Obama couple surprises Chicago students as library opens

Barack and Michelle Obama visited 25 kindergarten through third grade students at the Obama Presidential Center’s public library branch on Chicago’s South Side on Friday morning, just before the 5,000-square-foot library opened to the public for the first time

Barack Obama walked into the main reading room at the Obama Presidential Center’s Chicago Public Library branch and the children looked up like the day had already turned into something bigger.

Just ahead of the doors opening to the public for the first time on Friday. former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama surprised 25 kindergarten through third grade students from William H. Ray Elementary at the South Side campus. During their roughly 25-minute visit. the Obamas read Maurice Sendak’s children’s classic “Where the Wild Things Are” and acted out parts of the book with the students and staff.

“Are you telling stories up in here?” Obama asked the children after they settled in.

He began with riddles. One student answered a question about what “goes up but never does down” with “your age.” Obama joked about how that riddle landed with his family. “That’s only true for me. My wife, she’s getting younger,” he said. Michelle Obama shot back, “No, I’m not.”

The couple split the reading time, with Michelle Obama reading first and Barack Obama following. The children asked questions and joined in with the acting, and Obama encouraged them to “roar,” “gnash their terrible teeth” and “roll their terrible eyes.” The Obamas took part.

During a section about being “king of all the wild things,” Michelle Obama quipped that “there were no kings,” and the room erupted with applause.

That same moment of playfulness carried a sharper edge later. when Michelle Obama made pointed references to President Donald Trump during the center’s dedication ceremony on Thursday. In the library reading room. she tied that theme back to what she called a lasting legacy—telling the crowd that it “isn’t an award or name on a building or number of zeros in a bank account. but the difference we make in one another’s lives.”.

Teachers and parents in the room said they hadn’t been told the school would have special guest readers. The students—from kindergarten through third grade—were also the first school group invited to the new library.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson attended the reading.

The library itself sits on the Obama Presidential Center’s campus in Hyde Park, adjacent to the main museum. The branch spans 5. 000 square feet and is part of the choice the Obamas made for the grounds: they opted to build a community library on the museum campus instead of a traditional National Archives research hub that appears at other presidential centers.

“This is your library, alright,” Barack Obama told the children. He described how he remembered loving books and libraries when he was their age, even when librarians asked him to “shh” because he was “kind of loud.”

“And I’m still kind of loud, my wife says,” he added. He told the students there were “just tons of books here that you guys can read,” calling the space “going to be your spot.”

In the 70-foot muraled reading space—featuring “Reading Circles/Weaving Dreams/Seeding Futures” by artist Aliza Nisenbaum—visitors had been taking photos all morning. Some gave high fives to statues of the Obamas outside the museum while the public waited for the library to open.

The library branch opened its doors to the public around 11 a.m. Friday for the first time. People lined up to get a commemorative Obama Presidential Center public library card.

Before the Obamas appeared, LeVar Burton from “Reading Rainbow” and Mychal Threets, Burton’s successor, read to the children. Threets said he learned the Obamas would be reading to the children about five minutes before the event began. The California native came to Chicago specifically for the library opening and said he had to remember to “calm down and take a deep breath when they walked into the room.”.

“This is pretty cool to be part of the opening of the library for the first black president of the United States. especially on Juneteenth. ” Threets said. “So it’s very special to be part of it. I have my grandmother’s library card, and she wasn’t always able to have a library card. So to fast forward all this time forward, it’s a very special day.”.

The reading room also includes the nearby President’s Reading Room, which features 3,000 books personally selected by the Obamas.

When the Obamas finally stepped into the story—prompting riddles and encouraging the children to roar along with the wild things—the moment landed as more than a ceremonial start. It was a reminder. delivered in plain language. that the library was built for the people who would use it—especially on a day meant to feel historic.

Obama Presidential Center Barack Obama Michelle Obama Chicago Public Library Juneteenth Hyde Park William H. Ray Elementary LeVar Burton Mychal Threets Maurice Sendak