The role of the state in the organization of statewide library service: Essae M. Culver, Louisiana's first state librarian

Library Trends, Spring, 2004 by Florence M. Jumonville

ABSTRACT

In 1925 the Carnegie Corporation granted $50,000 to Louisiana, a state then "backward in library development," to fund a demonstration of rural public library development. Essae M. Culver, a California librarian, was chosen to direct the project. Culver arrived in Louisiana to find that the entire state needed organizing. She concluded that the parish (county) was the appropriate unit upon which to base a system of libraries and adapted California's demonstration system to the southern state's needs. Key to Culver's method was local funding after the demonstration period, and she convinced legislators to finance the state library agency. Similarly, voters concurred that their parish libraries were worth keeping, and, despite some early failures during times of flood and economic depression, parish libraries eventually were established throughout the state. Culver's demonstration method was credited with greatly influencing library development both in the United States and abroad.

A STATE "BACKWARD IN LIBRARY DEVELOPMENT"

A century ago, the phrase "public library" meant "city library," for few such agencies existed beyond the limits of municipalities. Throughout the United States, most residents of unincorporated communities and rural areas lacked access to library services (Held, 1973, p. 130). The situation in Louisiana differed from that in other states only in that it was exceptionally grim. A flurry of interest in the library movement had begun in 1909 with the formation of the New Orleans Library Club, and in December of that year the club organized the first statewide meeting of a Louisiana Library Association. Although the group fell dormant from 1913 until 1925, it flourished long enough to draft and to secure the passage of Louisiana's first library law (Reed, 1938, pp. 26-27). Enacted by the state legislature in 1910, the law provided for the establishment of public libraries and library boards and for the use of public funds to support them (An Act to Aid Public Education by Providing a General Library Law for the State, Louisiana P.L. 149, 1910).

The existence of this enabling legislation positioned Louisiana well when, in 1925, a confluence of events led to the availability of funding to create a statewide system of rural libraries. First, as the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the American Library Association (ALA) approached, its leaders became increasingly concerned about the slowness of library development. Second, the League of Library Commissions (LLC), an organization of states working toward improved library service, stood ready "to help any of the states which, for one reason or another, had done little or nothing to help themselves"; however, with "little power or contact with those that were unconvinced" and with no funds, the LLC hardly knew where to begin (Ferguson, 1931, pp. 7-8). And third, the Carnegie Corporation, disappointed with municipalities that had accepted funding to construct buildings but failed to develop real library systems, was receptive to new alternatives. Discussions at the 1924-25 winter meetings of the ALA and LLC converged these interests, and, with support from ALA officials, league president Milton J. Ferguson obtained Carnegie funding in the amount of $50,000 to promote library development (Ferguson, 1931, pp. 7-8).

A committee formed by the LLC to implement this effort "soon decided that the best results could be expected from concentrated sowing in one state, rather than dropping a few seeds in hopeful abandon throughout the nation" (Ferguson, 1931, p. 8). Louisiana appeared to offer fertile soil in which libraries might be cultivated. En route to his home in California after the ALA midwinter meeting, Ferguson detoured through the state to determine whether its populace would support library development. There he found the library law of 1910, which had not been implemented because no funds were available; additional legislation passed in 1920 that created the Louisiana Library Commission and provided for the appointment of members; more than one million inhabitants who had no access to library service; and prominent citizens who realized the importance of the project (Ferguson, 1931, pp. 8-9; An Act Creating a Louisiana Library Commission, Louisiana P.L. 225, 1920). Governor Henry Fuqua asked "whether the plan were not a 'Yankee scheme to educate the heathen of the South,'" but upon learning that "success of the kind we were looking for would require local appropriations, he declared himself open to conviction" (Ferguson, 1950, p. 35) and pledged to appoint a library commission if Louisiana was chosen (Ferguson, 1931, p. 10).

As news of this "project of making a library 'demonstration' in states backward in library development" spread ([Untitled], 1925, p. 346), officials in thirteen states hopefully offered their hinterlands for the experiment. In addition to explaining why their respective states merited selection, some of them, suspecting that Louisiana was the leading candidate, offered reasons why it should not be chosen. Their negative campaigning came to naught, for Ferguson and his committee selected Louisiana (Ferguson, 1931, p. 9). He found the state "attractive for several reasons: the people were enthusiastic and unbelievably hospitable, the ground was not encumbered by any structure which must be removed to make way for a newer edifice, and laws had been enacted so that money alone was needed to set the wheels in motion" (Ferguson, 1938, pp. 3-4).