On November 18, 1924, the Berwyn City Council passed a law to establish the Public Library and Reading Room. The law also empowered the mayor, with the approval of the City Council, to appoint a nine-member Board of Library Directors.
On the night of Mayor Frank Janda’s second inauguration, he appointed to the Board of Library Directors Karel Marsicek,Secretary of the Berwyn Improvement Association (BIA); Frederick L. Dole; Mrs. Chipman (Anna) Skeels, Mrs. Lester (Gladys) B. Orr, and Mrs. O. J. (Hattie) Deschauer of the Berwyn Woman’s Club (BWC); Mrs. Mae Lafferty; John F. Lanka; James Pavek; and Dr. L. Stolfa. Gladys Orr had had been librarian of the town’s second library, the Berwyn Community Service Library.
The first meeting of the Board of Library Directors, at which Dole was elected president and Mrs. Skeels was elected vice-president, was held on May 7, 1925. By November, the City of Berwyn had lent it $500 to cover initial expenses. One of those expenses was the salary (“not to exceed $8 per week”) of a “library attendant.” Another expense was $175 to cover seven months’ worth of rent in the Berwyn Club, an L-shaped building at the intersection of 33rd Street and Oak Park Avenue that had been built to house a Masonic lodge, an Odd Fellows lodge, and a men’s social club.
By mid-1926, the Berwyn Library had amassed a 4,000-volume collection. The Board of Library Directors hired Miss Margaret Ely as the BPL’s first full-time librarian in June of 1926 and she held the post until July of 1957. Born in Morrison, Illinois, she had degrees from Oberlin College in Ohio and the University of Wisconsin. She had taught library science at Creighton University, in Omaha, Nebraska, before she was placed in charge of book acquisitions at the Chicago Public Library (CPL). Sister Mary Serena, Professor of Library Science at Rosary College (now Dominican University), wrote that Miss Ely was quite influential in the CPL post.
In July of ‘26, theBerwynPublic Library & Reading Room was renamed the Berwyn Public Library, and in August, the BPL issued library cards. In November, the Berwyn Club building was sold to a motion picture company (back when many movie theaters were owned by movie studios and just before the new “talkie” movies replaced silent movies) and the Board of Library Directors received a notice the BPL had to vacate the building by the end of the month.
A slumping real estate market (in a recession most people have forgotten took place before the Great Depression) led the real estate firm Barnhart & Company to rent its own office building at 2214–16 Oak Park Avenue to the BPL at $60 per month for six months and $75 per month thereafter. The Board of Library Directors acquired 2 tables and 12 chairs to furnish it. A photo in History of the Berwyn Public Librarydepicts a clapboard building about the size of a housewith a three-sided sign atop the building’s porch.
The Library Board hired Miss Mary Duran as a typist at $60 per month, George Blaha as a janitor for $1 per day, Miss Mary Deschauer as part-time clerical assistant at 25¢ per hour, and Glenn Roberts as a page for 50¢ per day. Library employees depended on a stove for heat. One day, it blew up, coating Miss Ely, Mrs. Deschauer and most of the books with soot. After a coal stove replaced the old oil stove, library staff members had to fill it themselves (like Bob Cratchitin A Christmas Carol).
The BPL arranged with the CPL and Oak Park Public Library (OPPL) for BPL patrons to be able to borrow books from those libraries. At the time, the BPL had a collection of approximately 6,000 volumes. In the last four months of 1926, circulation reached 17,511. The next year, it reached 90,926.
By 1930, the BPL vacated the old real estate office building and had two branch libraries in addition to the Central Library, also known as the Main Library, which was located in one room of a commercial building at 6910 Cermak Road. [Back then, though, it was still called 22nd Street, because Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak (1863-1933) hadn’t been killed yet by Giuseppe Zangarawhile shaking hands with President-elect Franklin Delano Roosevelt in Miami.] The decision to distribute library services between three libraries followed Berwyn’s historical north-south divide that began as two communities separated by 1 ½ miles of farmland and wilderness. In addition, for decades, residents of North Berwyn received mail from a different post office than residents of South Berwyn, and had utilities provided by different sources.
In the 1920s, the green space between North Berwyn and South Berwyn disappeared, but the continuation of the North/South divide in the mental geography of Berwyn residents resulted in several decades’ worth of debate over whether the town should have a single relatively large library or three small branches. As a result, the BPL would ultimately occupy sixteen main and branch locations, for a total of nineteen library sites when we count the earlier private lending libraries.
At first, the BPL South Branch was located at 3204 Grove Avenue. By 1930, it had moved to 3118 Oak Park Avenue, very close to where the Berwyn Community Service Libraryhad been in the Masonic Temple.
By 1930, North Berwyn School District 98 provided space for free in a portable classroom building adjacent to Havlicek School for the BPL North Branch. It later moved to 6405½ West 16th Street, the heart of the North Berwyn. The BPL amassed a Czech language collection and housed it in the North Branch, a precedent for the BPL’s current Spanish language collection.
The North and South Branches were open for six hours a day Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. The Central Branch Library was open from 9:00 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays and was closed on Sundays.
By 1932, the BPL offered time on Saturday morning for children in the 1st through 4th grades to hear stories and book clubs for schoolchildren in 5th through 8th grades. These were being held not only in the BPL’s North and South Branches, but also in space provided gratis in the Gospel Tabernacle church at 2212 Oak Park Avenue.
The puppet shows performed by the children’s book club became so popular they evolved into a regular weekly feature at the library on Tuesdays. In response to requests for the formation of a book discussion group for adults, the BPL arranged for the first meeting of the Berwyn Adult Community Book Club to be held in February of 1932 in the Presbyterian Church at 32nd Street and Clinton Avenue.
