Fund-raising as a key to the library's future - Library Finance: New Needs, New Models

Library Trends, Wntr, 1994 by Dwight F. Burlingame

Abstract

The growth and development of library fund-raising in the United States is reviewed within the context of library history as well as in the greater context of the development of contemporary philanthropy in this country. The role that fund-raising can play in the articulation of a library's mission as well as the contribution it can provide to management objectives are examined. The author concludes that fund-raising can play a critical role in the future of today's libraries.

Introduction

The environment in which libraries operate has changed dramatically in many ways. Still, the libraries that Carnegie and others helped build often appear to be the same. In other words, the traditional function of libraries to provide a safe place for the accumulated knowledge of humans has remained much the same while the ways to package the information and distribute it have changed dramatically. Scholarly communication has gone through some major changes because of the development of communication networks, technology-based forms of knowledge, increased production of scholarly information, and the capacity of libraries to deliver and preserve the last century's knowledge that was primarily printed on acidic paper. The electronic library is fast approaching.

Libraries are faced not only with the rapid growth rate of information but also with continued increases in costs for materials and services which most often exceed the rate of inflation. Meeting these needs demands additional resources that appear not to be available from traditional sources. As Vartan Gregorian (1991) so elegantly put it in his foreword to Raising Money for Academic and Research Libraries:

From the clay tablets of Babylonia to the computers of modern research libraries stretch more than 5,000 years of men's and women's insatiable desire to establish written immortality. It is, therefore, critical that...[we] promote libraries as worthy recipients of philanthropy. Our intellectual heritage depends on the success of this mission. It cannot be done by a single financial source. (p. v)

History

The beginning of private support for American public libraries was usually attributed to John Harvard when he bequeathed some 300 volumes from his private library to a struggling colonial college which today is, of course, Harvard University. Benjamin Franklin's launching of a subscription library in Philadelphia in 1731 served as a model for many other libraries in Europe and North America. Franklin intended to promote equal access (among Americans of the time). The first financing of a public library from public dollars came about when the Reverend Abiel Abbott convinced citizens to support the Peterborough Town Library in New Hampshire in 1833 (Clark, 1992). However, the birth of the public library movement in the United States really began in earnest in the mid-nineteenth century as Americans supported the notion for a free education which was inherent in the democratic promise. It also provided a response to the varying social requirements in a democracy as well as a reflection of the idealism that characterized the Enlightenment period in America (Curley, 1990).

The trust by citizens in private philanthropy to assist in the public library movement was rewarded by such individuals as Jacob Astor in New York City, Joshua Bates in Boston, Enoch Pratt in Baltimore, and, of course, Andrew Carnegie in over 1,500 communities across the land. Private philanthropy was a stimulus for public tax support. However, some have argued that the reverse can also be true, contemporary examples of which are briefly mentioned later.

The shift from subscription lending libraries to mainly publicly supported libraries took well over 100 years. However, community support grew for public libraries even during the depression as libraries served many unemployed. Roosevelt's New Deal through the Works Progress Administration spent millions by creating jobs for Americans in libraries. The postwar economic boom saw marked expansion of suburbs and along with them came a public library in almost every one. In 1956, the Library Services Act was signed primarily for the extension of library services to rural areas. And, in 1964, the Library Services and Construction Act was signed by President Johnson, which created another major building cycle for public libraries.

Budget cuts started in the 1970s, and libraries were once again faced with troubled times. Galvanization of grassroots support for local libraries around the United States in the 1980s and 1990s has appeared to steam the tide of budget cuts, often because of the support of voters rather than the help of politicians (Berry, 1993).

Being able to obtain multiple sources of support for the library appears to have become part of the effective librarian's portfolio. Seeking the right balance of support from local, state, national, and private sources has been, and continues to be, a major challenge for libraries. A library development program integrated within the library structure can assist in bringing clarity to this chronic problem.