NC School Library Offers Public Memberships in 1912

Postal librariana related to school libraries is difficult to find so I was delighted when I found a 1912 hand written flyer (see above) mailed by the Warrenton (NC) High School Librarian to members of the Warrenton community. The Librarian W. A. Naham extols the resources of the high school library and then offers to make the library available to non-students for an annual fee of $1. A sign up card was enclosed. He/she ends with: "This is better than borrowing from your neighbors, cheaper than purchasing for yourself, and the wise thing to do. Sign it now." Today Warren County Schools has two high schools in Warrenton. No information on their website about their libraries.

University Club Library Postal Card 1900

According to its website the University Club is "New York’s premier social club offering unparalleled services to members - from gracious dining, luxurious accommodations and a variety of social events, to extensive athletic facilities and the world’s largest and finest club library." The club received its charter in 1864, but its roots date back to 1861. It's current building located at West 54th Street at 5th Avenue was completed in 1899 and includes an incredibly beautiful library. The postal card above which was mailed by the library on Sept. 26, 1900 is a recent addition to my postal librariana collection. The Librarian W. H. Duncan, Jr. is responding to a request from one of the club's members. Duncan had just become librarian after serving as a branch librarian for the Brooklyn Public Library.

Colorado Library to Library Postcard

As I have noted in other posts I collect envelopes and other postal items that have been sent to or from a library. I especially like finding items that have been sent from one library to another. The postcard above fits into that category and it has the added distinction of being a picture postcard depicting a library. The postcard is part of the Phoebe Hayes library postcard collection that I wrote about in the previous post. In the message on the postcard the Documents Librarian at the Charles Leaming Tutt Library of Colorado College in Colorado Springs, CO is letting the Documents Processing Librarian at the Denver Public Library know that she has mailed some documents requested from an exchange list and that the postage to be reimbursed will be 31 cents. The postcard was mailed on March 31, 1967. The Tutt Library is depicted on the front of the postcard. Although, government issued pre-paid postal cards are often used to conduct library business, it is rare to see this occur on a picture postcard.

The Library Postcard Collection of Phoebe Hayes (1905-1975)

At a postcard show in Madison, WI this past weekend I acquired a collection of 30 library postcards that were at one time part of a collection owned by Phoebe Hayes, a librarian who ended her library career around 1970 as Director of the Bibliographical Center for Research in Denver, CO. The postcards that I acquired have all been used and for the most part are addressed to Hayes or one of the libraries where she worked. They date from 1930 to 1970 and have a variety of messages mostly with a library connection. I particularly prize these kinds of postcards. I was able to cross check Hayes' entry in the 1970 edition of A Biographical Directory of Librarians in the United States and Canada published by ALA with the postcard addresses. Her education and library work included the Univ. of Wisconsin, the University of Chicago, the Univ. of Denver, the Joint Reference Library in Chicago, and the Library of the Bureau of the Budget in DC in addition to the BCR in Denver.  It is apparent that her colleagues knew of her interest in library postcards and shared postcards with her that they found or received. The postcard above was sent to Hayes in Chicago (where she was a student) from a friend in Boulder, CO on June 18, 1941. The postcard depicts the Library of the University of Colorado. The message begins with "Another 'library' for your collection." I'll probably share some other postcards from her collection in the future. I've compiled lists of current and former library postcard collectors that I know about. 

George Lincoln Burr (1857-1938) and the White Library at Cornell

I'm a collector of envelopes (called covers by philatelists) that have been sent to or from libraries. I believe that I have the largest collection of these envelopes in the world. My collection numbers in the thousands. I'm always on the lookout for envelopes that have a special story so I was excited to acquire the envelope shown above. It was mailed to Professor George L. Burr at the President White Library at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY on April 25, 1911. Andrew Dickson White was the co-founder and first president of Cornell University. White, with the assistance of Burr, developed a remarkable personal historical library consisting of more than 30,000 volumes which he donated to the Cornell University Library. Burr served as the librarian/curator of the White collection and Professor of History at Cornell. He was an authority on the witchcraft trials and was editor of Narratives of the Witchcraft Cases, 1648-1706. He was President of the American Historical Association in 1916. The envelope is interesting in that it was a souvenir for the 1901 Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, NY but was mailed from Buffalo in 1911. It is marked "Personal". I'm putting together a philatelic exhibit titled "Libraries in 20th Century America" and this envelope will make a nice addition to the exhibit.

Exhibits for National Library Week

Library of Congress exhibit at Hartford, WI library

Wisconsin library memorabilia exhibit at Suring, WI library

One of the more enjoyable activities in my efforts to promote library history is displaying portions of my collection of librariana at libraries around Wisconsin. I do this under the auspices of the Wisconsin Library Heritage Center, a program of the Wisconsin Library Association Foundation. This year the exhibits are being displayed at fourteen different public libraries around the state. To help celebrate National Library Week which runs from April 13 to April 19 exhibits will be on display for the month of April at two very different public libraries - the Jack Russell Memorial Library in Hartford, WI and the Suring Area Public Library in Suring, WI. The Hartford library is located in the southeastern part of the state and serves more than 30,000 people and and occupies a large new facility. The Suring library is located in northeastern Wisconsin and serves about 3,800 people and is housed in a joint use facility with several other village departments. The exhibit at the Hartford library features memorabilia and souvenirs for the Library of Congress.  The exhibit occupies a small display case prominently located in the front of the circulation desk. The exhibit at the Suring library features memorabilia for Wisconsin libraries. The Suring library has four nice display cases located in the lobby of the joint use facility and the cases were large enough to display a significant portion of my Wisconsin library memorabilia collection.  My wife Kathy helps me with the exhibits and we had a wonderful early Spring drive up North to Suring which still had lots of snow and lakes frozen enough to support cars and trucks for ice fishers. Our exhibits are available to libraries on a first come first serve basis regardless of size and we have had exhibits at the metropolitan Milwaukee Public Library and at libraries in communities even smaller than Suring. Every library has a different display case configuration which represents an interesting challenge each time we install the exhibits. The exhibits are always appreciated by the libraries and their users which makes it all worth while. 

