respect for our flag, his devotion to our heroes, in developing a sense of human brotherhood which alone can prevent or delay in the next generation another such catastrophe as the one we face today?" Exclusion of the war from the schools is partly the outcome of the general attitude of most of our schoolmen, who object to the teaching of a subject as an incidental. Arithmetic must be studied for itself alone. To absorb it as a by-product of shopwork, as is done in Gary, is inadmissible. But it is also a result of the fear that teaching the war at all would necessarily mean a partisan teaching of ita conclusion which perhaps we can not condemn when we remember the partisan instruction in various other subjects for which our schools are responsible. Again, this exclusion is doubtless aided by the efforts of some pacifists, who believe that, ostrichlike, we should hide our heads in the sand, to avoid acknowledging the existence of something we do not like. "Why war?" asks a recent pamphlet. Why, indeed? But we may ask in turn "Why fire?" "Why flood?" I can not answer these questions, but it would be foolish to act as if the scourges did not exist. Nay, I hasten to ensure myself against them, though the possibility that they will injure me is remote. This ultrapacifist attitude has gone further than in school education and is trying to discourage community education also. Objection, for instance, has been made to an exhibit of books, prints and posters about the war, which was displayed in the St Louis Public Library for nearly two months. We intended to let it stand for about a week, but the public would not allow this. The community insists on self-education even against the will of its natural allies. The contention that we are cultivating the innate blood-thirstiness of our public I regard as absurd. What can we do toward generating or taking advantage of other great driving impulses toward community education? Must we wait for the horrors of a great war to teach us geography, industrial chemistry and international law? Is it necessary to burn down a house every time we want to roast a pig? Certainly not. But just as one would not think of bringing on any kind of a catastrophe in order to utilize its shock for educational purposes, so also I doubt very much whether we need concern ourselves about the initiation of any impulse toward popular education. These impulses exist everywhere in great number and variety and we need only to select the right one and reinforce it. Attempts to generate others are rarely effective. When we hear the rich, mellow tone of a great organ pipe, it is difficult to realize that all the pipe does is to reinforce a selected tone among thousands of indistinguishable noises made by the air rushing through a slit and striking against an edge. Yet this is the fact. These incipient impulses permeate the community all about us; all we have to do is to select one, feed it and give it play and we shall have an "educational movement." This fact is very strong upon any one who works with clubs. If it is desired to foster some movement by means of an organization, it is rarely necessary to form one for the purpose. Every community teems with clubs, associations and circles. All that is needed is to capture the right one and back it up. Politicians will understand this art of capture and use it often for evil purposes. In the librarian's hands it becomes an instrument for good. Better than to offer a course of twenty lectures under the auspices of the library is it to capture a club, give it houseroom, and help it with its program. I am proud of the fact that in fifteen public rooms in our library, about four thousand meetings are held in the course of the year; but I am inclined to be still prouder of the fact that not one of these is held formally under the auspices of the library or is visibly patronized by it. To go back to our thesis, all education is self-education; we can only select, guide and strengthen, but when we have done these things adequately, we have done a very great work indeed. A What is true of assemblies and clubs is also true of the selection and use of books. book purchased in response to a demand is worth a dozen bought because the librarian thinks the library ought to have them. The possibilities of free suggestion by the community are, it seems to me, far from realized; yet even as it is, I believe that librarians have an unexampled opportunity of feeling out promising tendencies in this great flutter of educational impulses all about us, and so of selecting the right ones and helping them on. My Almost while I have been writing this I have been visited by a delegate from the foundrymen's club - an organization that wants more books on foundry practice and wants them placed together in a convenient spot. Such a visit is of course a heaven-sent opportunity and I suppose I betrayed something of my pleasure in my manner. visitor said "I am so glad you feel this way about it; we have been meaning for some time to call on you, but we were in doubt about how we should be received." Such moments are humiliating to the librarian. Have we advertised, discussed, talked and plastered our towns with publicity, only to learn at last that the spokesman of a body of respectable men, asking legitimate service, rather expects to be kicked down stairs than otherwise when he approaches us? Is our publicity failing in quantity or in quality? Whatever may be the matter, it is in response to demands like this that the library must play its part in community education. Here as elsewhere it is the foundrymen who are the important factors - their attitude, their desires, their capabilities. Our function is that of the organ pipe – to pick out the impulse, respond to it and give it volume and carrying power. The community will educate itself whether we help or not. It is permeated by lines of intelligence as the magnetic field is by lines of force. Thrust in a bit of soft iron and the force lines will change their direction in order to pass through the iron. Thrust a book into the community field, and its lines of intelligence will change direction in order to take in the contents of the book. If we could map out the field we should see great masses of lines sweeping through our public libraries. All about us we see men who tell us that they despair of democracy; that at any rate, whatever its advantages, democracy can never be "efficient." Efficient for what? Efficiency is a relative quality, not absolute. A big German howitzer would be about as inefficient a tool as could be imagined, for serving an apple pie. Besides, democracy is a goal; we have not reached it yet; we shall never reach it if we decide that it is undesirable. The path toward it is the path of Nature, which leads through conflicts, survivals and modifications. Part of it is the path of community education, which I believe to be efficient in that it is leading on toward a definite goal. Part of Nature is man, with his desires, hopes and abilities. Some men, and many women, are librarians in whom these desires and hopes have definite aims and in whom the corresponding abilities are more or less developed. We are all thus cogs in Nature's great scheme for community education; let us be intelligent cogs, and help the movement on instead of hindering it. LIBRARY INSTITUTES IN NEW YORK STATE1 ASA WYNKOOP, HEAD OF PUBLIC LIBRARIES SECTION, ALBANY, N. Y. The system of local library institutes, as developed in New York State, is based on the same theory as underlies all associated effort in the library field, that progress is mainly the outcome of association and cooperation on the part of library workers. Since the beginning of what we call the modern library movement which itself began in a successful effort at closer association and cooperation, every stage of advance has been accurately marked by an increasing attendance at library conferences and an increasing membership in library associations. The degree to which libraries share in one another's ideas and achievements is the degree of their individual and collective efficiency, and is more significant of genuine library development than any figures as to financial or material resources. Many inefficient and unfruitful libraries can be found with rich facilities, fine buildings and large stocks of books, but I doubt if any of us can name a single unfruitful library, however weak in resources it may be, whose librarian has learned to avail himself of the wealth of ideas, energy and resources which are freely provided for all who will enter into close relations with their fellow workers. The date when a library is first represented at a library meeting is often as important for it as the date of its founding. 1 Paper read at meeting of the League of Library Commissions, Asbury Park, June 28, 1916. One of the first problems, therefore, in the working out of any successful state program for library development is obviously that of bringing the scattered, unrelated libraries and library workers of the state into some degree of fellowship and unity. Toward the accomplishment of this end, nearly all the progressive states have organized state library associations, with annual conferences lasting from a day to a whole week. New York was the first of the states to organize such an association, and its annual meeting in September, known as "library week," has come to assume a place in the library world second only to that of the American Library Association. But it was quickly observed by leaders of the movement that with all its popularity, its attraction and its strong constructive influence, "library week" and the state association were doing very little for the great majority of the libraries of the State, save as a general and indirect influence. This fact was made particularly evident at the meeting of 1900 at Lake Placid, where, with an attendance never before approached, numbering 115, and with a consciousness of assured success, the association voted to make permanent its annual observance of "library week." In the face of this general satisfaction with the success which the association had thus attained and in spite of the large attendance, there were a few at the meeting, with eyes fixed on the State as a whole, who were not quite satisfied with the kind of success represented at this meeting. Among these were Mr W. R. Eastman, the state library inspector, Mr A. L. Peck of Gloversville, Doctor Canfield of Columbia University and Mrs Elmendorf of Buffalo, all of whom were concerned more with the strengthening of the weak and needy than with the enrichment of the strong and prosperous. They made a careful analysis of the attendance at the meeting, brought out the surprising fact that out of a total of 175 free libraries then existing in the State, only 15 were represented at this meeting and only 2 with less than 4000 volumes, presented a strong resolution emphasizing the duty owed by the association to the small and weak libraries which never had been and never could be reached by a central state meeting and calling for the organization each year of not less than ten local meetings covering every section The of the State, to do for the small, weak and scattered libraries something of what "library week" was doing for the larger ones. resolution, presented by Mr Eastman, was cordially supported by most of those prominent in the association, and on formal vote was enthusiastically adopted, and thus the system of library institutes in New York State was born. A committee was appointed to report on a practical scheme of work at the next annual meeting. Such a plan was carefully worked out during the year, and at the meeting of 1901, was adopted, to be put into effect in the following spring. To show its faith and deep interest in the enterprise, the association voted from its scanty funds, $125 for meeting the expenses of the work. The work began with the division of the State into eight library districts, each with its central meeting place, the districts being so constituted as to reduce so far as possible the average distance between the libraries and this library center. Each of the meetings consisted of three sessions, covering the afternoon and evening of one day and the forenoon of the next. The day sessions were designed to be mainly instructional and were for the benefit of those engaged directly in library work. The evening sessions were termed "inspirational," consisting of one or two more or less formal addresses on the general scope and function of the library, and to these, all local friends and patrons of the library were invited. A general program and outline for all the meetings were prepared and printed in advance, and two members of the state committee were in charge of each meeting, so that, except in respect to the public sessions, the meetings were almost duplicates of one another. The following facts, taken from the first report of the committee, relating to the first institute of the first series, that held at Cortland April 15-16, 1902, show the exact plan and scope of the work as first initiated. The conductor of the instructional sessions was Mr Eastman. Topics named in the program were: (at the first session) The selection of books, The buying of books, The accessioning of books; (at the second instructional session) Shelf arrangement, Marking of shelves, Reference work, Miscellaneous questions. The principal speaker of the evening session was Doctor Canfield, his topic being, "The public library an integral part of public education." Fifteen libraries were represented, 50 persons attended the day sessions and 125 the evening session. At the eight institutes of the series there was a total attendance of 299 at day sessions, 735 at evening sessions and 110 different libraries were represented. Thus in a single year of this work more libraries were reached and helped and more library workers brought into associated effort than in the entire previous decade of the association's existence. On receiving the report at the 1902 meeting, the association expressed its mind and purpose regarding this work in the following resolution: "That inasmuch as the holding of institutes is the most definite and important work of this association, the funds in its treasury should, in large measure, be held for the benefit of this work." that if it had erred at all in its attempts to bring the benefits of associated effort to the smaller libraries of the State, it had erred only in not going far enough in its approach to these libraries and in not beginning in a sufficiently simple and elementary way. After careful consideration it was therefore unanimously decided at this meeting to adopt a plan proposed by the committee of increasing the number of districts and meetings from eight to thirty, of thus bringing a meeting each year near to the doors of each library; and further to popularize the movement, to let the libraries of each group select themselves the topics which should be discussed at the meeting. For the word "institute," the ferm "round table" was substituted and all attempts at systematic or formal instruction were laid aside. The whole emphasis was placed on the one idea of drawing the libraries out of their isolation, of bringing them into touch and acquaintance with one another and so of fostering a sense of unity and common interest. In this design the new plan showed itself immediately to be a distinct success. In the first year of its adoption the number of libraries registered at the meetings increased from 93 to 194, a large proportion of these being very small libraries which had never before been in attendance at any library meet With very little modification either in the plan or in the personnel of the committee in charge, the work as thus instituted was carried on for four years. Each year some special topic was given prominence in the program, some changes were made in the places of meeting and some new helpers were added to the list of conductors. Attempts were also made, with some success, to organize into district clubs the more active local workers in the different institute groups and to put upon these clubs an increasing degree of responsibility in the organization and conducting. This plan was continued without modifiof the meetings. No one can estimate the amount of good done the library cause in these four years of pioneer institute work. The public addresses alone, with their strong and eloquent presentation of library ideas and doctrine, were well worth all the effort and expense involved in the enterprise. But it was soon seen that in the main idea that had inspired the movement, the work was far from being the success that had been hoped. With all the eloquence, energy and ability that were put into the work, hardly more than a quarter of the libraries on the committee's list and to which invitations were regularly sent, could be induced to participate in the meetings, and from the first to the fourth series of institutes there was an actual decline in the number of libraries represented. When these facts were presented to it in the annual