Converse Free Library

Lyme was established by a charter in 1761; the first library was formed on January 20, 1778 and called “the Social Library in Lime”. In 1908, the town voted to support a public library called the Lyme Town Library.

By the 1930s, the library had outgrown its space in the Lyme School and the town accepted a bequest to build a separate library building across the street in memory of Sidney Converse, to be called the Converse Free Library. It was completed in 1936. A large, new section was added to the building in the early 1980s.

The collection today includes about 34,000 physical items to lend, in the form of books, periodicals, DVDs, and books on CD. In addition, the library provides access to tens of thousands of free resources through digital downloads, online databases, and a video streaming platform. The library functions in cooperation with the school library, sharing its resources with the Lyme Elementary School through the efforts of the librarians in each building.