Wash-bowls. Using books is not always cleanly work, and both attendants and readers often need facilities for washing their hands. Wash-bowls can be concealed in closets or tucked into special cupboards in shelving, where they are not obvious. There are too few of them oftener than too many in a library. Consider the rooms there where staff or readers might wish to wash their hands after handling dusty books. Frequent ablutions would cleanse the users, and protect books. Children, sometimes adults, come to the library with grimy hands, so that wash-bowls near entrances may be welcome conveniences. But all bowls should be set where they can be watched by one of the staff.
“The library of the future will be found to contain lavatories where every one wishing to use books will first have to cleanse his hands.”—Reinick. See [p. 222] post.
Protection from Enemies
Blades in his “Enemies of Books” enumerates Fire, Water, Gas, Heat, Dust, Neglect, Bookworms, Mice and other vermin [to which he might have added book thieves, extra illustrators, mutilators and defacers].
Against the latter group, supervision is a deterrent.
Gas is vanishing before the electric light.
Neglect we cannot allow, or plead guilty to.
Bookworms and vermin have not apparently worried our libraries as much as those of the old world. They can hardly be guarded against in building, except as we guard against moisture and filth.
Fire is a great danger in our climate. There is some quality in the atmosphere—some latent condition akin to electricity, which feeds flames. We have concluded that limits of expense and considerations of convenience render it impossible to make our buildings, or any part of them, except the vault for valuables, absolutely fireproof.