The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-08-10
CONDUCTED BY
FRANK PARKER STOCKBRIDGE.
LIBRARIES AND JUST BUILDINGS.

brarians more keenly alive to the responsibilities
as well as the opportunities Of their high Office,
writes to correct the statement made recently IN
this column that the county library system OF Van
Vert county, Ohio, is unique in the service 1t rem
ders to the people Of whole county. California,
sayp Mr.. Wheeler, much of whose library expert
ence was gained there has many county library
systems under benefcent State law permitting
the levying Of per capita tax upon the people OF
the whole county for the establishment OF library
service.
Under the California system it is not necessary
to have county library building as such. There
may be one or dozen local public libraries IN the
county, and the administrative headquarters OF the
county library may be in one OF these or anywhere
else. But all over the county there are branches
and library stations located in stores, schoolhouses,
village halls residences or wherever a custodian
can be found who will perform the small local SER
vice necessary in central point where people
naturally gather.
How It Works ~..as
. Books are kept constantly circulating The
stock at any particular branch is replenished and
renewed at frequent intervals. Thus single copy
of an expensive book, like The Education of Henry
Adams, may in the course of time be made avail
able to every in the county who cares to read
it. Agricultural Department buletinsy OIL the
other hand, may be distributed almost ad lib.
Some of the counties carry the service further,
shifting books from one branch to another by
means Of motor truck rugged up, except for tho
means of propulsion, like Roger Mifiin s Justly
celebrated Parnassus on Wheels, and giving the
farmers along the route from station to station
chance to exchange old books for newt
Of course California is the place where one
would expect library service to be carried to its
ultimate end of serving everybody at all times
with any books he wants. For in thrice blessed
California everybody reads, just as in Indiana
everybody writes. Except for the necessity of hav
ing the printing done in New York or Chicago the
annual output and sales of literature would hardly
be affected were the other forty-six States to be
suddenly submerged. The California county library
system, moreover is based upon fundamental
truth which in the rest Of the United States is
rarely fully recognized
This truth is that library is not building.
The first thing most Americans think of when
libraries are mentioned is buildings, whereas a
building is the last thing one should think of.
1t is this idea that before you can have public
library, or a branch of public library, in any
given town or part thereof you must have build
ing specially designed and erected for the housing
of the books that helps to keep people who other
wise would read from becoming readers. 1t is
doubtless true that many American communities
would have no public Libraries at all Qike Rich
mond, Va, for instance) if Mr.. Carnegie had
not imposed as condition Of his gift Of building
that the community must stock il with books and
maintain it. The sort Of local pride that likes to
show off the court house, the Jail and the library
succumbs to the temptation to add another to the
town s monuments, and behold, the community has
a "library."
The Case of Brooklyn.
Over in Brooklyn the borough is spending a
huge amount of money, some 100000, believe,
to put up anew main building for its public Ii
brary To the. authorities to whom power over
such things is delegated by the people of Brook
Ign library means building" while DR.. Hill,
to whom library means books in circulation,
is put to it to find ways of keeping up even mod
erately adequate service Of books to the Brooklyn
ties who want to read them, niggardly is thes
cd realities nf the libra