American Library Association

“ Too much material has already been absorbed into collections from which it will never emerge.
But universality in scope does not mean absolute comprehensiveness in detail. With its purchasing funds and other resources the Library of Congress bids fair to become the strongest collection in the United States in bibliography, in Americana (omitting the earliest) , in political and social science, public administration, jurisprudence. If any American library can secure the documents which will exhibit completely legislation proposed and legislation enacted it should be able to. ”

“ American Library Association to interest the universities so that the work of our association might be brought to the attention of the students, and that we ought to arrange to have lectures given by librarians at the various universities. ”

“ The 20th century is undoubtedly something of a fad already with public speakers. I should hesitate to speak of 20th century problems in library work were there not a special justification for noting chronologic epochs in connection with the modern library movement. It was almost precisely at the middle of the century that this movement took its rise in the passage of the first public library laws in England and in New England. And again it was at the very middle of the last half century, in the year 1876, that this Association was formed and the Library Journal started. ”

“ Throughout the entire continent there exist few, perhaps none, whose history, objects, and work, have warranted a more justifiable pride in being a member thereof, than is found in being a member of the American Library Association. ”

“ And yet the needs of this great, deserving class of "humans" with minds and hearts even more receptive to ideas than are city women—the needs of such as these are as yet almost wholly unrealized by librarians aside from Commission workers. No committee of the American Library Association has ever had the joy of working out a program of library extension from the great city systems to rural readers. ”

“ We shall never have great libraries in the United States until the typical librarian exalts his calling and takes his place in our modern life seriously—as the ruler of our civilization, the creator of the environment of a nation and as the dictator of the motives and ideals of cities, the discoverer of great men and the champion of the souls of the people. ”

“ There is another thing that we ought to do, and that is to give attention to the more scholarly side of librarianship. We are so busy organizing, so busy spreading library ideas, that we are in danger of losing sight of scholarship. That is something the state association can do—in the directions of literature, bibliography, and such subjects. I think that should be emphasized more than has been the case. In the Massachusetts Club we are trying a similar scheme to that of Mr. Eastman; we are going to have one annual meeting, which will take in all the library clubs all over the state. ”

“ Libraries should not be expected to lend text-books for general class use, popular manuals or books for the general reader, inexpensive books and those which can easily be procured through the book-trade, books to assist in school or college debates, or books for ordinary purposes of school or undergraduate study. Neither should they lend books which are likely to be in frequent demand by their own readers, or books which they do not lend at home on the ground that they ought always to be accessible on the shelves. ”

“ In every community there are scores of intelligent men—men who are well-informed on most subjects—who do not know what the modern public library does, whose conception of it is what might have been expected a generation or two ago. The word "library" to them means such a collection of books as they have in their homes, or the library they used while in college. There is no thought in their minds of the aggressive, civic and educational force that we believe the American public library to be. ”

“ But in the small library there is no such limitation, and the reference librarian, who may also be the head librarian and the chief cataloger, may come in touch each day with every sort of human interest, from the eager desire of the office clerk to get back to the soil by the road of raising rice in Arkansas or apples in Idaho, to the yearning for economic independence and artistic expression in the soul of the girl who comes to pore over books on design.
To one who is fully awake to the human side of things, there can never be any dull monotony in the life of the reference librarian. ”

“ The librarian's constant difficulty is now, what shall a library try to collect, what shall it keep? This has become a grave question. Being myself book greedy, a gourmand of print, I am a poor judge of what to reject.
Soon or late the average man, who is presumed to represent common sense, will ask, "What is the use of these accumulations of books?" This average man can never consider a library with comment of imagination. A book is for him a book, whereas for you or me a book is a saint, a hero, a martyr, a fool, a seraph of light bearing science. ”

“ The Library of Congress is now primarily a reference library. But if there be any citizen who thinks that it should never lend a book—to another library—in aid of the higher research—when the book can be spared from Washington and is not a book within the proper duty of the local library to supply—if there be any citizen who thinks that for the National Library to lend under these circumstances would be a misuse of its resources and, therefore, an abuse of trust—he had better speak quickly, or he may be too late. ”

“ The secretary has also lectured before the New York state library school, the Training school for children's librarians of the Pittsburgh Carnegie library, and the University of Illinois library school.
Necrology. The Association has lost by death eleven members since the conference of a year ago. The list includes an ex-president of the A. L. A., and one of the most prominent librarians of the country; a business man who had for years taken a deep interest in library progress; an eminent churchman who has for many years maintained his connection with the national association ”

“ With the change from the old ideas of safeguarding the precious books themselves to the advanced theory of placing their priceless contents within the easy reach of all, has come an equally important change in the character of the custodian of the books. The duties of the modern librarian are such that he must be not only something of a scholar, in the best sense of the word, but he must be capable also of properly directing others in the pursuit of learning, and, withal, combine executive ability with a highly specialized professional facility. ”