New York's School-district Public Libraries

New York's school-district libraries were a forerunner of the free public library. A law passed by New York's state legislature in 1835 authorized the creation of libraries in school districts which were intended to serve the general population and not just school pupils. Education reformer James S. Wadsworth (1768-1844) is considered to be the father of New York's school-district libraries. The initial law enabled school districts to tax themselves $20 the first year and $10 in succeeding years for the purpose of creating a library. New York revised its law in 1838 to provide a greater incentive for school districts to create libraries. I recently acquired a very interesting letter (see above) related to school-district libraries in New York. The letter was written on June 15, 1842 by a school-district library trustee for Moreau, NY complaining about his treatment on the library board. The trustee writes: "As respects the library of this district, I had made up my mind not to do anything about it, as there is time enough to answer the law when new trustees are chosen. I have two reasons: one is I never thought the library but little consequence, and another is I have been blamed very much since I have been a trustee, for doing what I thought was best for the district." He ends with: "My time will be out in about 5 1/2 months and I know that I shall be as glad as anyone in the district." New York was the first of a number of states to create school-district libraries.

Library War Service Library in Paris in WWI

Before the American Library in Paris was founded in 1920 it served as the central library for the American Library Association's Library War Service for France during World War I. I recently added an advertising card (see above) promoting the opening of ALA's library in Paris to my collection of librariana. The card has a map on the back showing the location of the library. The ALA library opened in July, 1918 and was located in the former residence of the Papal Nuncio to the French Republic at No. 10 rue de l'Elysee.  Burton Stevenson head of the Library War Service in Europe later said, "I dare say no public library was ever before installed amid such glittering surroundings." I was really pleased to get the card because it will go well in a philatelic exhibit I'm putting together for the stamp show in Denver, CO which takes place in May. The exhibit is titled appropriately "The American Library Association and World War I" and consists of sixteen 8 1/2 by 11 inch pages on which a variety of philatelic and other paper artifacts are mounted. I've written blog posts about many of the items in the exhibit which can be found HERE. Another post about the American Library in Paris can be found HERE. Arthur P. Young's Books for Sammies, The American Library Association and World War I (Beta Phi Mu, 1981) was a source for some of the information in this post. 

The 1894 ALA Conference in Lake Placid

Following its extremely successful annual conference in 1893 at the Chicago World's Fair the American Library Association met in 1894 at Lake Placid, New York. Melvil Dewey had pushed to hold the conference in this resort community located in the lake country of the Adirondack mountains.  He had an ulterior motive for doing so. Dewey and his wife Annie had purchased land in the area with the intent of creating a private retreat for librarians and other professionals.  The ALA conference was a perfect opportunity for showcasing the beauty of the area. The Library Journal for October, 1894 reported that "The meeting of the A.L.A. at Lake Placid will be remembered as one of the best ever held." There were 205 registered attendees with a little more than half being women. Attendees were from 18 states and Canada. The Library Journal report indicated that sessions were divided between the Grand View and Mirror Lake hotels and that the two hotels "vied with each other in making their guests comfortable and more". Melvil and Annie Dewey did succeed in creating their Lake Placid resort for professionals which I wrote about here and here. The ribbon to the left is part of my collection of ALA librariana.

The 1973 ALA Conference in Las Vegas

One of the readers of this blog suggested that I do a post on the 1973 American Library Association Conference in Las Vegas since it will be meeting there again this Summer after a 41 year hiatus. Thanks Elisa. I thought it was a great idea especially since I was one of the 8,539 individuals who attended that conference. The 1973 ALA conference was held June 24-30, and the theme was "People: Their Needs - Our Responsibilities".  A preliminary conference program gushed: "Three and one-half miles of incredibly colorful marquees, flashing, plunging, zooming - luxurious hotels, fascinating casinos that never close, lavish showrooms and superstar entertainment, excellent meeting facilities, and a profusion of good restaurants with offerings to suit every taste at reasonable prices. All of this, and more, is the heady excitement of the Las Vegas Strip - scene of the 92nd ALA conference. It promises to be an unforgettable and memorable experience!". It was definitely an unforgettable experience for many who attended the conference during the hottest period in Las Vegas in 1973. The temperature on June 28 was 113 degrees F. It was the heat that brought about such heavy criticism from attendees that ALA hasn't gone back in 41 years. Back then, many of the conference hotels were long distances from each other and some librarians made the mistake of trying to hoof it between them ending up with scorched feet. Personally, I enjoyed the conference. At that time I was active in the Junior Members Round Table and helped organize and staff JMRT's booth in the exhibits. I was rather proud of a home made roulette wheel that I put together. The famous public relations guru Fred Glazer was the incoming chair of JMRT and also helped with the booth. Of course, with the unbelievable development in Las Vegas since 1973, the 2014 conference should be unforgettable for many reasons other than the heat. I will hate to miss it.