Miss Hewins made a later report on the same subject [see the
previous article] in a paper presented before the World's Library
Congress in 1893. In this paper, given below, she has summarized
several of the early yearly reports made at the meetings of the
A. L. A., all of which are of great interest as a record of the
work of various libraries.
In the Government report on libraries, 1876, the relation of
public libraries and the young was treated by Mr. W. I. Fletcher,
who discussed age-restrictions, direction of reading, choice of
books, and incidentally the relation of libraries to schools,
referring to librarians and trustees as "the trainers of gymnasts
who seek to provide that which will be of greatest service to
their men." The report was suggestive, and called for several
radical changes in the usual management of libraries. No
statistics were given, for none had been called for, and the
number of libraries which were working in the modern spirit was
not large. Mr. Green, in his paper at the Philadelphia
conference of 1876 (L. j. 1: 74), gave some suggestions as to how
to teach school boys and girls the use of books, and in one or
two of the discussions the influence of a librarian on young
readers was noticed, but the American Library Association did not
give much time to the subject till the Boston conference of 1879,
when a whole session was devoted to schools, libraries, and
fiction (L. j. 4:319), the general expression of opinion being
similar to the formula expressed in the paper by Miss Mary A.
Bean, "Lessen the quantity and improve the quality." In 1881, Mr.
J. N. Larned, of the Buffalo Young Men's Library, issued his
pamphlet, "Books for young readers." The report on "Boys' and
girls' reading" which I had the honor of making at the Cincinnati
conference of 1882 has answers from some 25 librarians to the
question "What are you doing to encourage a love of good reading
in boys and girls?" (L. j. 7:182.) Several speak of special
catalogs or bulletins, most of personal interest in and
friendship with young readers. One writes, "Give a popular boy a
good book, and there is not much rest for that book. Librarians
should like children." It was in 1883 that, by the suggestion and
advice of our lamented friend, Frederick Leypoldt, I published a
little classified pamphlet, "Books for the young." In January of
the same year the Library Journal began a department of
"Literature for the young," which was transferred at the end of
the year to the Publishers' Weekly, where it still remains. The
report on the subject, made for the Buffalo conference by Miss
Bean, is on the same lines as the former one, with the addition
of the experience of some smaller libraries. She says, "I believe
the Lynn library has hit a fundamental truth, and applied the
sovereign remedy, so far as the question concerns public
libraries, in its 'one-book-a-week' rule for pupils of the
schools."
Miss Hannah P. James's report at the Lake George conference in
1885 (L. j. 10:278) sums up the information received from 75
sources in some suggestions for work in connection with school
and home, suggesting the publication of book lists in local
papers, supervision of children's reading if authority is given
by parents, and the limitation of school children's book to one
or two a week. At the St. Louis conference of 1889 Miss Mary
Sargent reported on "Reading for the young" (L. j. 14:226), One
librarian fears that lists of books prepared for boys and girls
will soon become lists to be avoided by them, on account of young
people's jealous suspicion of undue influence. Sargent's
"Reading for the young" was published just after the White
Mountain conference of 1890, and the subject was not discussed in
San Francisco in 1891 or at Lakewood in 1892 except in relation
to schools.
The Ladies' Commission on Sunday school books is at least five
years older than the American Library Association. It has done
good service in printing lists of books specially adapted to
Unitarian Sunday schools, others unfitted for them only by a few
doctrinal pages or sentences, and a third class recommended as
household friends on account of their interests, literary value,
and good tone. The Church Library Association stands in the same
relation to Episcopal Sunday schools, recommending in yearly
pamphlets: