In downtown Emporia right on Commercial Street sits the Lyon County History Center. This year, LCHC has introduced a brand new program: the Banned Book Club. 

The Banned Book Club gives its members a chance to read and discuss historically banned books. Alyssa Gharmalkar, senior History major and Media Director for LCHC, is the club’s host. 

“One of the jobs they assigned me over the end of summer/early semester was to find new merch items for our gift shop, things we can sell, and I came across a shirt that said ‘Name a time in history when it was the good guys banning books,’” said Gharmalkar. “We really liked it, but we didn’t think it was fit to sell year round in the gift shop, so my boss offered me the idea of creating a banned book club where we could offer the shirt.”

The goal of the club is to “spread more education and awareness about banned books” and Gharmalkar hopes the club will be very impactful for the community. 

“Because I feel like there is this negative connotation with banned books about them wanting you to think a certain way…we want people to understand education is free and you can’t ban it,” she said.

Just like most things, there are challenges. Gharmalkar says the most challenging aspect of this new project is the amount of banned book content. 

 “I started with 26 books and narrowed it down to ten and those are just the historical ones,” Gharmalkar said. 

The first meeting will be held on Thursday Oct. 5 from 4 to 5 p.m. at the Lyon County History Center and members will vote on a book to choose to be the beginning focus of the club. The Banned Book Club plans to hold meetings every other Thursday moving forward.