第24章 HOW LIBRARY WORK WITH CHILDREN HAS GROWN IN HARTFO

For several years we have been collecting a family of foreign dolls,who are now forty-five in number,of all sorts and sizes,counting seventeen marionettes such as the poor children in Venice play with,half a dozen Chinese actors,and nine brightly colored Russian peasants in wood.The others are Tairo,a very old Japanese doll in the costume of the feudal warriors,Thora from Iceland,Marit the Norwegian bride,Erik and Brita from Sweden,Giuseppe and Marietta from Rome,Heidi and Peter from the Alps,Gisela from Thuringia,Cecilia from Hungary,Annetje from Holland,Lewie Gordon from Edinburgh,Christie Johnstone the Newhaven fishwife,Sambo and Dinah the cotton-pickers.Mammy Chloe from Florida,an Indian brave and squaw from British America,Laila from Jerusalem,Lady Geraldine of 1830and Victoria of 1840.Every New Year's Day,in answer to a picture bulletin which announces a doll-story and says "Bring your doll,"the little girls come with fresh,clean,Christmas dolls,and every one who has a name is formally presented to the foreign guests,who sit in chairs on a table.Lack of imagination is shown in being willing to own a doll without a name,and this year the subject of names was mentioned in time for the little girls to have them ready.Mrs.Mary Hazelton Wade,author of many of the "Little cousins,"lives in Hartford,and lately gave us a copy of her "Dolls of many countries."I told her about the party and invited her,and she told the fifty children who were listening about the Feasts of Dolls in Japan.The doll-story was E.V.Lucas's "Doll doctor,"and it was followed by William Brightly Rands's "Doll poems."In 1893,the year after the library became free,the Connecticut Public Library Committee was organized.For about ten years it had no paid visitor and inspector,and I,as secretary of the committee,had to go about the state in the little time I could spare from regular duties,trying to arouse library interest in country towns.Now most of the field work is done by the visitor,but I have spoken many times at teachers'meetings and library meetings.We began by sending out pamphlets--"What a free library can do for a country town"--emphasizing what its possibilities are of interesting children,and "What a library and school can do for each other."Every year the libraries receive a grant of books from the state,and send in lists subject to approval.We often found the novels and children's books asked for unworthy of being bought with state money by a committee appointed by the Board of Education,and began to print yearly lists of recommended titles of new books,from which all requested must be chosen.The standard is gradually growing higher.The Colonial Dames have for years paid for traveling libraries,largely on subjects connected with colonial history,to be sent to country schools from the office of the committee,and have also given traveling portfolios of pictures illustrating history,chosen and mounted by one of their number.The Audubon Society sends books,largely on out-of-door subjects,and bird-charts,to schools and libraries all over the state.Traveling libraries,miscellaneous or on special subjects,are sent out on request.

A Library Institute has been held every summer for five years under the direction of the visitor and inspector.It lasts for two weeks,and several lectures are always given by specialists in work with children.

The choice of books,sources of stories for children,and what to recommend to them are frequently discussed in meetings for teachers and librarians.

A book-wagon has for the last two or three years gone through a few towns where there is no public library,circulating several thousand books a year for adults and children,and exciting an interest which may later develop into the establishment of public libraries.The committee has now 105which receive the state grant.Wherever a new library is opened,a special effort is made through the schools to make it attractive to children.

At this time of year the mothers'clubs in the city and adjoining towns often ask for talks on what to buy,and boxes of books are taken to them,not only expensive and finely illustrated copies,but the best editions that can be bought for a very little money.

These exhibitions have been also given at country meetings held by the Connecticut Public Library Committee.

A library column in a Hartford Sunday paper is useful in showing the public what libraries in other states and cities are doing,and in attracting attention to work with children.Letters to the children themselves at the beginning of vacation,printed in a daily paper and sent to the schools,invite them to book-talks.

Other printed letters about visits to places connected with books and authors,sent home from England and Scotland with postcards,have excited an interest in books not always read by children.

This year the Hartford children's librarian has read the letters and shown the books referred to,post-cards and pictures,to a club of girls from the older grammar grades,who were invited through the letters just spoken of to leave their names with her.

A club of children's librarians from towns within fifteen miles around Hartford meets weekly from October to May.Meetings all over the state under the Public Library Committee have stimulated interest in work with children,and Library Day is celebrated every year in the schools.

The visitor and inspector reports visits to eight towns in December,and says:"Somewhat more than a year ago,at the request of the supervisor,I made out a list of books for the X----school libraries.These were purchased,and this year the chairman of the school board requested my assistance in arranging the collection in groups to be sent in traveling library cases until each school shall have had each library.I spent two days at the town hall working with the chairman of the school board,the supervisor,a typist and two school teachers.

"A new children's room has been opened in the Y----library since my visit there.It is double the size of the room formerly in use,and much lighter and more cheerful.The first grant from the state was expended entirely for children's books,the selection being made in this office.

"In Z----I gave an Audubon stereopticon lecture,prefacing it with an account of the work on the Audubon Society,and an enumeration of the loans to schools.The audience in a country schoolhouse,half a mile from Z----village,numbered 102."