It's Battle For The San Francisco Library Ahead Of Championship

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — Things are heating up as the Los Angeles Rams and the San Francisco 49ers prepare to duke it out in Sunday's NFC championship for a spot in Super Bowl LVI.

But another, less likely pair of Golden State rivals is also taking up the fight on Twitter and Instagram: the San Francisco and Los Angeles public libraries.

The battle started Sunday when the Los Angeles Public Library tweeted a photo from its archives of a Rams player talking on an old-school landline, with the caption, "Hey [San Francisco Public Library] how are you doing?"

And off they went. The two libraries went back and forth for days.

"We're just getting warmed up," Los Angeles tweeted Thursday, with picture of a Rams hat sitting on a stack of books with provocative names.

"Uhhh you may just be getting warmed up but we're on fire," San Francisco fired back, with a video of a librarian knocking down a Rams book with a football.

The feud is heating up. San Francisco promised Patch there will be more friendly fire before Sunday.

This is not the first time the two libraries have gone back and forth on social media. They have battled over every major professional sports matchup for years. The Los Angeles Public Library has become known for its social media rivalries, said Keith Kesler, a social media librarian with the library.

The competition, of course, is all in good fun. Kesler said he always checks with a library before posting on social media. He thinks the competition is a good reminder that libraries are connected to cultural events and know how to have fun.

"Libraries — they sometimes will have a bit of a dusty reputation, but it gives us a chance to show off that we have a sense of humor," Jaime Wong, public relations officer for the San Francisco Public Library, told KQED.

Kesler started posting competitive tweets from the L.A. library's social media in 2017, when the Dodgers took on the Houston Astros in the World Series. He had seen other libraries battle like this on social media before but didn't anticipate how much people would love the posts, he said.

He has also taken some heat from other places, such as Georgia's Cobb County, which backs the Atlanta Braves.

The exchanges can look different, but Kesler usually includes a stack of books with topical titles topped with a Los Angeles hat. He spends a couple days collecting up to 100 books to use for his posts, all with titles that either describe the rivalry or antagonize the other team.

For a game against San Francisco in January 2021, he put Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse-Five" in the stack.

"The funny thing is you'll have people that are like, 'I'm not even watching this series, but I love what's going on here,' which cracks me up," Kesler said.