The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1897-08-08
THE MIGHT HAVE BEEN.

guide for the future to take a glance
backward and assess the cost that a
community has to pay for the indffer-
ence or the inability of it's governing
body to grasp a great opportunity
There has been no agitation of late of
the question of a library building for
st. Paul; and therefore, we do not bear
in mind daily, as we ought, the fact
that the absence of one must be charg
ed to the account Of a former city coun-
Gill; backed by certain prominent citi-
zens who ought to have known better.
Our misfortune and our loss are
brought to mind by an inquiry made
of the editor Of the G ! o b few days
ago. A gentleman Of such prominence
that his name is known to almost every
citizen of the state has acquired, in the
course of a large business professional
and public experience, valuable col
| lection Of books and documents. He
! desires to bestow this upon some wor-
thy institution, and would prefer to
| give it to the public library of his own
city. He Is deferred by the fact that
there is no place to put it, and that it
would have to be stored out of reach
of the public until that time, now ap-
parently indefinitely postponed, when
we shall have a building suited to
| library purposes. This is only one Of
| the losses that our people experience
annually without knowing it, by reason
of our disgraceful indifference to the
want Of suitable library facilities in
st. Paul. One of the surest ways of
| building up a great public library, to
have its needs and it's possibilities set
| constantly before the public, is by the
presence of a building that shall appeal
at once to their pride and their public
| spirit. Such a building in itself at
tracts donations Of books and Of money
| that it would otherwise never receive.
There Is no possibility of the evolution
of our library from it's present phase
into what it ought to and may become
| until it is decently housed
| The eXasperating thing about it all
is that we can see today that this
might have been accomplished to our
permanent good. 1t is less than two
years since a fair and even liberal prop
| osition was made to the city of St. Paul
to furnish it with a public library A
perfectly responsible firm offered to
erect library building, after plans
/ that should be accepted by the library
| board, adequate to the needs of the
city for probably fifty years to come.
on the st. Peter street end of the mar
ket house property, or on any other
site that might be selected. They ask
| ed in exchange either the fee to the re-
mafnder of the ground now covered by
the market house or long lease of it
at a nominal rental This insured the
additional advantage of the substitu-
ton of handsome business structure
for the market house rat-trap, and it's
addition to the real estate valuation
and tax-bearing property of the city.
The wonder at that time was that so
desirable an offer should be made and
every citizen not insist that it be &C
| cepted at once.
Forthwith there arose, as there
always seems to do when any
thing promoting the growth, the well
fare, the beauty and the progress of
this city is at stake, a chorus of OBJ
Jections. One set of people clamored
| against abolishing the central market:
although they knew, as we all know,
| that 1t is and forever will be useless for
market purposes. Another and more
| influential set declared against parting
with a property which it had been
proved by repeated efforts that the city
could neither sell nor rent on any terms
worth considering. We call to mind
the eloquent predictions Of at least one
prominent opponent of the scheme that
the market house property would sell
| within two years for several times the
amount that it would cost to build a
library building. Let us wait for the
beautiful boom era, he insisted; and, of
| course, more or less reflected upon the
plan as device for transferring valu-
able public property to private owner
ship. The directors had their way. 1t
would have required then, as is usually
true. a particularly united and deter
mined public opinion to overcome the
hesitation and inertia of the common
council. 1t was only too glad to seize
the pretext Of public opposition to
throw cold water upon the project; and.
shortly thereafter. it's promoters, be-
coming doubtful of their own sagaeity
in Suggesting this scheme. were glad
to withdraw it,
We would like some OF those gentle
men who are personally responsible for
the failure of st, Paul to secure a beau
tifCNl library h0ildiNg to tell us. now
that nearly two years have passed,
Wherein We have been gainers> The
market house property Is just where it
was, and remains a useless app@rte-
nance Of the city at the cstyNS cost, lit
could not be sold any more readily
now than them The outlook Tor a sale
is hopeleSsS and, were one To be con-
SNmmatea, it needs no prophet to ten
that the share OF the proceeds which
would so 10 the public library would
not be the lions part, In the mean