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Abstract
Free public libraries, and "modern" library methods, arrived late in the Pacific Northwest. Two individuals were particularly influential in the introduction, growth, and professionalization of library service in the state of Oregon: Cornelia Marvin (later Pierce), of the Oregon Library Commission and the Oregon State Library (1905-28), and Mary Frances Isom of the Library Association of Portland (1901-20). This article will explore their relationship as leaders and colleagues during the early years of public library service in Oregon. Isom and Marvin frequently consulted one another on professional and personal questions, supporting each other as senior leaders of their institutions and as women in positions of power. Often working together, Isom and Marvin promoted tax-supported libraries throughout Oregon and the advantages of staffing them with formally trained librarians. Between them, they established the foundations for community and government support for libraries in the state. They contributed to creating a professional support system for librarians in the region as cofounders of the Pacific Northwest Library Association and were also active in the American Library Association. Their publications, reports, and surviving correspondence provide evidence of their extensive mutual support, opinions, actions, and decisions, as well as their professional development during their years as Oregon colleagues. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]
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ABSTRACT
Free public libraries, and "modern" library methods, arrived late in the Pacific Northwest. Two individuals were particularly influential in the introduction, growth, and professionalization of library service in the state of Oregon: Cornelia Marvin (later Pierce), of the Oregon Library Commission and the Oregon State Library (1905-28), and Mary Frances Isom of the Library Association of Portland (1901-20). This article will explore their relationship as leaders and colleagues during the early years of public library service in Oregon. Isom and Marvin frequently consulted one another on professional and personal questions, supporting each other as senior leaders of their institutions and as women in positions of power. Often working together, Isom and Marvin promoted tax-supported libraries throughout Oregon and the advantages of staffing them with formally trained librarians. Between them, they established the foundations for community and government support for libraries in the state. They contributed to creating a professional support system for librarians in the region as cofounders of the Pacific Northwest Library Association and were also active in the American Library Association. Their publications, reports, and surviving correspondence provide evidence of their extensive mutual support, opinions, actions, and decisions, as well as their professional development during their years as Oregon colleagues.
To my thinking, a great librarian must have a clear head, a strong hand, and, above all, a great heart. He must have a head as clear as the master in diplomacy; a hand as strong as he who quells the raging mob or leads great armies on to victory; and a heart as great as he who, to save others, will, if need be, lay down his life. Such shall be the greatest among librarians; and, when I look into the future, I am inclined to think that most of the men who will achieve this greatness will be women.
-Melvil Dewey, 1899
In this statement equating librarians with heroes, Melvil Dewey looked forward from 1899 and observed that in the future most of the "great librarians" would be women. Certainly women were already very well represented in the profession, many of them with formal training from America's newly established library schools. Librarians trained at Dewey's New York school ,and other schools formed shortly afterward, shared a common body of knowledge, common principles, and a collegial connection to each other. Having received their formal credentials, these librarians went to work throughout the nation, contributing to the "missionary phase" of the free public library, one of America's most enduring public institutions.
In the states of the Pacific Northwest in the earliest years of the twentieth century, free public libraries were still scarce, although they had become common farther east. Oregon in 1903 boasted 3 free public libraries; by contrast, Massachusetts had 206 (U.S. Bureau of Education, 1909, p. 30). A member of the Library Association of Portland board explained that the late development of free libraries was a result of the understandable need for communities to focus first on essential services: "Light and water and the other necessities of municipal life demand their attention and money; they wish the best public schools they can afford, so that they are not without excuse in allowing the comparative luxury of libraries to wait" (Brewster, 1905, p. 785). As popular support for libraries began to take hold, librarians with formal professional preparation were increasingly drawn to the Pacific Northwest region, which they perceived to be a wide-open field. The advantages to a community of hiring a "trained librarian" began to be recognized, and since the Pacific Northwest had no library schools until 1911 when a program was established at the University of Washington, the pioneer librarians of the Pacific Northwest were trained in the schools of the East and Midwest. They were nearly all female and unmarried.
Mary Frances Isom and Cornelia Marvin were key figures in the development phase of Oregon's public libraries, influencing and implementing public policies that made these institutions possible. Isom headed Oregon's most important library, beginning in 1902 when it opened to the public, first serving the city of Portland and then all of Multnomah County; Marvin led Oregon's first state library commission, established in 1905, and she worked quickly to extend library services to the rest of the state's population through the establishment of city and county libraries and through the traveling libraries and direct mail-order service made available through her agency. These two women were at the top of Oregon's library hierarchy and were extremely influential in determining what public libraries in the state would be and who Oregon's librarians would be. Enough reliable evidence has survived to permit a critical summary of their professional activities and achievements and to support the application of the "pioneer" label to both.1 Along with a small group of their peers from the same generation, both women were model librarians of the time: well-trained, highly competent, intelligent, and confident, with a mastery of the tools they needed to establish and operate libraries. Both possessed personal qualities that were considered highly desirable for female leaders of this period, although today they might be dismissed as antiquated, sexist, and elitist. These were enumerated by historian Joanne Passet as "breeding, social skills, feminine virtues, and physical appearance" (Passet, 1991b, p. 217).
