Bethia [Owens] hired me,” Klineline says of the shared branch manager who she replaced when Owens retired on September 30. “I’ve been here ever since just working my way up. Over the years, you just get more and more responsibilities, until finally, I was the librarian here for the last couple of years. And then Bethia decided she was going to retire, and they offered it to me, and so I decided to take it to be the manager.”

Klineline is currently working toward her master’s degree in library science with distance learning through the University of Oklahoma, fulfilling yet another dream of hers.

“That’s been a dream of mine for over 30 years to earn my master’s. But life gets in the way, and money problems, kids are born, and you just put it behind you for right then,” Klineline explains. “Two years ago, right before I became the librarian, I had enrolled at OU and I’ve been working on my master’s for the last couple of years.”

Klineline expects to earn her master’s degree in spring 2026.

“It just kind of fit, everything just went together perfectly. I’ve been working in the library, and then I was working on my master’s, and then the opening came up, so that’s how I got here,” she summarizes.

For much of August and September, Klineline was spending time at the Muldrow library, working there once a week, getting to know the people and the organizations in preparation for assuming the shared manager role.

“I’d been doing that in Sallisaw for a long time. They have the Leadership classes that the city of Sallisaw does, and I’ve been doing those for the last couple of years, getting to know how the city works and the organizations,” Klineline says. “The library is really big, and we like to partner with the organizations in the community and go out from there. We can do so much more when we work together.

“I’ve been really excited to get to know the people in Muldrow. My daughter did a little bit of travel basketball that was based in Muldrow, she did that for a few years. They were Oklahoma Madness. So I feel like I have a slight knowledge of some of the people and the organizations there, but I have a lot to learn, and I’m just really glad and excited for the opportunity to be part of this.

“Bethia had been here so long and left such a legacy at both libraries, and I’m very much aware of how much work that I’m going to have to do to live up to that high standard that she has set, and that’s really what I’m hoping for,” Klineline says.

“We’re in a transition period here in both libraries. Everybody that comes to the library in Sallisaw has already seen me for all these years, so they know me. Those preschoolers that I was reading to when I started are now graduated, have their own families, and they come in and they recognize me and remember me, and that’s always kind of nice. I like to see them coming back in with their kids to see a tradition keeps going on. Muldrow doesn’t know me as well, so I’ve got to get to know them.

“But I’m really excited just to get through the transition as smoothly as possible, and look forward to the future and what the library can offer both communities.

“I’m still learning, even though I did a lot of the day-to-day work here at Stanley Tubbs, there is a lot to learn with the management end of it. So I’m still learning that,” Klineline says of the transition. “There’s a few little things that I’m trying to make it easier for both of my staff to communicate with me and stay in contact with me, because I have to divide my time between the two branches. I’m not really foreseeing any huge changes right now. I’m just trying to get the lay of the land, and I just want it to be a smooth transition. I don’t want our library users to feel like they’re losing anything while I’m learning. I want them to feel like they are still getting the best service from both branches.”

Serving the community

“It’s changed over the years, what our services are,” Klineline acknowledges. “We offer a lot of programs for the community, and we go out in the community.

“I have some senior citizen exercise classes that I do out in the community. One’s called S.A.I.L., and one’s called Tai Chi. The S.A.I.L. class has a little bit of cardio, some stretching, some muscle building, and both of those exercise programs are designed with the idea of helping those 65 and older keep their balance, be able to stay in their homes for longer, just improve their overall quality of life.

Also at Muldrow, we have the classes there in the library, and we do a lot of that. We have our story time, our summer reading program’s a big thing to help the kids retain their reading abilities over the summer when they’re not in school, because you don’t want them to lose it by not using it. And the libraries are really striving to provide accurate information, to provide education and entertainment for the community. So the scope of libraries has kind of changed a little bit over the years. It’s becoming more important for us not only to have people come into the library and use our services or classes, but to go out into the community and provide those same classes and let them know what we offer.

“We also have a lot of databases for people looking for a job, resume help,” Klineline says. “We have homework help on databases where kids can get real-time assistance in doing their homework. We have a database for veterans for them to navigate their health system, and also, whenever they retire from the military, there is a resume service to help them translate what they did for the military to a civilian type job, so that they can find a job after they leave the military.

