The beautifully restored Clayton House was the main attraction at the third annual "Party in the Stacks" fundraiser for the Houston Public Library Foundation.

A languid lawn party feeling permeated the grounds of the Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research in the Museum District as guests toured the newly renovated home where Anderson Clayton founder William Clayton lived until his death in 1966, feasted on a buffet of fried chicken strips, deviled eggs, and biscuits with gravy, sipped Old Fashioneds, and listened to Yvonne Washington and the Mix perform in a backyard tent amid crepe myrtles, roses and other vegetation that was popular in Houston in the early 1900s.

The Clayton family gave the three-story brick Georgian-style house, designed by Birdsall P. Briscoe and built in 1917, to the city of Houston in 1958. Ten years later, it became the center for the library's genealogical collection. In 1988, a new building was constructed in the same style next door.The main home had fallen into a state of disrepair before the recent six-year renovation.

"I truly believe we saved a historic building from the wrecking ball," said Susan Clayton Garwood, the great-great granddaughter of WIlliam Clayton and honorary chair of the event. "It took a village, but we got it done."

She recalled that when she was little, "we had dinner here every Friday night. I was three or four years old, and I had to sit on a telephone book at the dinner table."

Garwood urged guests to research their family genealogy at the center, where monthly sessions are offered from beginner to advanced levels. "No Internet search can come close to the Clayton," she said. "So get your pencil ready."

Also on hand, Mayor Annise Parker who praised the city's specialty libraries but lamented recent budget cuts that have severly curtailed library hours.

"It is going to be a struggle for parents and kids to get those library hours in," Parker said, while noting the increase in library volunteers as a result of the crisis.

"We're going to tap into that wellspring of attachment to the library," Parker vowed. "It's not the size of library, it's the books you find inside."

Also on hand: Houston Public Library Foundation board chair Cathryn Rodd Selman, council members Melissa Noriega and Wanda Williams, event chair Cyvia Wolff, HPLF president Susan Bischoff and husband, Jim Barlow, Nene Foxhall and Steve Jetton, Andrea White, Jack and Ginger Blanton, and Bill and Melissa King.