EXAMINING Two LIVES
Mary Frances Isom (1865-1920)
Several authors have previously written about Isom. Along with Marvin, she was among four pioneer librarians featured by Passet in Cultural Crusaders (1994, pp. 135-149). She has been the subject of two biographical articles (Van Horne, 1959; Kingsbury, 1975) and is represented in several reference works;2 she is also one of the three librarians featured in Oregon historian Dorothy Johansen's The Library and the Liberal Tradition (1959). Published histories of the Library Association of Portland (LAP) include information about her role as an important leader of a cultural institution with a long history of service to Portland's elite, as it was transformed into a tax-supported free public institution (Brewster, 1938; Anderson, 1964; Ritz, 2000; Gunselman, 2001, 2002). All of these works have been built upon a somewhat sparse and fragmented documentary record. Along with the correspondence mentioned in note 1, evidence of Isom's career maybe found in the minutes of the LAP board; other sources of information are local newspapers, which often included coverage of library affairs and activities, memorial tributes which appeared after her death, and an interview with Marvin (Pierce, 1956).
Most of the details of Isom's early years have not been preserved; very little record remains of her life prior to her enrollment at the Pratt Institute library school. We know that she was born in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1865, to army surgeon Dr. John Franklin Isom and Frances A. (Walter) Isom. She appears to have been their only child. Her family was from Cleveland, and they returned there after the Civil War. She spent one year at Wellesley but interrupted her college education to return to Cleveland, where she served as "hostess and companion for her father" (Kingsbury, 1978, p. 261). When Dr. Isom died in 1899, Isom, then in her thirties, enrolled in the library program at Pratt at the urging of her childhood friend, Pratt faculty member Josephine Adams Rathbone. She spent two years there, completing the optional second year "historical course," and began seeking a position.
Isom's ascent to the top position in the Library Association of Portland, a private subscription library, was remarkably rapid and occurred at a critical time for the institution. She was hired very shortly after completing her work at the Pratt Institute library school in 1901 to catalog a large collection of books that had been bequeathed to the IAP in 1900 by Portland merchant John Wilson. Wilson had attached a significant condition to his bequest: if the directors of the LAP wished to accept this gift of approximately 9,000 volumes, they had to agree to make the books accessible, free of charge, to the public. Isom began the process of cataloging the books as the directors were making their final decision about how their private institution would go about making the collection freely available. In a remarkably rapid series of events between September 1900 and March 1902, the state of Oregon passed its first legislation authorizing tax levies for the support of free public libraries; the directors of the IAP agreed to make their library free; and Isom replaced Davis P. Leach, the head librarian, to preside over the LAP's transformation into Oregon's first tax-supported public library. Under her supervision, the use of the library skyrocketed; the number of library users grew from 803 dues-paying members in 1901 to 12,233 registered public users in 1903. Statistics also reflect use of the library building, a large structure in downtown Portland built by the LAP in 1893: attendance rose from 56,750 in 1901 to 228,918 in 1903 (see table 1). Isom and her staff apparently accommodated the changes very well, and the LAP continued to grow rapidly.
At the time of her promotion she was thirty-seven, unmarried, and financially secure, having inherited the estate of her parents. For the rest of her life Isom lived in Portland, intentionally choosing to devote herself to her career. In her correspondence she occasionally joked about matrimony, but in general she appeared content with her choice to remain unmarried. She maintained a busy social and volunteer schedule: at the time of her death, she was a member of the Oregon Civic League, the Consumer's League, the Professional Women's League, the Art Museum, the Drama League, the Evening Star Grange, the British Benevolent Society of Oregon, and a director of the Social Workers' Association of Oregon and the Audubon Society (Library Association of Portland, 1920, p. 4).
Isom's domestic life was privileged and full. In 1910 she adopted a young girl, Berenice Langton, the daughter of impoverished friends. They lived very comfortably with the help of their live-in domestic employee, Inga, who served as maid, cook, and housekeeper-a kind of support that undoubtedly gave Isom a great deal of freedom from the day-to-day domestic chores that often demanded so much of women's time and energy during this period. Her dependence on Inga is occasionally revealed in her letters; in 1909 she wrote to Marvin that "Inga is away on her vacation and will not be home until September 1st; we are taking our meals out and hating it" (Unpublished letter from M. F. Isom to C. Marvin, August 20, 1909. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). Marvin, whose own meals were prepared over the years by boarding house proprietresses, restaurants, and hired cooks, sympathized. Isom maintained two homes: in addition to her Portland house, she also built a beach house on the Oregon coast, a cottage called Spindrift, which was designed by A. E. Doyle, the same architect who worked with Isom on the design for the library's 1913 central building.3 In contrast with their counterparts today, both women from time to time took extended vacations or leaves of absence, periods of several months where they were free of their administrative responsibilities. Isom would spend time at Spindrift or travel. She also volunteered: during World War I she served for several months in "camp libraries" in France as part of the American Library Association's (ALA) wartime library service. Marvin took long trips abroad and was also active in the ALA wartime services during World War I.
