The Topeka state journal., 1904-08-15
A GREAT SUCCESS
Kansas Travelling Library One
Of States Best Investments.
Goes to Small Towns and to the
Farms.
WOMEN RESPONSIBLE.
Club Members Found Library
With Few Hundred Books.
Has Grown to a Collection Of
$1,000 Volumes.

house about which little has ever been
said, less has been written. and in many
localities absolutely nothing is known.
Yet people who know about it and who
use it believe it to be one of the best
investments the state OF Kansas ever
made.
1t is an institution which takes books
of all sorts right into the homes of the
people in the little towns and on the
farms. In fact it gives the farmers
family the benefit of big library, just
as the rural delivery of the mails gives
the farmer the full daily benefit of
Uncle Sans mail service. 1t is the
state travelling library.
When a number of club women start
ed out five or six years ago to establish
a travelling library it was little realized
the possibilities which were open be-
fore such an Institution. They gathered
together about 1,500 books through do
nations, got thirty cases made, in each
of which fifty books could be packed,
and started to sending them out to
small organizations through the state
which wanted them and which did not
have access to a regular library. The
books with which the library started,
being donated, were, of course, not the
latest and of the choicest variety. They
were the kind that people give away
when they can't use them themselves.
But they were appreciated just the
same.
A year later, about five years ago,
the club women VINO started the pro-
ject got the legislature to take hold of
library. under the control of the justices
of the supreme court. That is how it
comes to be a state institution. Today
it contains $4,000 books and it has three
hundred cases or libraries in which
they are sent out and the number Is
being added to each wear.
According to the rules, any response
Bile organization or club can secure a
library, keep 1t six months free and
then return it and get another. The
books are meant for the people of Kan
sas to read. and the only thing that is
necessary to secure them is for those in
authority to know that the library mas
been placed in responsible hands. For
instance, a country lyceum or debating
society at any county school house, a
club in a little town, can borrow Il
set of fifty books from the state for
the asking, with the understanding that
the officers of the orga nization shall see
that the books are properly returned at
the end of six months More than that,
an effort is made to send the class of
books that the community asking for
1t wants. 1t is simply a circulating
library on a scale which covers the
state of Kansas.
The result is that many people who
otherwise would never get nopportuni-
ty to read good class of books can
secure them in abundance. They can
get the latest novels, or Gibbons Rome. |
The boys and girls on the farms can
read Dickens and Scott, or Anthony
Hope and Winston Churchill. Or they
can get scientific works if they want
them.
Frequently a request comes in for a
library with some of Mary ]. Holmes
or 1.-The Duchess books. Miss Nellie |
travelling library, puts in few of these |
books as requested, but along with |
them go some of a higher grade. 1t |
is quite likely that the next order that |
Holmes works, but will call for those |
Of the higher grade. This order is filed |
and few of a still higher grade, or |
some historical or scientific works are
Included. 1t has been a noticeable fact |
that a taste for better literature has |
been thus created without the knowl
edge of the person upon whom the op-
GRAFTON is performed.
A few weeks ago a community down
In Edwards county asked for a library
pertaining to scientific agriculture. No |
such books were in the travelling library, |
but they were purchased as soon as
possible and the order supplied. The |
call came from farmers who want to
study the newest things in their line of
work.
There is not so great q demand for
books during the summer months when
the evenings are short and there is All |
Over-supply of work to be done on the |
farms, Dut as the evenings grow longer
the demand increases At present |
about two hundred of the three hundred |
libraries are out. The books in the
rest are undergoing repairs and be- |
ing gotten into shape for the winter
During the winter there is
a demand for about all the libraries
that can be supplied, and new commun-
tiles are constantly calling for them.
There are many parts of the state where
It is not known that such a thing as the
library exists. and when 1T
becomes thoroughly known the work
Of the library will be tremendous.
Until a short time ago the travelling
library has been shut in in a small
room adjoining state library, but re-
Gently 1t has been moved to the large
room formerly occupied by the Goss
collection on the west
side of the south wing on the ground
floor of the state house. That room has
been equipped with cases and new desks
and packing tables, greatly facilitating
the work in the library.
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