A Library Primer | Page 3

ideal university of the people.
The public library, then, is a means for elevating and refining the taste,
for giving greater efficiency to every worker, for diffusing sound
principles of social and political action, and for furnishing intellectual
culture to all.
The library of the immediate future for the American people is
unquestionably the free public library, brought under municipal

ownership, and, to some extent, municipal control, and treated as part
of the educational system of the state. The sense of ownership in it
makes the average man accept and use the opportunities of the free
public library while he will turn aside from book privileges in any other
guise.
That the public library is a part of the educational system should never
be lost sight of in the work of establishing it, or in its management. To
the great mass of the people it comes as their first and only educational
opportunity. The largest part of every man's education is that which he
gives himself. It is for this individual, self-administered education that
the public library furnishes the opportunity and the means. The schools
start education in childhood; libraries carry it on.
CHAPTER IV
Suggestions as to general policy of the library
In general, remember always 1) that the public owns its public library,
and 2) that no useless lumber is more useless than unused books.
People will use a library, not because, in others' opinions, they ought to,
but because they like to. See to it, then, that the new library is such as
its owner, the public, likes; and the only test of this liking is use. Open
wide the doors. Let regulations be few and never obtrusive. Trust
American genius for self-control. Remember the deference for the
rights of others with which you and your fellows conduct yourselves in
your own homes, at public tables, at general gatherings. Give the
people at least such liberty with their own collection of books as the
bookseller gives them with his. Let the shelves be open, and the public
admitted to them, and let the open shelves strike the keynote of the
whole administration. The whole library should be permeated with a
cheerful and accommodating atmosphere. Lay this down as the first
rule of library management; and for the second, let it be said that
librarian and assistants are to treat boy and girl, man and woman,
ignorant and learned, courteous and rude, with uniform good-temper
without condescension; never pertly.

Finally, bear in mind these two doctrines, tempering the one with the
other: 1) that the public library is a great educational and moral power,
to be wielded with a full sense of its great responsibilities, and of the
corresponding danger of their neglect or perversion; 2) that the public
library is not a business office, though it should be most business-like
in every detail of its management; but is a center of public happiness
first, of public education next.
CHAPTER V
Trustees
[Condensed from paper by C.C. Soule]
1) Size of the board.--The library board should be small, in small towns
not over three members. In cities a larger board has two advantages: it
can include men exceptionally learned in library science, and it can
represent more thoroughly different sections of the town and different
elements in the population.
2) Term of office.--The board should be divided into several groups,
one group going out of office each year. It would be wise if no library
trustee could hold office for more than three successive terms of three
years each. A library can, under this plan, keep in close touch with
popular needs and new ideas.
3) Qualifications.--The ideal qualifications for a trustee of a public
library--a fair education and love of books being taken for granted--are:
sound character, good judgment, common sense, public spirit, capacity
for work, literary taste, representative fitness. Don't assume that
because a man has been prominent in political business or social circles
he will make a good trustee. Capacity and willingness to work are more
useful than a taste for literature without practical qualities. General
culture and wide reading are generally more serviceable to the public
library than the knowledge of the specialist or scholar. See that
different sections of the town's interests are represented. Let neither
politics nor religion enter into the choice of trustees.

4) Duties.--The trustee of the public library is elected to preserve and
extend the benefits of the library as the people's university. He can
learn library science only by intelligent observation and study. He
should not hold his position unless he takes a lively interest in the
library, attends trustees' meetings, reads the library journals, visits other
libraries than his own, and keeps close watch of the tastes and
requirements of his constituency. His duties include the care of funds,
supervision