Mary Frances Isom died at home, from cancer, in 1920; her friend Cornelia Marvin was probably with her at the end of her life, according to a letter written by one of her coworkers: "Miss Marvin has been called to Portland on account of the serious illness of Miss Isom whom you will be sorry to know cannot live but a few days more" (Unpublished letter from M. McPhearson to J. B. Kaiser, April 15, 1920. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 37. Oregon State Archives). Among the beneficiaries of her will were the LAP, to establish a pension fund for library employees, and her adopted daughter Berenice, who received the bulk of her estate.
Cornelia Marvin Pierce (1873-1957)
As with Isom, there are various published sources of biographical information for Marvin. She is the subject of a feature article and an undergraduate thesis (Brisley, 1968, 1966), as well as entries in several reference works (Passet, 2000; Mickey, 1978). Along with Isom and Ida Kidder, she is featured in The Library and the Liberal Tradition (Johansen, 1959). Many years after her retirement, she herself wrote an article in which she reflected upon her career and accomplishments (Pierce, 1955).
Cornelia Marvin was born in 1873 in Monticello, Iowa, the second of five children. Her parents were Charles Elwell Marvin and Cornelia Moody Marvin, a businessman and a homemaker. At least some portions of her childhood appear to have been tumultuous; her family moved to Tacoma, Washington, when she was in her teens, and her mother died there of tuberculosis in 1892. One of Marvin's biographers mentions that the children were sent to boarding schools or to live with relatives around this time, and her father appears to have been struggling financially with his business (Brisley, 1968, p. 125). She moved to Chicago in 1893, where she took a position as a "mother's helper" and attended courses at the University of Chicago. In 1894 she became one of Katharine Sharp's students at the newly established Armour Institute library school, and Sharp engaged her as a teacher after she graduated. She left the school when it relocated in 1897 from Chicago to Urbana. Sharp, one of the most important pioneers in library education, had been one of Melvil Dewey's closest proteges; she remained an important professional contact for Marvin throughout her career.
During Marvin's time as an instructor at Armour, she and her sister Mabel, who was then a student at the library school, came into contact with the well-known reformers Jane Addams and Florence Kelley:
One of the most interesting and rewarding experiences of my Armour days was the establishment and carrying forward of the "home libraries" in the Chicago stock yards district. I told the famous founder, P. D. Armour, of my plans and dreams for taking good books to the children in those homes and he told me to go ahead, he would furnish the money. I worked with Miss Mary McDowell, well known head of the stock yards settlement house. I took one of the home centers, and my sister and other library students volunteered for services in other centers. This brought me into touch with Jane Addams and Hull House. I also frequently met Florence Kelley, famous as liberator through legislation of laboring women and children. (Pierce, 1955, p. 6)
After leaving Armour, Marvin engaged in various areas of library work, organizing collections at academic libraries, acting as librarian of the Scoville Institute in Oak Park, Illinois, and then making a transition to state library commission work in Wisconsin. Marvin's interest in politics was nurtured during her time at the commission, where she worked with prominent pioneer librarians Frank Avery Hutchins and Lutie Eugenia Stearns. In Wisconsin Marvin quickly replaced Sharp as head of the commission's summer library school. This summer school was one of her most important responsibilities, and it eventually became the library school of the University of Wisconsin. In Oregon she continued her work as a library educator, working with Isom to offer summer training schools for Oregon librarians; they also tried unsuccessfully for several years to obtain Carnegie funding for a permanent library school in Oregon.
Marvin found her work at the Wisconsin State Library Commission rewarding, and she enjoyed the opportunity to work with colleagues she considered great librarians (Marvin, 1925a). Still, when Isom approached her in 1905 looking for recommendations for candidates for the secretary of the newly formed Oregon State Library Commission, it did not take Marvin long to indicate her own interest in the job. It would mean a cut in pay and starting a whole new enterprise from scratch-but she wrote Isom to put her name forward and was quickly offered the position. Her expression of interest is typical of her writing, showing her confidence in her own value, perhaps even to the point of arrogance: "I do not wish to apply but will let you know as soon as I hear from you whether I could accept it if offered. For many reasons I should like to be there" (Unpublished letter from C. Marvin to M. F. Isom, April 29, 1905. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). She followed this statement with a litany of questions for Isom about library conditions in Oregon, apologizing for the "catechism" as she tried to gather enough information to be sure the move would be a good decision.
It is not clear whether Isom was genuinely surprised when, instead of providing a list of likely candidates, Marvin herself seemed interested in the position; she may have been being coy when she wrote "My dear Miss Marvin, Your telegram quite took me off my feet, the idea that you could possibly consider the position for yourself never once occurred to me" (Unpublished letter from M. F. Isom to C. Marvin, April 28, 1905. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). Other factors may have been the presence of some of her family in the Pacific Northwest and the attraction of once again assuming the role of a pioneer; Passet observed that Marvin's relocation was at least partly motivated by her desire to be involved once again in the beginning phase of library work: "She enjoyed many elements of her work at the Wisconsin Free Library Commission, but nonetheless had grown restless and discontented as the missionary phase began to be replaced by bureaucracy and politics" (Passet, 1994, p. 81).
Marvin eventually left her position in Oregon for a reason common among women in librarianship: marriage. Although at fifty-five she was considerably older than most new brides, she followed custom and resigned. She married Walter M. Pierce, former governor of Oregon and a future member of Congress. Her personal and political partnership with Pierce, as detailed by other authors and illustrated in surviving correspondence and personal papers, is a fascinating part of her life; it lasted from 1928 until Walter Pierce's death in 1954 (Bone, 1981).
Marvin is an excellent example from the library profession of a Progressive Era reform activist. As mentioned above, she was briefly involved with Chicago's settlement houses in the 1890s, a well-known example of Progressive Era reform, in a project to establish "home libraries." She was politically engaged long before she was able to vote and made a major impact through her work on behalf of public libraries. But we should also consider another of her reform interests, particularly striking since it falls far outside of what we would consider to be "progressive" today. In 1955, Hearing the end of her life, Marvin reflected on her career and her civic accomplishments. She revealed her strong sympathy with the eugenics movement and its most determined and powerful advocate in Oregon, Dr. Bethenia Owens-Adair: "I believe my most important work outside of the Library was the backing I was able to give Dr. Owens-Adair in her long fight for legislation in making possible sterilization of the unfit. That bill was signed by Governor Walter Pierce. I also assisted in the preparation of her autobiography" (Pierce, 1955). For readers who find it perplexing that individuals labeled "progressive" would promote cavises such as involuntary sterilization, this seeming paradox is discussed in many histories of this period. In one recent article, historian Mark Largent explained that "[Owens-Adair] and many other social and political leaders in Oregon believed that eugenic sterilization and marriage laws could improve the quality of the state's citizenry by preventing 'unwise marriages' and their subsequent offspring" (Largent, 2002, p. 193).
In her writing, Marvin indicated that she believed this issue was related to her position as Oregon State Librarian. Concerned about what she perceived as the misallocation of resources in favor of the "unfit" (rather than the "fit" or perhaps the "fittest," pressing the social Darwinian language further), in 1921 she wrote: "there are just two things to be done to relieve the terrible burden of the tax-payers. The first is the income tax. The other is to put a stop to the terrible increase of the unfit. In about a quarter of a century, with our humanitarian bills, as they are, we shall be doing nothing but raising money to support the unfit, and we shall not have a decent citizenship at that" (as cited in Brisley, 1966, p. 31). Marvin was primarily concerned with persuading the legislature and Oregon's citizens to provide adequate financial resources for the delivery of library services to Oregonians. Framing her arguments about allocation of resources in Darwinian language may very well have made them more persuasive. It was a common way of thinking about society during this time. Richard Hofstadter noted that "Accompanied by a flood of valuable genetic research carried on by physicians and biologists, eugenics seemed not so much a social philosophy as a science; but in the minds of most of its advocates it had serious consequences for social thought" (Hofstadter, 1959, p. 161). This phenomenon of simultaneously promoting such different causes as free public libraries and eugenic sterilization provides some of the most interesting questions for interpreting the activities of progressive reformers.
As she prepared for retirement upon her marriage in 1928, Marvin took advantage of the occasion to articulate her vision for the future of public libraries. It is clear from this statement that she felt that the library as a public educational institution was not rising to its full potential for social good because it was not being given proper support from government:
The library is a great constructive force. Its trustees and those of other educational institutions must soon face the issue and decide whether the major expenditures and activities of the state shall be concerned chiefly with the provision for the defective and delinquent, supplemented by such material benefits as good roads, or whether the educational privileges now given only to youth congregated in a few places, shall be state-wide and open to old and young, poor and rich, people of all kinds, performing useful tasks in all occupations, citizens all, participating in the privileges made possible through cooperation in the political life of the state. (Oregon State Library, 1915-29, p. 6)
Marvin had viewed Oregon as a missionary field, upon which she could place her own personal stamp, systematically introducing her own version of the best standards and practices. Passet suggested that this was common among pioneering librarians: "Cornelia Marvin, along with countless others, viewed the West as a tabula rasa, where she could exercise professional and personal autonomy" (Passet, 1994, p. 151). Her commitment to work for the improvement of society only increased when she left librarianship upon her marriage. Johansen describes her transition from state librarian to political spouse: "Cornelia surrendered the library in 1929, to carry Walter Pierce into a larger political arena and to broader issues of reforming and remaking society toward the goal of what in her earlier days had been called 'rational democracy'" (Johansen, 1959, p. 16; see also Bone, 1981).
