Boston Public Library

The Boston Public Library is the largest municipal public library in the United States^[1] and was established in 1848. It was the first publicly supported municipal library in the United States and the first public library to allow people to borrow books and other materials. The Boston Public Library is also the library of last recourse^[2] of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts; all adult residents of the state are entitled to borrowing and research privileges, and the library receives state funding.

The Boston Public Library's McKim building with the campanile of Old South Church to the right

Collections

With 14.9 million volumes, the Boston Public Library is the third largest library in the United States.^[3] In addition to its extensive circulating library, which includes works in many languages, the Boston Public Library's collection has special strengths in art and art history (available on the third floor of the McKim building) and American history (including significant research material), and maintains a depository of governmental documents. There are large collections of prints, works on paper, photographs, and maps, rare books, incunabula, and medieval manuscripts.

History and Architecture

In 1852, financier Joshua Bates gave a gift of $50,000 to establish a library in Boston. The library was initially located in a former schoolhouse located on Mason Street, and was opened to the public on March 20, 1854. Later that year, the construction of a new building was authorized by the Library Commission, to be located at the corner of Boylston Street and Dartmouth Street on Copley Square.

The McKim Building

Courtyard of the McKim building looking north.

In 1888, Charles Follen McKim, of the architectural firm McKim, Mead, and White, was engaged to design the new building, opened in 1895. This building included a children's room, the first in the nation and a sculpture garden in its central courtyard surrounded by an arcaded gallery in the manner of a Renaissance cloister. To Copley Square the library presents a façade reminiscent of a sixteenth century Italian palazzo (illustration, top). The arcaded windows of its façade owe a debt to the side elevations of Alberti's Tempio Malatestiana, Rimini, the first fully Renaissance building. McKim did not simply imitate his model, however; the three central bays are subtly emphasized without breaking the rhythm. The library also represents one of the first major applications in the United States of thin tile vaults by the Catalan master builder Rafael Guastavino. Seven different types of Guastavino vaulting can be seen in the Boston Public Library.

Monumental inscriptions

Architect Charles Follen McKim chose to have inscribed monumental inscriptions, similar to those found on basilicas and monuments in ancient Rome, in the entablature on each of the main building's three façades. On the south is inscribed: "MDCCCLII • FOUNDED THROUGH THE MUNIFICENCE AND PUBLIC SPIRIT OF CITIZENS;" on the east: "THE PUBLIC LIBRARY OF THE CITY OF BOSTON • BUILT BY THE PEOPLE AND DEDICATED TO THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING • A.D. MDCCCLXXXVIII;" and on the north: "THE COMMONWEALTH REQUIRES THE EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE AS THE SAFEGUARD OF ORDER AND LIBERTY".

The last quotation has been attributed to the library's Board of Trustees. Another inscription, above the keystone of the central entrance, proclaims: "FREE TO ALL". Across the street from the central entrance to the library is a twentieth century monument to the Lebanese born poet and philosopher Kahlil Gibran who as a young immigrant educated himself in the Boston Public Library. The monument reflects an inscription back to the McKim building reading "IT WAS IN MY HEART TO HELP A LITTLE, BECAUSE I WAS HELPED MUCH". The text is excerpted from a letter enclosed with Gibran's generous bequeath to the library.

Bates Hall

Bates Hall has a coffered ceiling in a wide catena-arched barrel vault. Internet and power connections are discreetly placed under the large wooden research tables

Bates Hall is named for the library's first great benefactor Joshua Bates (1788-1864). Boston Globe writer Sam Allis identified "Bates Hall, the great reading room of the BPL, vast and hushed and illuminated with a profusion of green lampshades like fireflies" as one of Boston's "secular spots that are sacred." ^[4] The form of Bates Hall, rectilinear but terminated with a hemi-circle on each end, recalls a Roman basilica. A series of robust double coffers in the ceiling provide a sculptural canopy to the room. The east side has a rhythmic series of arched windows with light buffered by wide overhanging hood on the exterior. Heavy deep green silk velvet drapery installed in 1888, and again in the 1920s and 1950s was not recreated in the 1993 restoration of the room. The drapery helped to mufffle sound and lower light levels.

The Johnson Building

A late modernist addition, somewhat anticipating postmodernist architecture, designed by Philip Johnson was completed in 1972. The Johnson Building reflects similar proportions, and is built of the same pink granite as the McKim building. Critics have likened it to a mausoleum, citing its small percentage of windows relieving the massive walls in the exterior façade. It now houses the circulating collection, while the research library is located in the McKim Building.

Art, Rare Books and Exhibits

Murals include recently restored paintings by John Singer Sargent on the theme of Judaism and Christianity; Edwin Austin Abbey's most famous work, a series of murals which depict the Grail legend; and paintings of the Muses by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes.

Dancing Bacchante and Infant Faun, by Frederick William Macmonnies in the library's Italianate Courtyard. It is one of his most famous sculptures.

The library has 1.7 million rare books and manuscripts in its collections. It is the home of several large collections, including first edition folios by William Shakespeare, records of colonial Boston, and the 3,800 volume personal library of John Adams.

Staffing and funding levels for conservation, as of 2006, are below its peers: the BPL's staff of two full-time conservators compares with New York Public Library's thirty-five. The Boston Globe said that many colonial records and John Adams manuscripts are brittle, decaying, and in need of attention and cited the library's acting Keeper of Rare Books and Manuscripts as saying "they are falling apart."^[5]

The library regularly exhibits its rare works, often in exhibits that will combine works on paper, rare books, and works of art. Several galleries in the third floor of the McKim building are maintained for exhibits. Rooms are also available for lectures and meetings.

Branch library system

The main branch is located on Boylston Street in Boston. Facing the library from across Copley Square stands Henry Hobson Richardson’s Trinity Church.

In 1870, the first branch library (geographically distinct facility of the same organization) in the United States opened in East Boston. The library currently has 27 branches serving diverse populations in the city's neighborhoods.

Technology

One of the features that the Boston Public Library offered first is Free Wi-Fi wireless internet. It is offered throughout the entire library and at all 27 branches, giving access to anyone who has a wireless enabled laptop and a library card to access the Internet. Plug-in ethernet access is also available in Bates Hall. The Boston Public Library also maintains several internet databases providing either catalogue or full text access to different parts of its collections, as well as to a number of proprietary databases. Public Internet access is also available to those without laptops, though this is in high demand and will be limited in duration if there are other patrons waiting.

References

1. ^ American Library Association fact sheet Only the Library of Congress and the combined libraries of Harvard University, an academic library collection not open to the general public, contain more volumes
2. ^ Declared in 1970 by law. Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 78, Section 19C, paragraph 4
3. ^ According to the American Library Association [1], the Library of Congress has 29.6 million volumes, Harvard University 15.2 million.
4. ^ Allis, Sam (2005): "Holy Hub's hot spots: Fenway Park and other secular spots that are sacred." Boston Globe, December 4, 2005, p. A3
5. ^ MacQuarrie, Brian. "Library lacks means to repair old tomes", The Boston Globe, 2006-10-06. Retrieved on 2006-10-06.

External links

• The Boston Public Library
• A Tribute to the Boston Public Library
• Boston Public Library: architectural images
• Great Buildings on-line
• Photos of the Boston Public Library

Gallery

Main staircase

First floor plan

Early postcard

Categories

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