The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-09-15
ChHdren's S LibrQru

f1-lvERY time I think of "children's jCI EEoks." my mind reverts to the
 long ago. when I was just a alit- tie bitty'' and the big old fireplace with the hickory logs in our spacious, com fortable library in my childhood home over in Mississippi. and how l used to curl up while the blue smoke wended it's way up sthe chimney. and l sat and listened. for hours to fairy tales" and 'storles' of adventure and travel and the happy hours I spent.
 We had big gray kitten-just a plain old tabby cat on it's mothers side and Angora on it's fathers, a sort of
 King Cophetua' and the "Beggar Maid" sort of an ancestry, you know, productive of both vitality and charm, and the big gray kitten would stretch her long, fuzzy legs out and yawn and yawn. while the blue smoke continued to curl up the chimney and listened and listened, never tiring of the beautiful stories that were being read aloud to ''us children" by our beloved mother.
 I believe I have always had, taste for books, because that was when 1 was a little girl Chose last six words are wonderful words, aren't theyO When 1 was a little girl" and as soon as I could read I had access to my fathers excellent library, acclaimed by critics to be the best and most complete pri- vate library in the state of Mississippi and when I tell people that l read Tom Jones" and "Peregrine Pickle" "Clar- issa Harlowe' and Pamela" "Tristram Shandy" and The Fairie Queen," -Hudibras" and "The Vicar of Wake field" "Rasselas" and Plush Times" besides all of Dickens and Scott and Thackeray, long before I was Is, they shrug their shoulders and wonder what sort, of a childish mind I had. and where l got these monderful books!
 Which brings me to introducing to you a most lcultured and charming young woman. Miss Margaret Duncan, who has recently come to Birmingham as valued addition to the public f- brary. having charge of the "children's library of the public library.
 Miss Duncan is here to provide what many children have not within their ken as I had when I was a child, and> that is a wonderful father who adored books. who was a student of literature, possessing beautifully educated and cultured mind; who bought books as he bought nothing else on earth; who loved "old editions" and unusual books; to whom Tom Moore and Byron, Long, fellow and Tennyson were charmed words, and the Bible the book he loved best of all. and whose heart and life centered about his library and his won derful collection of books-never so happy as when he was among them.
 Miss Duncan, who loves books as much as I do I found to be most con- genial spirit. We talked books world 1 without end the other afternoon when I had the pleasure of meeting her soon after her arrival from Jacksonville. | Fla, where for two years she was as- sociated with MT. l.. W. Josselyn in library work there. To MT. Josselyn's efforts are due the fact that Miss Dun cans name is numbered in the person. nel of the library here today
 Like yourself, I have always loved books" Miss Duncan said, ''and my G- brary work has been most congenial and delightful. In my home in Clearwater. Fla, I had charge of the library after I had finished my library course at