At the end of her life she bequeathed most of her estate to Reed College, a private Portland liberal arts institution, giving approximately $300,000 to support "maintaining salaries and if necessary books, for instruction in the fields of American history, government and institutions, history of American foreign affairs and related subjects necessary for the preparation of young people for the public service of state or nation and to create an interest in governmental affairs" (Johansen, 1957, p. 1). This gift still supports a Cornelia Marvin Pierce chair in American history and institutions at Reed.
PROGRESSIVE ERA CONDITIONS FOR LIBRARIES
The overall climate of progressive reform in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries contributed to the establishment of public institutions such as free schools, land-grant colleges, and free libraries. There was great social support and popular momentum for these institutions, which were intended to function as agencies of opportunity, providing individuals with tools for economic and social upward mobility and shaping a nation of good citizens. Describing government's evolving role in society, Hildenbrand stated that "Progressivism linked large-scale government intervention, necessary to deal with the new conditions, to an old tradition, individual opportunity" (Hildenbrand, 1985, pp. 185-186). Popular ideas about human capabilities, especially those informed by "scientific" ideas such as social Darwinism, contributed to building political and popular support for the large public investment required to establish these agencies.
Librarianship was a profession that appealed to Progressives, including Isom and Marvin. Historian Robert Crunden noted that "They [Progressives] groped toward new professions such as social work, journalism, academia, the law, and politics. In each of these careers, they could become preachers urging oral reform on institutions as well as on individuals" (Crunden, 1982, p. ix). Librarianship shares many common qualities with the other professions named here. To be successful in their endeavors, librarians and other reform-oriented professionals needed a combination of conviction and skills, along with personal qualities arising from class-birth and upbringing-or professional and social "polish" developed through their education and individual efforts. Self-assurance and confidence enabled them to gather and deploy resources, to form crucial alliances in their local communities and beyond, and to recognize and effectively capitalize on opportunities.
The tax-supported library, open and free to all, began as the embodiment of an American progressive ideal: the informed citizen as the foundation for effective democratic self-government. The American library movement of the Progressive Era attracted individuals who worked together to persuade state and local governments all across the country to fund free libraries. One of the primary arguments offered by these advocates for levying taxes to fund free libraries was the need for informed citizens to exercise the franchise. In Arsenals of a Democratic Culture, Sidney Ditzion examined the American public library movement, and observed that the library was a populist institution: "The free library was to be an intellectual and literary common where the humblest and the highest would meet on equal terms just as they did at the polls" (Ditzion, 1947, p. 60). Two other major arguments were the benefits to individuals and society of institutions to support continuing adult education and to provide "wholesome" entertainment. In Oregon these arguments generated political action and momentum beginning about 1900, and Isom and Marvin were the central figures as the state's public libraries began to be developed.
A free public library, with a building funded through taxation or the gifts of Andrew Carnegie or other philanthropists, provided a public space especially for the purpose of reading and thinking, with a collection of materials for research, for current awareness, and for recreation. In examining the impact of these libraries, and the motives and activities of librarians and library boards, some historians have noted that, in addition to its educational mission, the public library also served as a tool for social control. Christine Jenkins, among others,4 has observed that historians are not necessarily in agreement regarding the social benefit of public libraries: "The mission articulated for the American public library in the earliest years of the profession-to uplift, educate, and improve native and immigrant working-class citizens-has been viewed by historians as both progressive and an effort at social control" (Jenkins, 1996, p. 223).
Nevertheless, social instability, in various forms and with various causes, was a major concern for most Americans at this time. In many professions, including librarianship, contributing to the stability of society was considered an important duty. For example, during the Progressive Era, it was common for librarians to consider the Americanization of immigrants to be a part of their mission. Lee has noted how "Libraries in the principal cities-New York, Brooklyn, Chicago, Detroit, and Seattle-assisted in the Americanization of the vast number of immigrants entering this country between 1900 and 1915. These libraries provided the newly arrived alien with the best literature of his own country as well as readable books about America, its institutions, customs, and ideals." (Lee, 1966, p. 41).
