(Note: The following is written by one of the “Urban Legends” program presenters from the Bookmobile Department. Therefore the contents may, or may not, actually be true.)

The earliest archeological evidence concerning bookmobiles was discovered near the almost complete skeletal remains of a dreaded Thesaurus Rex - along with petrified pieces of its favorite food: synonym rolls (I know - it’s an old joke. But we are talking history here). To continue - the earliest bookmobiles, well - weren’t. First of all, it wasn’t the Bookmobile, it was the stone tablet mobile and it took six stonetabletmobile associates and four paraprofessionals just to move it! So it wasn’t all that mobile either. The number of operators was, of course, reduced with the invention of the wheel.

The first really mobile stonetabletmobile achieved locomotion through what scientist have come to call the FBFB or FB squared method. The first FB indicates that the vehicle was powered from both the Front and the Back (i.e. where it was powered). The second FB indicates how it was powered - in this case the initials of the two best known earliest means of locomotion are used: those of Fred and Barney. And although archeologists have figured out how these earliest vehicles were powered - probably by watching the same cartoons as the rest of us - they have yet to figure out how they were steered.

As to the arrangement of the vehicles - weight distribution played a big role. First of all you had your nonfiction (primarily law) carved in stone tablets - these were nearly all granite - and they covered one whole side of the vehicle (actually it didn’t take that many to cover one side - you couldn’t put more than two in a tub - OK, maybe three in a big tub - of course the tubs themselves were made of stone). On the other side of the vehicle was your light reading (mainly just written in stone rather than carved). These were almost always on shale (hence the light reading). Of course you needed to stock a lot more of these on the other side of the vehicle to balance the weight from the nonfiction side. Needless to say, not all the heavy stuff was nonfiction. There was some heavy fiction too - like “Moby Brick”, as well as some lighter nonfiction - such as “How to Make That Perfect Drink on the Rocks” written on a twist of limestone. All of this size and weight took up most of the vehicle. So, even though there was a small children’s section - it consisted mainly of gravel.

The main reason we know all this is that in late 2004 scientist, while looking for that rarest of creatures - an honest politician - discovered a complete mummified stonetabletmobile in a tar pit southwest of L.A. - where the unsuspecting stonetabletmobile driver, trying to find a shortcut, took a wrong turn. It really is quite a find considering the number of people from that area who actually did read.

To be continued: