The Public Library Movement In America

For libraries to remain a place for a lively exchange of ideas, librarians should be armed with the right knowledge and strong conviction to preserve people’s rights.

The author starts off with a rhetorical question: “What kind of problem is a library?” urging the readers to think about this question as they continue to read the article. The question grabs the readers’ attention, and intrigues them to read on to find and answer. She further utilizes this technique of rhetorical questions throughout the article for the same purpose of emphasis on the vitality of the role of public libraries. Moreover, Smith extensively employs the use of metaphors and personification. For example, she describes the internet as libraries’ “universal death knell”, which portrays the internet’s negative impact on the development of

In Ray Bradbury’s fictional novel about the horrifying future, he discusses topics that, politically and socially, can relate to Judith Ortiz Cofer’s short story; The Paterson Public Library. These two pertain to each other because both Bradbury’s and Cofer’s characters are afraid of situations that involve books. Though they do compare in many ways, there are also differences between the stories.

The city of Hoover, AL is nestle into a suburban Appalachian mountain community. That has a huge middle class population consisting of lower to higher types of this economic group. The purpose of this paper is to showcase the city of Hoover’s demographics and history. With the demographics and history analyzed, this paper will be able to point out the effectiveness of the current services and collections at the Hoover Public Library in address community needs. This will be done by starting the focus on census and demographic records of Hoover, AL. It will be followed by an examination of the library, its services, and its impact on the community. Lastly, surveys and reviews of the library from the community users will help decide

Eleanor Roosevelt, former first lady of the United States, had many accomplishments during the Roosevelt years in America. She was a social and women’s activist who used her words to change the minds of people in America. One of the many things she took the upper hand in was education. Eleanor Roosevelt carried deeply about the education of American citizens and this is learned through her emotional and logical appeals in her famous “What Libraries Mean to the Nation” speech.

In Eleanor Roosevelt's speech, “What Libraries Mean to the Nation”, she talks about the importance of libraries in the United States. She talks about how useful libraries are in making a better education for the people. She does this by using logical appeal and in an anecdote.

The London Public Library is an organization spanning the city of London, delivering services from 16 physical locations. The core services of the library include reference, reader’s advisory and referral; collections and lending; technology services; programming and community outreach. The library is focused on literacy, learning, culture/leisure/recreation, information and community meeting place. The past few years have seen significant resources pegged towards fund raising strategies, resulting in other areas of the organization being neglected and

The author of this article Mrs. Denise Davis is the director of the Office for Research and Statistics of the American Library Association. This means that Mrs. Davis is able to access and is responsible for the reports mandatory for each library across America to turn in each fiscal year, these reports are used to determine what changes the libraries need to make to better serve the public. Given her credibility to write on such topics she then chooses a topic each year to write on to prepare libraries and librarians across the country for the upcoming years. In 2010 Mrs. Davis choose to write on eBooks and their increasing popularity throughout the American population as well as the difficulties libraries have encountered in the past fiscal year to compete with eBooks. Because this article is written in 2010 it shows just how long libraries have struggled with the topic of eBooks and can demonstrate the new policies that have been used by the libraries throughout the past four years. This information can help my research in showing how eBooks have affected the library's behavior, and consequently give me the statistics needed to show the effects of eBooks on the libraries throughout the recent years. Understanding this source is outdated other sources will also likely be used in my final project from the American Library Association websites of statistics of more recent years.

As new technologies are rapidly introduced, people are able to find any information with the access of internet. This leads to people questioning the relevance of libraries and its true purpose. Public libraries cultivate the value of increased education and a social unity to advancing as a society.

The Rose County Public Library is situated in Rose, IN and was established in 1846. The Rose County Library’s creation was not accidental, but rather with prudent foresight, the creators of the Indiana constitution implemented provisions for county libraries. The law of 1816 stated that upon the creation of a new county the Indiana General Assembly,

Richard Wright in the story, “A visit to the Library” 2015, explores that Richard Wright has come to terms with reality, the ignorance, and realization of the environment surrounding him. Over and over he is instructed on what is an acceptable thought process, the curiosity of the boy eventually concludes with exposure on the situation of colored people in the south. The main theme of the story is his position within society, and awareness of the situation in order to come to terms with the illusion. This reading is really aimed at skeptics, to question and challenge ideas, beliefs, and positions, even our own no matter how painful the truth can be.

The library started with goal of making written knowledge more available to the local community by the Company of the Redwood Library started by Abraham Redwood (History). Even as a public library, it required a membership fee to be allowed access to the books inside. Originally when opened, the library had a “collection of 751 titles” with topics over “Religion, Philosophy, Law, Architecture, Classics, Agriculture and Medicine” from London (History, Redwood Library). This was a large collection of knowledge for the public in colonial America. Noticed by Thomas Jefferson, the library was framed as the prime example of what a public building should be (History).

Since their establishment, libraries have served as a gateway to knowledge and services that revolutionized the way the public attains information. Unlike many other institutions, public libraries have grown and evolved along with society by adopting new technology and offering resources tailored to the needs of their local community.

Benjamin Franklin established the Public Library in Philadelphia in 1731. He had his library plan drawn by Mr. Grace into a legal document named Articles of Association which were later replaced by a charter. The articles communicated how the library would be handled and include how the meetings for election and officers would occur. Most of how the libraries are handled now have similarities of how Benjamin Franklin handled the Philadelphia Public Library, examples, lending rules, fines for overdue books, rules for number of books that could be checked out and the practice of renewing library loans. When he was young he formed a social group of friends of initially 12 people called Junto, it was a club for self-improvement, learning and hospitable company. Club members where ordinary people. Laborers, craftsmen, farmers and tradesmen who did not have the money to be spending on books. Their need for books inspired Franklin to come up with the plan of a library in Philadelphia. He seeks people willing to subscribe and pay forty shillings yearly each to join and ten shillings to increase more book purchases. By opening up the first public library, he was able to open up more doors to people who didn’t have much money to go to libraries since in the past libraries where only for socially and economically elite. Books where pretty uncommon or a luxury to most people that didn’t have enough money. Common people were able to improve their status standing by being part of a

Following the years of revolution, the eighteenth century was relatively stable and peaceful age. General improvement of life and urbanisation led to increase in the amount of spare time and money. The commercialisation of the leisure also made recreational activity more affordable, especially for the new middle class constituted by professionals. Their new vulnerable status in the society led them to seek their own culture, such as participation to society activities and enrolment to the subscription library. Subscription Library was first established in Liverpool in 1758, and it spread across Britain, growing the number of subscribers along the way. It was essentially a private library, requiring a payment of a guinea for entry and another ten shillings or so for the annual subscription fee. In turn, the members were allowed access to the permanent collection of the books. In this essay, I would like to discuss the possible purposes of the subscription library in the eighteenth century, by studying the library catalogues and regulations. Firstly the library’s role in the associationalism and the polite culture would be considered. Then I would like to discuss how the library served as a place of forming a uniformed society, offering useful knowledge and promoting equality. Lastly, its exclusiveness would be studied.