Another activity that was sometimes controversial and necessarily carried with it notions of social control was selecting (and rejecting) books in order to create collections suitable for the use of the community. The role of fiction, particularly popular or pulp fiction, was an enduring topic of debate. Should public funds be used to acquire such material? And was it good professional practice for a librarian to make it available (Carrier, 1985; Garrison, 1979)? Both Isom and Marvin believed this was an important moral responsibility of a public librarian, particularly with regard to children's literature. Neither was hesitant in exercising professional prerogative to remove books they thought unworthy or potentially harmful. Oregon historian Dorothy Johansen related a childhood memory of Isom purging a small library of this material: "She had among her other capacities infinite mercy and compassion but she had also a high and splendid anger. As a child I saw it in action when she swept the shelves of a village library clean of Horatio Alger books, the only books for children in the place-and to her, the just cause in itself for her Olympian wrath" (Johansen, 1959, pp. 10-11).
While continuing to acquire and circulate fiction they judged to be suitable, Marvin and Isom were careful to be prepared with arguments and explanations if their judgments were questioned-more often for acquiring fiction than for excluding it. For example, in 1909 Marvin articulated the proper role of this material in the tax-supported public libraries of Oregon: "Another function of the free library is to furnish the best form of wholesome recreation, books of fiction and travel" (Oregon Library Commission, 1907-1913, p. 27). This function of the library depended upon the authority and expertise of the professional librarian to make carefully reasoned, appropriate judgments; this professional mediation between the universe of literature and the reader was central to good practice in service to public library users.5 But Marvin could just as easily take the antifiction side of the debate, and during World War I, when public funds were severely constrained, she advocated a national moratorium on the purchase of fiction (Marvin, 1917, 1918).
In Cultural Crusaders Passet identified Marvin and Isom as belonging to this context of progressivist reform; of Marvin she observed that "Like many of the Progressive Era social reformers, Marvin believed that libraries had the power to eradicate ignorance, foster good government, and create responsible, intelligent citizens" (Passet, 1994, p. 81). In a broader discussion of early western librarians, Passet stated that "Daughters of the Progressive Era, and products of a middle-class milieu, the first professionally trained librarians in the West shared a vision of the library as a powerful educational agency that could preserve democracy and eradicate social ills" (Passet, 1994," p. 151; see also Maack, 1996, and Passet, 1991a).
In Oregon progressive reform activities played out against a political background where an elite, moneyed "ruling class" retained a great deal of control over municipal politics in Portland, while at the same time a tremendous populist idea of direct democracy took hold.6 In his book about Portland's "radical middle class," historian Robert Johnston discusses the complexities of these politics and notes that "at the 1902 election, Oregonians made their state the first in the union to adopt a fully functioning initiative and referendum law by the overwhelming vote of 62,024 to 5,668" (Johnston, 2003, p. 123). With the passage of this legislation, the dynamics of Oregon politics became very complicated: a powerful, wealthy elite centered in Portland was accustomed to exercising a great deal of control over affairs in Oregon, and the population at large had just empowered itself to influence policy and public priorities at the grassroots level. Marvin, who was tremendously interested in politics, was intrigued by the possibilities and challenges generated by these forces. Both Marvin and Isom were challenged by the need to work effectively with the wealthy and powerful, and also to appeal to the population at large, in order to advance the development of Oregon's free public libraries.
ACHIEVEMENTS
Isom had quick and major success, moving into a leadership role at a crucial time in Oregon's library movement. Even though she was newly graduated from library school and her professional experience was limited, she was clearly suited by temperament and personal experience to assume leadership and be effective. Marvin's experience was broader and deeper, and once in Oregon she was able to build on the momentum Isom had created to extend Portland's early success quickly to other parts of the state. Their early correspondence shows that Isom was tremendously influential in tempting Marvin to consider and seek the pioneering position of Oregon's first state library commission secretary, even though she was well-established elsewhere, enjoying successful and more lucrative work with Wisconsin's state commission. Considering this somewhat perplexing relocation, library historian Laurel Grotzinger identified Isom as a key factor in Marvin's move:
Her commitment to library expansion was eventually carried to the West Coast. In Oregon, during the first decade of the new century, a young Pratt library school graduate [Isom] was hard at work in an attempt to develop a public library system similar to that found in Wisconsin and New York. Mary F. Isom was able to entice Cornelia Marvin away from her Wisconsin home to help in her efforts. (Grotzinger, 1994, p. 21)
Describing library conditions in Oregon in 1905 to members of the ALA, who had gathered in Portland for their annual meeting, Isom explained that there was as yet little "library history" in the state. All of the important developments had been recent: "If you are investigating the history of the library movement of the state, there is no digging in dusty archives, no poring over musty records; you seek your information from the man who drew the bill, the woman who bought the book, the trustee who first threw open the rusty doors" (Isom, 1905, p. 279). Only fifteen years later, Marvin eulogized Isom in similar language, describing her contribution to the establishment of free libraries in Portland and Multnomah County and beyond: "To relate the story of Miss Isom's connection with the libraries of Oregon, is to give the whole history of library development in the state, as she was the founder of all our library institutions and associations" (Library Association of Portland, 1920, p. 7). This statement is not as hyperbolic as it may seem. Even though she had been in Oregon only four years when she addressed the ALA in 1905, Isom had already been present for the major developments in the state's library movement. Oregon's first library law permitting taxation at the local level for free public libraries had been passed in 1901, as she was beginning her work at the LAP. The timing and language of the law were directly related to the circumstances of the LAP, whose directors had agreed to make the library free in order to accept the Wilson bequest and required tax support to make this possible. The Wilson bequest was the catalyst for Oregon to change from a state with no free libraries to a state with the necessary conditions for a public library system: enabling legislation, popular support, and momentum for the rapid establishment of library service, first in the Portland area and then throughout the state. The board of the LAP had discussed the question of making their library free many times since it was founded in 1864, but until the Wilson gift there was not sufficient support for this radical change.
