Library Work with Children [28]
and finely illustrated copies, but the best editions that can be bought for a very little money. These exhibitions have been also given at country meetings held by the Connecticut Public Library Committee.
A library column in a Hartford Sunday paper is useful in showing the public what libraries in other states and cities are doing, and in attracting attention to work with children. Letters to the children themselves at the beginning of vacation, printed in a daily paper and sent to the schools, invite them to book-talks. Other printed letters about visits to places connected with books and authors, sent home from England and Scotland with postcards, have excited an interest in books not always read by children. This year the Hartford children's librarian has read the letters and shown the books referred to, post-cards and pictures, to a club of girls from the older grammar grades, who were invited through the letters just spoken of to leave their names with her.
A club of children's librarians from towns within fifteen miles around Hartford meets weekly from October to May. Meetings all over the state under the Public Library Committee have stimulated interest in work with children, and Library Day is celebrated every year in the schools.
The visitor and inspector reports visits to eight towns in December, and says: "Somewhat more than a year ago, at the request of the supervisor, I made out a list of books for the X---- school libraries. These were purchased, and this year the chairman of the school board requested my assistance in arranging the collection in groups to be sent in traveling library cases until each school shall have had each library. I spent two days at the town hall working with the chairman of the school board, the supervisor, a typist and two school teachers.
"A new children's room has been opened in the Y---- library since my visit there. It is double the size of the room formerly in use, and much lighter and more cheerful. The first grant from the state was expended entirely for children's books, the selection being made in this office.
"In Z---- I gave an Audubon stereopticon lecture, prefacing it with an account of the work on the Audubon Society, and an enumeration of the loans to schools. The audience in a country schoolhouse, half a mile from Z---- village, numbered 102."
A CHAPTER IN CHILDREN'S LIBRARIES
The following account of the beginning of children's work in Arlington, Mass., in 1835, marks the earliest date yet claimed for the establishment of library work with children, and was written for the January, 1913, number of The Library Journal. Alice M. Jordan was born in Thomaston, Maine, and was educated in the schools of Newton, Massachusetts. After teaching for a few years she entered the service of the Boston Public Library in 1900, Since 1902 she has been Chief of the Children's Department in that library, and since 1911 a member of the staff of Simmons College Library School.
"In consequence of a grateful remembrance of hospitality and friendship, as well as an uncommon share or patronage, afforded me by the inhabitants of West Cambridge, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in the early part of my life when patronage was most needful to me, I give to the said town of West Cambridge one hundred dollars for the purpose of establishing a juvenile library in said town. The Selectmen, Ministers of the Gospel, and Physicians of the town of West Cambridge, for the time being shall receive this sum, select and purchase the books for the library which shall be such books as, in their opinion, will best promote useful knowledge and the Christian virtues among the inhabitants of the town who are scholars, or by usage have a right to attend as scholars in their primary schools. Other persons may be admitted to the privilege of said library under the direction of said town, by paying a sum for membership and an annual tax for the increase of the same. And my said executors are directed to pay the same within one year after my decease."
This "extract from the last
A library column in a Hartford Sunday paper is useful in showing the public what libraries in other states and cities are doing, and in attracting attention to work with children. Letters to the children themselves at the beginning of vacation, printed in a daily paper and sent to the schools, invite them to book-talks. Other printed letters about visits to places connected with books and authors, sent home from England and Scotland with postcards, have excited an interest in books not always read by children. This year the Hartford children's librarian has read the letters and shown the books referred to, post-cards and pictures, to a club of girls from the older grammar grades, who were invited through the letters just spoken of to leave their names with her.
A club of children's librarians from towns within fifteen miles around Hartford meets weekly from October to May. Meetings all over the state under the Public Library Committee have stimulated interest in work with children, and Library Day is celebrated every year in the schools.
The visitor and inspector reports visits to eight towns in December, and says: "Somewhat more than a year ago, at the request of the supervisor, I made out a list of books for the X---- school libraries. These were purchased, and this year the chairman of the school board requested my assistance in arranging the collection in groups to be sent in traveling library cases until each school shall have had each library. I spent two days at the town hall working with the chairman of the school board, the supervisor, a typist and two school teachers.
"A new children's room has been opened in the Y---- library since my visit there. It is double the size of the room formerly in use, and much lighter and more cheerful. The first grant from the state was expended entirely for children's books, the selection being made in this office.
"In Z---- I gave an Audubon stereopticon lecture, prefacing it with an account of the work on the Audubon Society, and an enumeration of the loans to schools. The audience in a country schoolhouse, half a mile from Z---- village, numbered 102."
A CHAPTER IN CHILDREN'S LIBRARIES
The following account of the beginning of children's work in Arlington, Mass., in 1835, marks the earliest date yet claimed for the establishment of library work with children, and was written for the January, 1913, number of The Library Journal. Alice M. Jordan was born in Thomaston, Maine, and was educated in the schools of Newton, Massachusetts. After teaching for a few years she entered the service of the Boston Public Library in 1900, Since 1902 she has been Chief of the Children's Department in that library, and since 1911 a member of the staff of Simmons College Library School.
"In consequence of a grateful remembrance of hospitality and friendship, as well as an uncommon share or patronage, afforded me by the inhabitants of West Cambridge, in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in the early part of my life when patronage was most needful to me, I give to the said town of West Cambridge one hundred dollars for the purpose of establishing a juvenile library in said town. The Selectmen, Ministers of the Gospel, and Physicians of the town of West Cambridge, for the time being shall receive this sum, select and purchase the books for the library which shall be such books as, in their opinion, will best promote useful knowledge and the Christian virtues among the inhabitants of the town who are scholars, or by usage have a right to attend as scholars in their primary schools. Other persons may be admitted to the privilege of said library under the direction of said town, by paying a sum for membership and an annual tax for the increase of the same. And my said executors are directed to pay the same within one year after my decease."
This "extract from the last