Several years ago when I visited the Bodleian Library, I was shown around the portion known as "Duke Humphrey's library," and when I admired the old parchment bound volumes in the alcoves my guide remarked sententiously: "These books were on these shelves when the Pilgrims sailed for America." That remark points to an essential difference between many of the old world libraries and those of this country. The museum feature which is so strong in the administration of some of the European libraries is much less prominent in those of the United States.
Illustrations of university library history in this country naturally begin with Harvard. The library there was begun on the death of its first benefactor in 1638 with his bequest of 320 volumes. The Mathers were among the largest collectors of books in their day in New England but few of their possessions passed into the college collection, most of the Mather library having been destroyed in 1775 during the battle of Bunker Hill. About the close of the 17th century Cotton Mather said of the Harvard College Library that while it was "far from a Vatican or Bodleian dimension" he considered it the "best furnished that can be shown anywhere in the American regions." The fire of 1763 which destroyed the first Harvard Hall destroyed also the entire college library, housed in an upper room, with the exception of one volume: Downame's "Christian Warfare," which was out in circulation at the time. "May Harvard Library," wrote John Barnard of Marblehead, "rise out of its ashes with new life and vigor, and be durable as the sun, tho' the building is a nuisance." This contemptuous sounding phrase, intended to describe the ruined building, can again almost be justified in connection with the overcrowded and outgrown structure of today. The first general catalog of the library, printed in 1790, containing 350 pages, devotes 100 pages to theological tracts, 50 to religious books, 3½ to Bibles, ¾ of a page to periodicals, 4 to books of travel, and ten to Greek and Latin authors—all of which shows how closely the college had held to its original purpose as a training school for the ministry.
There was practically no change in the curriculum at Harvard College during the first two centuries of its existence. The old classical course as pursued by our forefathers required comparatively few books. With the introduction of such studies as modern history and languages, the sciences and economics, came the demand for access to many books, both old and new.
That books were regarded as a first essential in the establishment of colleges in the New World is shown not only by the terms of John Harvard's will, which bequeathed one-half of his estate and all his library "towards the erecting of a college," but also by the picturesque founding of Yale College. Eleven ministers met in New Haven in 1700 agreeing to form a college. Each member brought a number of books and presented them to the body, and laying them on the table said these words, or to this effect: "I give these books for the founding of a college in this colony." Then the trustees as a body took possession of them and appointed the Rev. Mr. Russel of Branford as keeper of the library, which at that time consisted of about 40 folio volumes. The library with the additions which came in was kept at Branford for nearly three years, and was then carried to Killingworth. In 1765 the library had grown to 4,000 volumes, showing a growth of only 60 volumes a year through two generations.
Other American university libraries showed equally modest beginnings. In a letter from President Manning to Dr. Llewellyn, 1752, is found the following reference to the early efforts made on behalf of the library of Brown University: "At present we have but about 250 volumes and these not well chosen, being such as our friends could best spare," a statement which was equally true of many other college libraries of that period.
The vicissitudes of American university libraries in their early years would seem to have been enough to discourage any but the stoutest hearted librarian. Thus the King's College buildings in New York having been required by the British for a military hospital, the books were deposited in the City Hall or elsewhere. Three years later some 600 or 700 volumes were found in a room in St. Paul's Chapel. How they got there is a mystery, but they were all that remained of the nucleus of what is today the Columbia University Library. Mr. John Pintard, the founder of the New York Historical Society used to say that he remembered seeing the British soldiers carry away the books from the college library in their knapsacks and barter them for grog. Horace Walpole in his Memoirs sneers at the Prince of Wales, afterwards George III, for presenting a collection of books to an American college during the Revolutionary War, and says that, instead of books, his Royal Highness ought to have sent arms and ammunition.
In his report as secretary of the Smithsonian Institution for 1850, Prof. C. C. Jewett wrote: "Our colleges are mostly eleemosynary institutions. Their libraries are frequently the chance aggregation of the gifts of charity; too many of them discarded, as well-nigh worthless, from the shelves of donors. (But) among them are some very important collections, chosen with care and competent learning, purchased with economy and guarded with prudence."
In 1850 Marshall College at Mercersburg, Pa., reported that "the college library is distributed among the professors—each professor having charge of those books pertaining to his department." Until comparatively recent years the periodicals subscribed to by one of our western state universities were sent direct to the homes of the professors interested and whether they were brought to the library later for binding depended upon the whim of the professor.
One of the striking contrasts between the college library of today and that of the middle of the last century is shown by a comparison of the hours of opening. The Chinese character for "library" means "a place for hiding books," and if some members of the present day faculties think there is still justification for this pictograph, what would they say of the apology for a library which their predecessors had to contend with? In 1850 the libraries at Amherst and Trinity, for example, were open once a week from 1 to 3 p. m., at Princeton one hour twice a week, at the University of Missouri one hour every two weeks. At the University of Alabama there was a rule that "the books shall ordinarily be received at the door, without admitting the applicant into the library room." Harvard with its 28 hours of opening per week was as usual in the vanguard of progress, but contrast even those liberal hours with present day schedules of 89 hours and even more per week and you see that there has been considerable progress along this line.
"A quarter of a century ago the library in most of our institutions," said the late President Harper in an address delivered in 1894, "even the oldest, was scarcely large enough, if one were to estimate values, to deserve the name of library. So far as it had location, it was the place to which the professor was accustomed to make his way occasionally, the student almost never. It was open for consultation during perhaps one hour a day for three days a week. The better class of students, it was understood, had no time for reading. It was only the 'ne'er do well,' the man with little interest in the class-room text-book, who could find time for general reading. Such reading was a distraction, and a proposition that one might profit by consulting other books which bore upon the subject or subjects treated in the text-book would have been scouted. All such work was thought to be distracting. The addition of one hundred volumes in a single year was something noteworthy. The place, seldom frequented, was some out-of-the-way room which could serve no other use. The librarian—there was none. Why should there have been? Any officer of the institution could perform the needed service without greatly increasing the burden of his official duties."