1905 was a particularly busy and fruitful year for Isom. She persuaded the ALA to accept an invitation to hold their annual meeting in Portland that year, while the "Lewis and Clark Centennial and American Pacific Exposition and Oriental Fair" was underway. Until that time, the only other West Coast city to have hosted the ALA annual meeting was San Francisco, in 1891. She was in her fourth year heading the LAP and in addition was influential in achieving the passage of legislation establishing a state library commission for Oregon and in attracting Marvin to become its first secretary. Isom had used the power of her position, and her credibility as head of Oregon's most important library, to act as an advocate for the extension of library services to the rest of the state through the establishment of such an agency. Even in her very first annual report as head librarian of the LAP, in the midst of recounting the events and accomplishments of that institution's critical and hectic first year as a free public library, she made the effort to explain the function of a state library commission and argue that Oregon needed one:
In our country the people are the state and the majesty and the dignity and the worth of the state will be according to the degree of intelligence, morality and general enlightenment possessed by the people. It is not the province of this library [the LAP] to undertake such statework, our lines are drawn for us within which we must develop, but is it not fitting as the only free library in the state we should vase our influence to bring about such an organization, properly equipped, with a trained library organizer at its head, whose work should be to encourage libraries already started, to establish new ones and to answer fully the many demands which come to this library which we must often neglect in part, or refuse entirely because our hands are tied. (Library Association of Portland, 1900-1920, pp. 13-14)
Isom had been a librarian for only two year's when she wrote this report. She had already completely transformed the LAP, introducing standards and best practices, from the catalog cards available from the Library of Congress to a well-developed scheme for salaries of library employees. Under her leadership the LAP was growing into a large institution with highly differentiated departments, services, and a system of branches serving about one-third of Oregon's population. She was eager for a strong colleague to tackle the challenge of developing free libraries for the rest of the state.
Marvin's main responsibility as leader of the Oregon State Library Commission was to help and advise public and school libraries in Oregon communities outside of Multnomah County. To give an idea of the magnitude of this task, she and "library organizers" on her staff made about 340 visits to Oregon communities between 1905 and 1916 (Oregon State Library, n.d.). She pushed her goals beyond the explicit mandate for her agency, extending direct service from the State Library to Oregonians whose communities were without libraries. She had been hired as a trained expert, and her success gave her a large degree of autonomy in determining the strategy and activities of the agency. Her formal biennial reports to the legislature provided her with a platform to package her account of the commission's activities with exhortations to the legislature to give more financial support. Her frustration with appropriations she considered inadequate occasionally appeared in her correspondence with Isom: "I am feeling a little more hopeful about the possibilities of doing something in this benighted state, but for a few days after the close of the legislature it seemed to me quite useless to attempt anything that would really count for good" (Unpublished letter from C. Marvin to M. F. Isom, March 5, 1909. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). Statistics of the commission's activities provide empirical evidence of the work accomplished with these insufficient resources (see table 2), and letters from individual patrons offer powerful anecdotal evidence of the impact of the services Marvin developed. Demonstrating the importance of both qualitative and quantitative evidence of library effectiveness even in the early twentieth century, she explained why certain statistical information was needed, along with patron comments, to measure the value of the State Library:
The time of report-making is, to the public servant, the time of searching the records for those significant facts and figures which will best convey to the public served, some definite conception of the importance and extent of the work being done by the institution created by the public for its own benefit, and administered by a person highly privileged in being entrusted with a portion of the public welfare service, and, to a small extent, with the expenditure of the public funds. (Oregon State Library, 1915-1929, p. 5)
In her 1925 report, Marvin provided statistics reflecting the magnitude of her accomplishments as the leader of the state's library agency. She recorded 220,156 volumes in the State Library and 18,133 individual borrowers directly utilizing the collections of the State Library. Elsewhere, she noted that of Oregon's communities, only 3 out of 198 incorporated cities, with a total population of 178 people, had not received service from the State Library (Marvin, 1925b, p. 442). But she also wished to alert her constituency to the dangers of relying too heavily on statistics to measure value, a familiar concept to librarians wrestling with the challenges of assessing the performance of today's libraries. In 1921 she wrote:
