Reference Question of the Week - 5/4/08

A few weeks ago, I got an email at the library from a librarian working towards a Masters Degree in American Studies. She was researching Mark Twain, and specifically whether public libraries during his life censored his works.

She was contacting all the libraries in the country that were open at the time (Chelmsford’s Adams Library is usually dated at 1894, but various library associations in the town date to the 1790’s), hoping our accession records would indicate which Twain books were held by the library, and whether they were shelved as adult or childrens books.

Up until this question, I had a vague understanding that we had old library records, but I didn’t know how extensive they were, what condition they were in, or what was in them. So I was happy to get this question, as in the course of helping someone, I also had an excuse to check out these records.

It turns out, there is a lot in the library archive. Much of it are treasurer reports or invoice logs, and were either uninteresting (to me) or indecipherable (just columns and columns of numbers). But I also found library member rolls from the late 1800’s, and one ledger even had the circulation history of the patrons (all done in longhand).

But getting down to brass tacks, I was very happy to find book lists from the era, which listed the books, author, publisher, date, call number, and a few other things. And it turned out that there were two libraries operating in Chelmsford at the time, which were later merged into the single library I work in today. So, I was able to research this question in both sets of records.

But here’s the best part: one book in the archive was entitled “List of Books (not all juvenile) for Boys” and was prepared by Librarian Emma J. Gay. It consisted of handwritten pages broken up into sections (Stories, History, Biography, Travel, Scientific, Natural History, Games and Amusements, and Miscellaneous). The title page, along with a title page for each section, was professionally typeset and printed, and the whole book was professionally bound in hardcover.

In the Stories section, there is the following entry:

Clemens, S. L. (Mark Twain)
   Adventures of Tom Sawyer 1505 [accession number]
   Adventures of Huckleberry Finn 1803 [accession number]

I really want to do something with this book, but I don’t know what. I’m guessing it dates to the 1880’s, and it was interesting flipping through seeing what books back then appealed to boys.

And for the record, here are the Mark Twain holdings I could locate in the archive:

Some of the records were too fragile to use, and some of the handwriting illegible, so I don’t think this is a complete list. I emailed what I found to the patron, and she was very happy, and it was fun to this kind of real historical research for a change.

See Also

• Reference Question of the Week - 1/6/08
• Reference Question of the Week - 7/13/08
• Reference Question of the Week - 7/6/08
• Reference Question of the Week - 6/29/08
• Reference Question of the Week - 6/15/08

Posted under Books, Library, Reference Question | 3 Comments »

Fight Tyranny: Read Banned Books

This year’s Banned Books Week is September 29 - October 6.

Which is rather fortuitous timing, considering this week’s attack on the freedom to read in Lewiston, Maine.

Librarians (and teachers and others) often make a big deal of Banned Books Week (BBW), and many people don’t understand why. Who cares? No matter how hard groups fight to ban a book, anyone can always go to the local bookstore and buy it anyway, right?

The point is that everyone has the freedom to read whatever interests them. Once a small group is permitted to make decisions for the whole, and force their views on everyone, then this is no longer a free society.

So, during Banned Books Week - and every other week of the year - read what appeals to you. And be a better person for it.

For more information on banned books and Banned Books Week, here are a few good web resources:

• The American Library Association’s Banned Books Week webpage
• The ALA’s 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books
• The ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom’s blog post containing BBW web badges (where the image above came from. I also liked this one: )
• Wikipedia’s List of Banned Books

And: I know this is borderline immature (I draw my own borders), but, like the “Adult Books” sections of libraries, “BBW” also makes me giggle. Librarians often forget (or don’t know), that our abbreviations and jargon sometimes also have other meanings.

banned, banned books, banned books week, bbw, censorship, freedom to read, libraries, library, public libraries, public library

See Also

• Reference Question of the Week - 2/24/08
• Reference Question of the Week - 12/9/07
• Providing Access to Information, with a Shovel
• “Live Free or Die Harder” Download
• Reference Question of the Week - 11/25/07

Posted under Books, Library | 1 Comment »