“ Of the 79 American libraries 72 are in the United States, including university, public, governmental and miscellaneous institutions, with a combined collection of 19,295,000 volumes. If this statistical inquiry is pursued further, a reason becomes apparent why millions are starved for want of books while other millions seemingly have a surfeit of them. The rural regions, save in a handful of commonwealths whose library commissions or state libraries actively administer traveling libraries, the book supply is practically negligible. ”

“ It seems to me a truism, indeed, that there is one thing better than a book loaned, and that is a book owned. The ideal library community is, after all, one in which the people are so well supplied with books in their own homes that the function of the library is not so much a great circulation, however fine that may look in the statistics, but rather that of guide and helper to readers in the selection, and, if you please, in the "evaluation" of books. The board of health in a city or in a state is, perhaps, a fair illustration of the final function of the librarian ”

“ The plan which we have assumed to exist of issuing DUPLICATE or STUDENTS’ tickets available for non-fiction works only, in addition to an ordinary ticket available for all classes of literature, first became popular in Britain in 1893, and arose out of a suggestion made by Mr J. Y. W. MacAlister at the Library Association Conference at Aberdeen. In America this is generally known as the “Two-Book System,” and it became very widely adopted after 1894. Indeed, American libraries are most [347] generous in their lending; many libraries lend as many as ten books at a time ”

“ It has not prevented the sale of books; it seems not to have limited the sale of books; but it is probably true that the dissemination of the best literature among the mass of the people, in private libraries, while it has been immensely improved by the library system, has not been promoted by the bookselling system under present conditions as it should be. In Germany, a movement has been on foot for a few years past, and has been quite successful, to give that particular kind of librarian, the bookseller, a fee more worthy of his function ”

“ I suppose the ideal condition would be to meet in some central place, where there are library facilities, but I believe it is worth while to move the association about; that is one way of advertising it.
Miss Olive Jones: I fully believe that the greatest work of the state association it does through the librarians individually. It is of help in the state in bringing out different lines of work, and in keeping the library work before the public; but, after all, do we not gain more from individual effort than from anything else? ”

“ While, of course, we want to have material of a high order presented at the state association, at the same time we must remember that these associations reach those people who cannot be touched in any other way; and if they have come to get light on this new topic of work for children, or if they are on the point of reorganizing their library, or if they are having trouble with their board, they do not take kindly to a dissertation on printing in the 15th century. ”

“ If the library is to help business it must be organized as business is organized. To get everything on a subject may be necessary for some purposes, and is always interesting to the bibliographer; but to get the adequate thing is the business-librarian's ideal of service, and if he misses it he may wake up surprised to find his labor unappreciated. ”

“ It seems a fairly simple task to select 3000 titles from the books published in eight years, but a list based on the co-operation of about 75 librarians and 100 experts, all fully engaged with their own work, and selected, edited and prepared for printing in the intervals between work having a prior claim, is bound to progress but slowly and to suffer many changes of fortune. One needs to be this sort of clearing house of opinion but once to realize how far apart our libraries are in the matter of book selection. ”

“ The booksellers most heartily endorse the great and good work the libraries perform to the community, and from a selfish point of view, the bookseller freely admits the great assistance derived by them from the influence of the libraries in creating a desire for reading and the possession of books, and the general educating and elevating of the community, and the bookseller also feels that his presence in any community is likewise educating and elevating and that his interests should be reasonably conserved. ”

“ It was suggested a half century ago by the Federal Government through the Smithsonian Institution. Professor Jewett's proposal then was a central bureau to compile, print and distribute cards which might serve to local libraries as a catalog of their own collections. Such a project is now before this Association. It may not be feasible: that is, it might not result in the economy which it suggests. It assumes a large number of books to be acquired, in the same editions, by many libraries, at the same time. ”

“ In a single publication, repeated each year, it consumes over a million pounds of paper stock; and it maintains a bureau whose purpose is to replenish the forests which as publisher it thus depletes. It distributes gratuitously to the libraries of the United States each year over 300,000 volumes, embodying the results of its research, its legislative proceedings, and an account of its administrative activities. It maintains a bureau for the investigation of problems in education, for the accumulation and dissemination of information concerning the work of educational institutions ”

“ More and more the library is becoming of commercial use. Not only men of the various industries are finding use for the recorded experiences and the advice of experts in their own lines, but business men are beginning to find great possibilities in the use of books as time [Pg 127] -savers and as a help to efficiency. The use of the book as a tool is becoming constantly greater, and the public library, as a matter of course, is to supply all books which may be so used. It is the plain duty of the public library to make known its ability to help its community in these practical ways. ”

“ And I feel that the public library has but skirmished along the outposts while the great field of influencing the reading of American children remains unconquered. Until we affect production to the extent that the book stores circulate as good books as the best libraries we cannot be too complacent about our position as a force in citizen making. ”