The Legacy of Nancy Dulniak: Nana’s Story

Nana’s Books Foundation is a family affair built upon the legacy of Nancy Dulniak, mother, librarian, and lover of children, as reflected in a piece Nancy wrote during one of her memory classes after being diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment.

I spent the first eighteen years of my life in a small, picturesque valley with the foothills of the Adirondacks to the west and the Green Mountains of Vermont – Granville, NY. Because it was a small town where everybody knew everybody else, it was possible for me to get a library card at the age of 6. One whole year before the ‘legal’ age of 7! Books and reading have always been an important part of my life so it was completely natural that I would choose librarianship as my career!

I worked in the Pember Library during high school and then my college library, SUNY Fredonia where my husband Dennis and I met at Freshman Orientation. After college, I continued to work in libraries such as the University of Rochester, Montana State University, (the main and the architecture libraries), Ohio Wesleyan University, Piedmont Technical College, and Lander University. These positions allowed me to gain experience in several areas including Circulation, Acquisitions, Library Instruction, Special Collections, Reference, and Cataloging.

It was 11 years after I graduated from college before I had the opportunity to go to graduate school. The University of South Carolina granted me a Masters of Librarianship in 1987 and inducted me into Beta Phi Mu. Since then, I worked at the Sixth Court of Appeals Library in Nashville, TN, at Austin Peary State University as a tenured librarian, and at the Maitland Public Library. I retired in 2014 from Florida A&M University College of Law Library where I was the Catalog Librarian. 

Nancy passed away from Early Onset Alzheimer’s on January 26, 2021 in Oviedo, FL, leaving behind her husband of 47 years, Dennis Dulniak, her son Mark, daughter-in-law Olivia, son Craig, daughter-in-law Julia, and grandchildren Blaine and William. Her family created Nana’s Books Foundation in December 2020 to honor Nancy’s lifelong library legacy by providing grade-appropriate materials on Alzheimer's, dementia, and other disabilities to public libraries and students in Title I schools. We want to pass on Nancy's dual loves of reading and of helping others find what they need in libraries by providing resources for people to better understand disabilities that they may face in one way or another throughout their lives.