"An Active Instrument for Propaganda": The American Public Library During World War I

Beta Phi Mu Monograph #1

by Wayne A. Wiegand

This study effectively addresses the What was the involvement of the American public library community in The Great War? A comprehensive introduction provides an overview of public library history prior to World War I, touching on such topics as the growth of the public library from the genteel, early nineteenth-century social libraries of New England and the Mid-Atlantic states and the founding of the American Library Association in 1876. The A.L.A. provided for an exchange of information and a means to address common problems encountered in librarianship. It facilitated the adoption of the Dewey classification system, pressed for the publication of periodical indexes, and began publishing its own collection guides. Wiegand details the socioeconomic characteristics of turn-of-the-century library professionals and their determination to address industrialization, urbanization, and immigration as these issues came within their sphere of influence. He identifies two perplexing problems of the the inability of public librarians to force Americans to actually use their libraries, and the challenges posed by new forces in the cultural, intellectual, and literary worlds. It is against this background that American public librarians and their institutions responded to the call for united action during World War I.

Chapter 1 deals with the response to the Great European War before the United States entered on the allied side in 1917, while Chapters 2 and 3 analyze library-initiated wartime activities on both the local and national levels. The role of the public library in food conservation and the infrequently addressed issue of censorship and book burning are scrutinized in Chapters 4 and 5. Chapter 6 outlines programs for the Americanization of immigrants. A concluding chapter offers a synthesis of the volume. An essay on primary sources is included in the bibliography. An Active Instrument for Propaganda inaugurates the Beta Phi Mu's Monograph Series that, in the tradition of the International Library Science Honor Society's Chapbooks, will add significantly to the scholarly literature of the library profession. The book will be an important addition to collections dealing with World War I, and a valuable resource for historians of that period. Because wide coverage has been given to the wartime activities of hundreds of public libraries across the nation, many local public library collections will be enriched by this important volume.

Genres: History, Politics

205 pages, Hardcover

First published April 26, 1989

About the author

"Wayne August Wiegand (born April 15, 1946) is an American library historian, author, and academic.

Often referred to as the "Dean of American library historians," Wiegand retired as F. William Summers Professor of Library and Information Studies and Professor of American Studies at Florida State University in 2010. He received a BA in history at the University of Wisconsin–Oshkosh (1968), an MA in history at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (1970), and an MLS at Western Michigan University and a Ph.D. in history at Southern Illinois University (1974). Before moving to Tallahassee in 2003 he was Librarian at Urbana College in Ohio (1974-1976), and on the faculties of the College of Library Science at the University of Kentucky (1976-1986) and the School of Library and Information Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison (1987-2002). At the latter he also served as founder and Co-Director of the Center for the History of Print Culture in Modern America (a joint program of the University and the Wisconsin Historical Society established in 1992).

In Spring, 1994, he was William Rand Kenan Jr. Visiting Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In Spring, 1998, he was Fellow in the UW–Madison’s Institute for Research in the Humanities. In 1999 he was elected to membership in the American Antiquarian Society, and in Fall, 2000, he was a Spencer Foundation Fellow. Between 2004 and 2007 he served as Executive Director of Beta Phi Mu (the International Library and Information Science Honor Society). As a member of the faculty of the FSU Program in American & Florida Studies, in 2006 he co-organized the Florida Book Awards (the most comprehensive state book awards program in the United States) and until July, 2012, served as its Director. For the academic year 2009-2010 he shared time between Florida State University in Tallahassee and the Winter Park Institute of Rollins College in Orlando, where he was “Scholar in Residence." In 2011 he received a Short-Term Fellowship from the New York Public Library. From 2010 to 2014 he served as President of the Florida State University Friends of Libraries. For the academic year 2008-2009, he was on a Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities to write a book tentatively entitled ’Part of Our Lives:’ A People’s History of the American Public Library. This book will be published simultaneously with a documentary on the American public library currently being put together by independent film makers.[1]

He currently resides in Walnut Creek, California."

~Wikipedia entry - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_A....