The Wallowa County libraries leaped far into the future this fall, connecting their patrons to more than a million items that can be reserved from the comfort of home on a personal computer.

The Enterprise, Joseph and Wallowa city libraries as well as the county libraries in Troy and Imnaha joined the Sage Library System of Eastern Oregon — a consortium of academic, public and special libraries. The combined catalog is hosted by Eastern Oregon University’s Pierce Library in La Grande.

Enterprise Librarian Danene Rautenstrauch said the Wallowa County libraries decided to join the Sage System together. “We tend to hang together because we are so small,” she said.

Now Wallowa County patrons have access to as many items as people in Pendleton and Hood River, she said. In return, the Enterprise Library has 16,000 items available. Rautenstrauch said she was surprised when requests started coming in to borrow from its collection.

“Who would have thought I’d send out 10 to 25 items a week?” she said.

A courier service delivers materials borrowed from other libraries to patrons’ home libraries. Sage cardholders may initiate and cancel holds, check their patron records and renew materials online.