CALIFORNIA COUNTY FREE LIBRARIES

THE

HARRIET G. EDDY

County Library Organizer, State Library

HE library and the school are coming to be regarded more and more as supplemental and vitally interrelated in purpose. This recognition of their interrelation in theory is coming to make them more and more so in fact. As a consequence, schools are paying more attention to libraries and demanding more of them; and libraries are paying more attention to service to the schools. We are all coming to have the clear vision that between school and library there should be no boundary, since both are working to the same purpose—the general raising of the average intelligence. Each should be so interwoven into the other as to present a solid fabric. Or to vary the figure, the ideal library is the enveloping action of the whole drama of education, furnishing books, pictures, and the story hour to the little child, then offering him recreation and supplemental work through all his years of grammar and high school; furnishing him with material for research in the university, and finally equipping him with the only means we yet have for a continuation school through the rest of his life.

Firm in the belief that this is the true mission of a library, and ambitious to bring about its realization, the California State Library has for years been working towards books for the people-not a few books for all the people, nor plenty of books for a few people, but plenty of books for all the people. And the two reasons which justify me in telling you about it are that we have the schools especially in mind in thus attempting complete service; and second, because anything so vital to the welfare of the community is, or should be, of vital interest to every teacher.

Up to within a few years, there have been three ways in which library service has been given to the public: 1. Municipal libraries; 2. Traveling libraries; 3. School libraries. These have not proved adequate to the task, for they are disconnected from access to a larger collection of books, do not receive sufficient financial support, often do not have trained supervision, and hence are poorly and disproportionately chosen, and fail to arouse in the people an enthusiasm to use them. So a unit was sought which would cure all these ills, and give service to everybody, whether living in the congestion of the city, or on the distant mountain side. The county offered the solution to all these

difficulties, as it is large enough to give ample support, to pay for trained supervision; and when all the counties have established a county free library, then everybody in the state will have free library service. So a county free library law has been passed in California, making it permissive for the county supervisors to establish a county free library, to levy taxes to support it, and to appoint a county librarian to have charge of it. Already twelve counties have taken up the plan, with unprecedented success. It works out exactly like a large city library with its branches. The central library is in the county seat, and branches are placed in every community in the county; each branch has a collection of books, exchanged as the community finishes with them, with additional ones sent as requested and needed. Then the State Library stands back of the county free libraries, supplementing them with any books they can not have in their own collection.

It is a wonderful plan, by far the most comprehensive ever started for getting adequate library service for everybody. And the people are approving it by their enthusiastic appreciation. Small towns are able to have reading room and library service, impossible if supported locally; high schools have access to hundreds of dollars' worth of material for special research work during the year; study clubs have collections of books at their disposal; the special student has access to the book he most needs for his study; the farmer has sent to him the latest book in his particular industry; and the general public receives every service a library can give. Thus the end, toward which the county free library was created to aim is being realized-plenty of books for everyone, with pleasure and profit for everyone from early age to the end of life.

WHAT CHAMBERLAIN SAYS

He was very bashful and she tried to make it easy for him. They were driving along the seashore and she became silent for a time. "What's the matter?" he asked.

"O, I feel blue," she replied. "Nobody loves me and my hands are cold."

"You should not say that," was his word of consolation, "for God loves you, and your mother loves you, and you can sit on your hands."Success.

GIVE US A PLACE TO PLAY

BY JOHN L. SHROY

Frances E. Willard School, Philadelphia

"Git out!" yells the cop, "'r I'll soon put a stop
To y'er nerve rackin' din by runnin' you in.
You won't play on the street when I'm on this beat,
So chase y'urself hence. Git away from that fence!"
An' the cop, he's the law, an' we've got to obey,
But he don't tell us what 'r where we can play.

"Git out!" yells the man when we kick his ash can.
Then he calls us vile toughs, an' villains and roughs,
An' names if I said would knock mother dead.
We run all our might to get out of his sight,
An' bump into people, who kick us away

An' growl, but don't mention a place we can play.

"Git out of the way!" yells a man with a dray
As he nearly runs down my chum, Billy Brown;
He raises his whip, and then all of us skip.
But we only change streets, for where else can we go
To escape cops and drivers-does any one know?