“We have an Ancestry subscription that people can use here in the library, and we also offer genealogy classes.

“So it’s grown, it’s changed the scope of everything that the library provides. It’s more than books, more than movies. Whatever the community needs that we see that we can provide, that’s what we’re going to try and do. So we really try to get familiar with what the community wants and needs,” Klineline says.

Through the years

“When I first started, way back in 1992, the Fort Smith library was the first library in Arkansas to go to a completely electronic card catalog,” Klineline recalls of her journey. “They had just gotten rid of that catalog maybe the year before I started, and so it was still a transition. We kept the old catalog behind the desk, and we used it to hold the information on people’s library cards. The OPAC (online public access catalog), the computers that people used to look up the catalog, what’s in the library, was out on the floor, so they could come look up what they wanted to find.

“But people weren’t used to that. And I would have people come around the desk and try to go to the card catalog, and I had to say, ‘I’m sorry, let me take you over here and show you how to look up your items.’ That was a big change,” Klineline recalls.

As with virtually everything else in the world, technology drives change.

“Mostly it’s just the technology and the use of computers has increased so much over the years. I would say ebooks and the digital materials we have are becoming more what people are looking for when they come into the library. People are still checking out books, and they love books. But there’s also that convenience of being able to go online in the middle of the night and check out a book to read, and also the availability of the databases,” Klineline observes. “That’s the biggest change for me, just the electronics and technology and trying to keep up. When I was in high school, computers were barely used then, and now everything is computerized. Kids are born using these computers. So for us older people, it’s a challenge to try and keep up with that technology and learn. You have to keep learning.”

An example of that continual learning is the acronym READ, which stands for Reading to Ensure Academic Development.

“In Muldrow, we’ve got the READ program, which is something that’s been going on for over 20 years. Seniors at the Muldrow school are paired up with younger students who might be having some issues with reading or need some encouragement. So the READ program works to partner a senior with a child, and they meet in the library once or twice a week and read and play games with them, just to give them the encouragement to increase their reading ability, and it helps both of them.

“The student gets the practice and encouragement they need, and the senior can earn credit for volunteering, and they also are up for a scholarship that’s offered by the Muldrow Friends of the Library at the end of that semester. So we partner with lots of different groups to try to provide programs that will benefit the community,” the new shared branch manager says.

The nuts and bolts

Libraries in the Eastern Oklahoma Library System (EOLS) have two different subscriptions to benefit library users — Libby and Hoopla.

“The Libby most closely resembles a standard library,” Klineline explains. “You only get that one copy (of a book), that one electronic copy that people can check out. So you do have to wait sometimes to get it.

“With Hoopla, you don’t get to pick what books are available on Hoopla all the time, but multiple copies can be used at the same time. So we do have both options available, and Hoopla is the more expensive option (for the library) because of the fact that it lets everybody check out multiple copies.”

While the library still maintains a robust collection of physical DVDs that can be checked out, with Hoopla, the public also has the option of streaming movies, TV shows and music. “All that’s available through Hoopla. You just have to have your library card, and then that’s available to you.”

Klineline says digital content is a new experience, for both the library and its patrons, so there’s still a learning process. And because the companies that provide digital content still have to make money, it’s a delicate balance for libraries with limited financial means.

“Libraries are stewards of the money that we’re given, and we have to make careful decisions. We want to serve the community the best way we can and make their money go as far as we can to serve them,” she says.

In addition, the EOLS cardholders can also be a cardholder with other library systems, such as the Southeastern Oklahoma Library System.

To be sure, the Sallisaw and Muldrow libraries are much bigger than you think.

“The great thing about being part of a system library is, not only do our communities have all the volumes that are in the buildings at these two libraries, we can borrow from our other branches. There’s 15 branches, so patrons have access to all the books and materials in all 15 libraries,” Klineline explains.

“We have a delivery service that brings the books here that our people request. We also have something called interlibrary loan, where we could go outside our system. If we don’t have the item here, we can try and borrow it from a library anywhere in the United States to bring it here for our people to use.

“We have the ability to provide most anything that somebody needs. And sometimes we don’t know what we can provide until someone asks us, tells us, ‘I need this. Can you get it for me?’ And we’ll have to think about it. And if it’s possible, we’re going to try and get that for them, because that’s our job, is to get them the information that they need,” Klineline says.