On March 27, 2025, ENTRE was one of many businesses that was affected by flooding in Harlingen, Texas and across the Rio Grande Valley. While many in the community may be aware of this and have helped in our clean-up efforts, we wanted to talk with you all about the effects of the rainwater on over 60 of the books that made up our library. These books were soaked through in the storm. When they dried, many of their pages became wavy and many stuck to each other, making them unreadable. A number of the hardcover books retained water in the covers, leaving them soft to the touch. Most of the books also grew mold and had small bugs in them. As a result, all of the affected books were discarded on our last volunteer day on June 22, 2025.
These journals and books comprised a collection that covered various topics including filmmaking, Mexican and Latinx diasporic creatives, the Valley, and collective action. Some of the books that were lost are classics released decades ago (for example, A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess), while others are rare or out of print (like Memorias by Gabriel Figueroa).
Luckily, the ENTRE space is rebuilding, thanks to the efforts of the team and volunteers over the course of three months. We are installing higher shelving and gearing up to reorganize our media library onto those new shelves. While we know it may take time, we’re hoping to build the book portion of the media library up once again and restore these offerings as a resource for the community to use well into the future.
We’re asking those of you reading this to take a look at our registry of books lost to the flood. If it is within your ability and you’re called to do it, a purchase of a book sent to us would help rebuild our print library. We created a guide that has screenshots showing the process of purchasing a book via the registry. We are also accepting donations of books that community members have that are not on the registry. Donated books may feature topics on film, especially experimental and classic film, director-focused/bios, and technical skills; video art, video technology, and skills; cameras; photography; alternative image making; expanded cinema; and film/art history.
We also want to emphasize here that you do not have to go out of your way to buy any book on or not on the registry; donations of materials aligned with our work are more than welcome! We understand that purchases and/or donations are not possible for everyone, so if you could share the registry, this blog post, and our social media posts widely, that would be a tremendous help as well. Every action has ripple effects that can greatly help us in this time of regrowth and change.
Whatever you are able to do, we appreciate you taking the time to read about this development from the flood. This post was written in an effort to be transparent and invite the community to help, however possible and from whoever is available. We can’t wait to return to you in July with new and exciting programming in ENTRE 3.0!
ENTRE Film Center
P.O. Box 1923
Harlingen, TX 78551
Written by Linda Smith
ENTRE Archive Intern