If you were a lad; didn't mean to be bad,
Had no place to meet except in the street,
No place to play ball 'r "tagger" at all,

No place just to yell when y'ur feelin' real well,
Now, honest and true, what on earth would you do?
Why, you'd swear an' make bets an' smoke cigarettes;
You'd gamble an' fight, an' throw stones just for spite.
You'd try to live down to the names you were named,
An' you'd lie, with the gang, without feelin' ashamed.

Big brothers of ours, we want to do right,
But try as we will, it's a hard, uphill fight.
We'd rather play ball in a place where we dare,
Than skulk near a corner an' gamble an' swear.
We'd rather clim' ladders an' act on a bar,
Than dodge a policeman 'r hang on a car.

It's up to you, brothers; come, please don't delay;
But establish a place where us fellows can play.

CENTRAL CALIFORNIA SCHOOLMASTERS' CLUB Winfield A. Benner

I

Vice-Principal Hawthorne School, Fresno

N view of the rapid, progressive strides of the Central California Schoolmasters' Club in the past few years, we feel that a resume of our work would be of interest to the readers of this journal. The Central California Schoolmasters' Club was formed on October 16, 1905, for the purposes of promoting better fellowship among the men in the school departments in and around Fresno, and of officially aiding any worthy educational work in the community.

Meetings have been held at irregular intervals of from one to two months during each school year since. At these meetings topics of educational interest and value have been discussed by prominent people. Among these were Rev. Thomas Boyd, who, a year ago, spoke on his recent trip to Europe; Hon. Frank Short, who, two years ago, spoke to us on his winter's experiences in Washington, D. C.; E. E. Manheim, of the Farmers' National Bank, who addressed us on "Banking"; Dr. H. S. Curtis, formerly secretary of the Playground Association of America, who last winter spoke on Playgrounds; and Dr. A. E. Winship, who spoke on "Educational Progress in California" last winter.

The club has had delegated to it full charge of the entertainment of the visiting teachers during the meetings of the California Teachers' Association-Central Section, for the past two years; and the entertainment has been conducted in such manner that we feel justly proud of its success. Among other features was a banquet, to which the lecturers of the session have been invited. Last spring Dr. Winship was one of our guests.

Last year the Park Commission of Fresno being anxious to turn over the management of the Municipal Playgrounds to some branch of the School Department, the Schoolmasters' Club volunteered to accept the responsibility. We planned, and, with the assistance of the entire School Department, carried out a mammoth "Play Fest," in which nearly two thousand school children competed. The proceeds went toward supervising the playgrounds during last summer's vacation. The writer was selected as supervisor, and Miss Mabel Newell of Emerson School for that of assistant supervisor. Considering our financial resources for equipment, our work was a success, and there is now a strong sentiment in Fresno for permanent supervision.

By no means our least important step has been our joining the Chamber of Commerce as an organization and taking an active part in its affairs.

One man only from outside the school department has been elected to membership Mr. John Fee, Physical Director of the Fresno Y. M. C. A., who has always been of invaluable assistance to the Fresno schools in all matters pertaining to athletics and physical culture. He is one of our most enthusiastic and influential members. Our officers for this year are: President, John A. Nowell, viceprincipal of Fresno high school; vice-president, W. B. Munson, principal Webster school; secretary, F. M. Fulstone, head of the commercial department, Fresno high school; treasurer, D. D. Davis, principal Hawthorne school.

In conclusion, let me say that the Schoolmasters' Club is rapidly becoming a potent factor in all important matters in this community. What has been done here can be duplicated elsewhere, and it is with the sincere wish that a knowledge of our successes may aid in the organization of similar clubs elsewhere, and in encouraging such organizations already existing, that this account has been written.

MARK TWAIN AND THE TYPEWRITER

Mark Twain, during his seventy and more years, led a life of such infinite variety that there are few things in the gamut of human interest that were foreign to his experience and there are many, many things on which he threw the light of original knowledge. He was more than an author. He was always an actor in the human drama, and he was more than one kind of a pioneer. Among other things, he claimed to be the first person in the world to apply the type machine to literature. When we consider that the typewriter is now the accepted medium for the preparation of authors' manuscript, this claim assumes importance. It shows that Mark Twain could claim and justly claim to be a veritable Columbus of literature in a new and incontrovertible sense.

The facts were brought out in a most interesting way. While Mr. Clemens was working on his autobiography, an old letter written by him thirty-two years ago to the manufacturers of the Remington Typewriter was unearthed and brought to his attention. Here is what he

wrote: