Two great American pastimes converged into one fun event at the Mineral County Library, pie and reading. On March 25 the library celebrated with a pie contest and they offered a free download of the book, “Art of the Pie” as part of The Big Read.

“We had 13 of the prettiest and tastiest pies you’ve ever seen,” said Library Director, Guna Chaberek on the library’s Facebook page. “Our judges had their hands full trying to pick three winners.”

A long table was filled with mouth-watering lemon meringue, strawberry, huckleberry, and chocolate pies. The judges, Ed Chaberek, Sheelia Miller and Waveland King had the difficult task of sampling the delectable pastries to determine the winners.

Sample, after sweet sample, was taken by the three and after a while, they finally declared Melissa Tuckerman’s chocolate caramel cream as the first place winner. Second place went to Debbie Kelsey’s huckleberry pie, and third went to Pauline Wilson’s southern sweet potato pie with a ginger snap crust and maple whipped cream.

“It was a fun time, well attended and enjoyed,” said Chaberek.

The downloadable book, “Art of the Pie” was a part of an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts. The Big Read “broadens our understanding of our world, our communities, and ourselves through the joy of sharing a good book,” states their website. The book was available for free until March 30.

The initiative aims to inspire conversation and discovery. Something many lucky participants had the opportunity to do that Saturday afternoon, because after the judges made their picks, everyone was able to enjoy a nice piece of pie.