ALA 140th anniversary

A visual history of the American Library Association in its 140th year (2016).

478 Pins

·8y

American Libraries magazine - ALA

an old black and white photo of people in front of a building

American Library Association

1927, March 15-18: The first Negro Library Conference is held at the Hampton Institute Library School in Virginia.

an old document with writing on it that says,'i am not sure what this is

Annual Report

1927, July: ALA Executive Secretary Carl Milam's annual report takes the form of a 17-page description of what a visitor to ALA Headquarters might see.

an old book page with some writing on the front and back pages in black ink

First Names

The First

1927: The first named editor of the ALA Bulletin is Dorothy Rowden, who also has duties related to Association publicity.

1927: A description of the ALA Headquarters Library in 1927. Gladys English leaves ALA shortly afterward to become a librarian at Piedmont (Calif.) High School.

several boxes are lined up on top of the conveyor belt

Digital Collections

1927, June 2: The new Philadelphia Free Library's book retrieval system works like this: When a patron requests a book, a librarian in the Reading Room transmits the request to the stacks via a Teletype system. An employee stationed in the stacks receives the request via a recording typewriter, retrieves the book from its place on shelves, and places it on a conveyor system for a long, circuitous trip to the requesting librarian. The entire process requires only 2-4 minutes.

two men shaking hands in front of an american flag and other people on the street

Digital Collections

1927, June 2: Librarians and trustees open the new Philadelphia Free Library Central building with a dignified ceremony on the lawn. While bands play and newsreel cameras roll, Mayor W. Freeland Kendrick, City Council President Charles B. Hall, and other dignitaries including former US Sen. George Wharton Pepper (1867-1961), a descendant of the library's founder, praises the new building and the many people who had devoted years to its erection. Librarian John Ashhurst opens the doors.

an old book with the title equalizing library opportunities

Equalizing Library Opportunities 1927

1927: The ALA Committee on Library Extension publishes a small brochure that describes the inequality of access to public library service in the US and advances the goal of "Adequate public library service within easy reach of everyone." It then offers some strategies for achieving that goal. A chart in the brochure shows that more than 50 million Americans are without library service, mostly in rural areas.

an old map of the american library association

1926, Oct. 4: At the ALA Annual Conference in Atlantic City, N.J., Council approves a resolution to expand the ALA Bulletin into a "complete journal of discussion, adequate under competent editorial direction to accommodate the major contributions from the profession." The resolution is proposed by M. L. Raney, librarian at Johns Hopkins University. The Bulletin does add a cover and a few more enhancements over the next 5 years.

1926, Oct. 4-9: Although ALA briefly made use of radio broadcasts during its 1924 and 1925 conferences, during the 1926 ALA Annual Conference in Atlantic City, local station WPG broadcasts talks every night featuring librarians, including ALA President Charles F. D. Belden and ALA President nominee George F. Locke.

an old black and white photo of a building

ALA's Jubilee, 1926

1926, Oct. 6: Although the ALA Annual Conference is being held in Atlantic City, N.J., about half the attendees travel to Philadelphia for an Anniversary Session at the Drexel Institute (now Drexel University) to commemorate ALA's 50th anniversary. Richard R. Bowker and Melvil Dewey, who were both at the 1876 conference, give presentations.

Dewey Decimal Classification

Melvil Dewey and the Two Lake Placids

1926, Oct. 6: Melvil Dewey (1851-1931) gives a talk on "Our Next Half-Century." In it, he comments on the competition that radio and films are giving to books. He says: "Our great function is to inform or to inspire, or to please; to give to the public in the quickest and cheapest way information, inspiration, and recreation... If a better way than the books is found, we should use it."

an old photo of a man sitting at a desk with papers in front of him

University Of Chicago

The University Of Chicago

Frederick Paul Keppel - Wikipedia

1926, March: Frederick Paul Keppel (1875-1943), president of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, informs ALA that it plans to grant it $4 million over the next 10 years. The funds will be used to endow a graduate library school (at the University of Chicago), aid other library schools, begin a general ALA endowment fund, and carry on ALA's general activities.

a group of men standing next to each other in front of a large white building

Foreign Delegates at the White House | The American Library Association Archives

1926, Oct.: Following the Atlantic City conference, some 30 overseas librarians are invited to take part in the ALA Post-Conference trip to visit libraries in Washington, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Detroit. Hugo Krüss (third from left, shown in front of the White House), director of the Preussische Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, proposes setting up an international library association to be formally constituted in Great Britain in 1927. The proposal is considered a precursor of IFLA.

an article from the chinese library association to the a l c greetings, with two cats on a table

1926: As a gesture of appreciation for sending St. Louis Public Library Director Arthur E. Bostwick on a consulting trip, the Library Association of China and its secretary Yuan Tung-li (1895-1965) send to ALA headquarters a 1000-year-old earthenware statuette of an oxcart used to transport manuscripts. Unfortunately, the statuette has been misplaced in recent years.

an old black and white photo of books on display in a library with signs above them

1926: For its 50th anniversary, ALA encourages every library in the US to set up an exhibit to let the public know about the interesting things that libraries do. This library exhibit is at a farmers' meeting in New Jersey. The ALA Bulletin notes: "Probably everyone who passed these exhibits stopped at least to read the captions."

ALA 140th anniversary

A visual history of the American Library Association in its 140th year (2016).

478 Pins

·8y

American Libraries magazine - ALA

American Library Association

1927, March 15-18: The first Negro Library Conference is held at the Hampton Institute Library School in Virginia.

Annual Report

1927, July: ALA Executive Secretary Carl Milam's annual report takes the form of a 17-page description of what a visitor to ALA Headquarters might see.

First Names

The First

1927: The first named editor of the ALA Bulletin is Dorothy Rowden, who also has duties related to Association publicity.

1927: A description of the ALA Headquarters Library in 1927. Gladys English leaves ALA shortly afterward to become a librarian at Piedmont (Calif.) High School.

Digital Collections