In May of 1933, the Main Library moved from its Cermak Road location to the 2nd floor of the former Murphy Building at 6828 Windsor Avenue and was re-designated the South Branch. That is to say, the South Branch Library became the headquarters of the Berwyn Public Library, while the BPL continued to have a “central branch,” meaning a branch library with a central location. This is why people write and talk about the BPL in that period having a “central branch library,” which would otherwise be a contradiction in terms.
As with many organizations, during the Great Depression, the BPL was forced to lay-off some workers. In 1930-32, the height (or rather greatest depth) of the Great Depression, Mayor Frank Novotny purged the Library Board of members who would not acquiesce to his demands to assume control of the BPL’s finances, including Board President Frederick Dole, by simply not reappointing them to the Library Board, and packed it with cronies.
The BWC, the League of Women Voters, and Kiwanis Club supported the BPL when the mayor tried to take control of it. Friends of the Library, not to be confused with a later organization of the same name, formed to give library patrons a stronger voice in how the BPL should be run.
In December of 1931, the mayor’s clique repudiated by-laws that called for elections in June so they could elect themselves officers of the board immediately. The next year, they tried to replace two qualified assistant librarians with an ex-alderman, which resulted in a protest by 100 people, and then with two unemployed local girls who would be paid lower wages. One of them had the grace to withdraw when she found out someone would be fired so she could get a job. The clique also tried and failed to close the Central Branch Library.
This culminated in about 400 residents attending a Committee of the Whole meeting of the City Council. The crowd applauded when they heard things they liked and booed or hissed at remarks like Library Board Vice President W. C. Wharton’s statement the Library Board would ask for a 25% reduction in its budget.
In March of ‘33, two members of the clique resigned. Mayor Novotny quickly replaced them. Dr. Albert W. Hall would sit on the Library Board for 30 years until his goal of erecting permanent library buildings had been achieved.
State Library Extension Supervisor L. Price conceded the BPL had the lowest operating cost in the whole state of Illinois, but she pointed out this had come at the price of Berwyn having only one-tenth the number of books a town of Berwyn’s size required. Miss Price concluded, “The local library is poorly manned in comparison with other cities.” In October of 1937, Rev. Carl P. Graff replaced the retiring Mrs. Skeels as president of the Library Board, and pledged to address the shortcoming identified by Miss Price. He proved his word was good (as one would hope of a clergyman).
By June 1, 1938, the collection had increased by almost 3,000 new books. This brought the collection to 23,000 volumes – nearly 80,000 volumes short of the library standards called for in a city of Berwyn’s size, which at two books per capita would have been 100,000 volumes.
In 1939, the Central Branch Library moved into the newly-built City Hall, where it occupied the entire lower floor. The words “Berwyn Public Library” were carved into the stonework over the entrance at 6720 W. 26th Street.
In January of 1940, Miss Ely reported that in 1939 the BPL had 25,460 patrons. Out of a budget of $25,000, about ½ went for salaries, ¼ for new books and periodicals, and the rest went on “bindery, rent, postage, repairs, etc.” Also in 1940, Berwyn librarians began to go to the town’s schools to explain to schoolchildren how to use the library. The next step was a practice lesson at one of the town’s three libraries. That same year, 26,170 visitors read 234,501 books.
In May of 1942, the Library Board approved the hiring of a librarian for the Central Branch Library at a salary of $100 per month. The City Council reduced the allocation of money for book purchases to $2,000 when the city budget went in the red. Dr. Hall, the new Library Board president, objected, “Cutting the new book allowance from $5,614 to $2,000 would wipe out the prospect of new books at a time when they are especially in demand by people attempting to equip themselves for technical war jobs.”
By January of 1943, the BPL promoted a Victory Book Drive to encourage residents to donate books for the U. S. Armed Forces. By April, the BPL had civil defense displays and advertised its readiness to “find the answers to any national defense questions.” By July, the BPL responded to wartime gasoline rationing with displays featuring “vacation destinations close to home.”
Many library employees were forced to seek jobs elsewhere because wages at the BPL were so low at a time when defense contractor jobs were plentiful and lucrative. By September of 1943 the BPL was forced to close at 1:00 p.m. on Saturdays “because of the shortage of help.”
In September of ‘43, the Berwyn City Council voted against a transfer of $335 in library funds to the BPL that would have enabled the Library Board to raise salaries so that trained librarians could be hired. The excuse was city officials were uncertain if an exemption for municipal employees to a War Manpower Commission wage freeze applied to library personnel.
Finally, in October of ‘48, the Library Board increased all BPL salaries by 5% by taking money out of book and periodical funds. Despite this, the BPL was able to allocate money to subscribe to magazines for teenagers, such as Mademoiselle and Calling All Girls. Special reading sections were set aside for teens in the Central Branch Library and the South Branch.
During the 1940s, many of the Library Board meetings were cancelled for lack of a quorum. In 1944, the Library Board was unable to muster a quorum for seven out of its ten meetings. By October, the Library Board decided to count only active members toward achieving a quorum.
In April of 1947, the Library Board authorized President Hall to negotiate with the landlord of the North Branch at 6405½ West 16th Streetto determine if the branch might expand into a second storefront adjacent to the first. In December of ‘47, a lease extension was approved at a monthly rate of $50 for 1948 with a two-year option to renew, and the official address of the BPL’s North Branch became 6409 West 16th Street.
The total BPL budget for 1949 was $30,493. The 1950 budget was $32,541. The BPL cost Berwyn only $1.03 per person to operate.
Although library salaries were low, by 1950 employees enjoyed long vacations. Employees were offered one day of vacation for each month of service less than one year, three weeks of vacation after one year of service, and four weeks of vacation after three years of service. Lengthy vacations were made possible by closing the three libraries in rotation during summers.
Comments