conference of 1905, the association was as firm as ever in its conviction that the work in some form must be continued, and cation and with growing popularity for eight years, the register showing in 1913 that no less than 423 libraries of the State had had a share in the meetings of that year. This was a fourfold gain in library attendance over the first year of institute work, and a fair approach to the inclusion of all the free libraries of the State in the movement. Clearly the libraries were learning the benefits of a common association and fellowship. But with all its success in the fundamental thing of bringing libraries together, the plan had decided disadvantages which year by year became more and more evident. With no fixed or comprehensive program, with the topics chosen each year by vote of those attending, there could be no consistency or definite progress in the discussions. The same topics were repeated year after year, the discussions represented little reflection or study, important things were continuously omitted, talk too often went round and round and led nowhere, and serious busy librarians began to question whether the advantages of the meetings were worth the time and cost involved. The committee, while never in doubt on this point, concluded at the end of the 1913 series of meetings, that the time had come for the adoption of a more serious, systematic and logical plan of work. Having developed among the libraries in so large a degree the habit of association, it was now hoped to put into practice some of the more ambitious and constructive ideas with which the work had first started. With the expressed approval of the association, the committee worked out such a plan in the winter of 1914, to comprise a continuous and consecutive course of work to cover four years, the program each year to be devoted to a particular field of library economy, the whole course to include, in an elementary way, the entire problem of the small library. The plan was put into effect with the meetings of 1914. With such a fixed and formal program, removing at once from the libraries their privilege of choosing for the meetings such random topics as they might prefer, it was fully expected that some of the popularity which the meetings had attained under the former plan, would be lost. It was like giving to people who had become used to vaudeville, a single, long drawn-out play; but it was hoped that what might thus be lost in mere popularity, would be more than made up in the added value and seriousness of the work. This plan has now been in operation for three years, and the results are interesting. The first year of the new plan, owing to some financial uncertainties that the committee had to take into account, the number of meetings was cut down from 30 to 20, furnishing a strong additional reason for expecting a falling off in library attendance. But the libraries proved themselves more serious in this matter than the committee had dared to hope, showing a remarkable change in their attitude since the first plan for instructional institutes was given up in 1905; and when the reports for the twenty meetings came in, they showed that in average attendance, both of libraries and individuals, they had broken all records, and that in total attendance, the 20 meetings under the course plan had brought more libraries together than any 30 meetings under the former plan, except for one year. In 1915, the second year in the course plan, meetings were held in 31 centers, with a total representation of 535 libraries or districts, 112 more than had ever before been registered; and this year, in the series of meetings completed June 2d, consisting of 27 institutes, there was a representation of 568 libraries or districts and an attendance at day sessions alone of 1248 persons. The total advance then, in figures of attendance since the work began fourteen years ago, is from 108 to 568 in the number of libraries participating, and from 299 to 1248 in the number of library workers or patrons sharing in the benefits of the meetings figures testifying eloquently both to the growth in libraries during this period, and more specifically to a growth of professional interest and an esprit de corps, which are the best guaranty of their growth in efficiency and public service. At the suggestion of your president, I will conclude this brief historic sketch by giving in some detail the methods and program of the work as now developed. From the first, although initiated, directed and sustained by the State Library Association, it has been made possible only through the close cooperation and support of the library department of the State. A member of that department has always been the administrating member of the institute committee and upon him has devolved the larger share of the work. Weeks and months are now required for the planning, organizing and directing of the year's series of meetings, and this time is provided at State expense under a clause of the library law which makes such service to libraries as is rendered by the institutes, a duty of the officials of the State Library. On the same ground, the State bears a large part of the other expenses of institutes, such as cost of printing, postage and traveling expenses of such state officials as help at the meetings. Altogether it is a fair estimate that the State expends the equivalent of $500 a year on this work, while the association itself appropriates from $150 to $200 toward it. The committee plans in all cases to give each institute group as much initiative and responsibility as it will and can assume. In a few of the districts, where there are permanent library clubs, the meetings are put in charge |