Illinois Carnegie Libraries Multiple Property Submission - Libraries

Libraries

As it became obvious in the late 1880s that Carnegie intended to give away a portion of his wealth, communities, including those in Illinois, began to scramble for the grants. Towns across Illinois petitioned Carnegie, who from 1897 delegated responsibility for screening applications to his personal secretary James Bertram. Bertram was the man that municipalities dealt with when trying to obtain a library, he was known as efficient to the point of rudeness.

Though Carnegie funded 106 libraries in Illinois, the Multiple Property Submission included just 17 of those libraries scattered in small towns across the state. The libraries included: Oregon Public Library, Arcola Carnegie Public Library, Ayer Public Library, Buffalo Township Public Library, (in Polo), Danville Public Library, El Paso Public Library, Greenville Public Library, Havana Public Library, Hoopeston Carnegie Public Library, Jacksonville Public Library, Lincoln Public Library, Litchfield Public Library, Olney Carnegie Library, Paris Carnegie Public Library, Paxton Carnegie Public Library, Streator Public Library, and the Vienna Public Library.

Before the construction of the Carnegie libraries the condition of libraries in small town Illinois can be described as poor, at least based on the descriptions in correspondence to Bertram regarding the grants. Littered among the glowing self-reviews of various communities are indications of the state of libraries in communities seeking Carnegie grants. For instance, in Oregon, Illinois, the library was forced to occupy "undesirable rented rooms," first in a drug store and then later in a bank building. The 12,000 volume library in Havana was housed in a small room in city hall, cluttered among other municipal offices and departments. The accuracy of these statements is hard to know as the communities were vying for competitive grants for new libraries, but the correspondence can give some idea of the condition of libraries around the state prior to influx of Carnegie's finances.