Library Work with Children

								

Mr. Henry E. Legler, in the last paper in this group, traces the
growth of the "conception of what the duty of society is to the
child"; claims that the children's library should be one in a
union of social forces, and asserts that it contributes to the
building of character, the enlargement of narrow lives, the
opening of opportunity to all alike.
Thus the modern viewpoint includes the ideals of democracy in
addition to Dr. Learned's emphasis on "knowledge" and "virtue"
and probably points the way to the future development of library
work with children.

 PUBLIC LIBRARIES AND THE YOUNG

The special report on "Public Libraries in the United States of
America," published in 1876 by the U. S. Bureau of Education
includes the following paper by Mr. W. I. Fletcher, in which he
advocates the removal of age-restriction and emphasizes the
importance of choosing only those books which "have something
positively good about them." This and the following eight papers
give, in some measure, a history of library work with children.
William Isaac Fletcher was born in Burlington, Vermont, April 28,
1844. He was educated in the Winchester, Mass., schools, and
received the honorary degree of A.M. from Amherst in 1884. He
served as librarian of Amherst College from 1883 to 1911, when he
was made librarian emeritus. Mr. Fletcher was joint editor of
Poole's Index to Periodical Literature, and editor of the
continuation from 1882 to 1911; edited the A. L. A. Index to
general literature in 1893 and 1901; the Cooperative Index to
periodicals from 1883 to 1911, and in 1895 published his Public
Libraries in America. He was president of the A. L. A. in
1891-1892.

What shall the public library do for the young, and how? is a
question of acknowledged importance. The remarkable development
of "juvenile literature" testifies to the growing importance of
this portion of the community in the eyes of book producers,
while the character of much of this literature, which is now
almost thrust into the hands of youth, is such as to excite grave
doubts as to its being of any service, intellectual or moral. In
this state of things the public library is looked to by some with
hope, by others with fear, according as its management is
apparently such as to draw young readers away from merely
frivolous reading, or to make such reading more accessible and
encourage them in the use of it; hence the importance of a
judicious administration of the library in this regard.
One of the first questions to be met in arranging a code of rules
for the government of a public library relates to the age at
which young persons shall be admitted to its privileges. There is
no usage on this point which can be called common, but most
libraries fix a certain age, as twelve or fourteen, below which
candidates for admission are ineligible. Only a few of the most
recently established libraries have adopted what seems to be the