The reports of librarians so generally consist of tables of statistics that the public may be justified in assuming that the value of a library may be measured by figures. Books are dangerous and powerful, as well as helpful and inspiring. The modern tendency in library work has been to emphasize the utilitarian value of books and libraries, and their usefulness in helping men in their occupations and professions, making it possible for them to overeome the disadvantages resulting from lack of education in colleges and technical schools. But, aside from this service of books in the ordinary affairs of life, where competition is keen, there is still to be felt their great inspirational purpose and their recreational possibilities. . . .It is the privilege of the librarian to bring books and people together, to find the books of value and power, and to put them into the hands of the people who need them, but can not, unaided, find them, and possibly can not afford to buy them. (Oregon Stale Library, 1915-1929, p. 5)
In her final official report to the legislature, Marvin noted: "It has been my delight and my great and happy privilege to do real library pioneering in this pioneer state" (Oregon State Library, 1915-1929, p. 3). In her summary of library conditions in Oregon as she retired, she provided statistics about the scale of activities of the State Library: a collection of 271,306 books for circulation, plus periodicals and government documents; 706 traveling libraries; and 29,816 patrons to whom the State Library provided direct mail-order service. The extent of public library growth in Oregon's towns and counties was another measure of her contribution: in 1928 there were 82 independent public libraries, compared with a mere handful when she began her work in 1905.
In addition to their on-the-job achievements, Isom and Marvin also contributed to the development of the profession of librarianship. They recognized that for librarians to be successful, particularly when their profession was new, they needed the support and society of other librarians. Both women were actively involved in national and local library organizations. They participated in ALA serving in various capacities; both were of sufficient professional stature at the national level to be approached as possible candidates for the ALA presidency (both declined). They were also among the founders of the Pacific Northwest Library Association (PNLA) in 1909. Isom's enthusiasm about the newly formed PNLA is illustrated in a 1910 letter to an Oregon colleague: "I am anxious that every living library mortal in the State of Oregon should belong to the Pacific North West Library Association. If you will send me the addresses of librarians, I will see what missionary work I can do" (Unpublished letter from M. F. Isom to R. M. Wrightjuly 14, 1910. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). Both Isom and Marvin served as presidents of the PNLA, and they remained active in the association throughout their careers.
FRIENDSHIP AND MUTUAL SUPPORT
Isom and Marvin are the focus of this study not only because they were Oregon's most important early librarians but also because of their longstanding practice of mutual support. They formed a formidable partnership and were particularly influential in the placement of librarians in many of Oregon's newly formed public libraries, constantly conferring and making recommendations. At the beginning of their work in the Pacific Northwest these two women had few professional peers in the region, but they were well connected in the developing national web of power in the profession through their library schools and their widening network of connections through professional associations. Grotzinger said of Marvin that her "social and paper network was immense. She worked with the legislature at regional and national levels, with national and state library associations, as well as with a variety of community organizations" (Grotzinger, 1994, p. 21). Isom's professional network is not as well documented, but sufficient evidence remains to confirm that she was able to participate fully in, benefit from, and contribute to the "invisible, indestructible network" of powerful library women, part of a web of "hierarchical, horizontal, social, and communication networks that permeated the turn-of-the-century library world" (Grotzinger, 1994, p. 7).
In their correspondence, these women nearly always addressed each other formally, as "My dear Miss Isom" and "My dear Miss Marvin," and signed their full names. Often their letters were typed by their secretaries, but they frequently added handwritten personal notes. At the end of a memo about arrangements for a temporary librarian, Isom showed how comfortable she was addressing Marvin in a very familiar, even teasing, tone. Marvin was planning a long trip abroad: "What a crazy girl to plan such a trip. If you want a sea voyage why don't you go to Japan and China and India. Fancy taking four months out of a short life to look at a wave." (Unpublished letter from M. F. Isom to C. Marvin, August 23, 1909. Records of the Oregon State Library, 89A-35, Box 54. Oregon State Archives). She often hosted Marvin and other close friends at her home for holidays, as well as business trips to Portland, and they sometimes traveled together for business and pleasure.
As soon as Marvin agreed to accept the position with the Oregon commission, Isom went to work to give her personal and professional support. She obtained letters of introduction and fretted about properly "launching" her in Oregon society; she helped her find suitable housing; and she helped Marvin feel at home on the commission, where their fellow commissioners were some of the most important people in the state: the governor, the superintendent of public instruction, the president of the state university, and a citizen appointee. They chatted and gossiped, but most frequently they consulted one another on difficult business matters, reviewed report drafts for each other, and gave honest, direct advice and comments-sometimes receiving testy replies. At conferences, they would stand in for one another to make presentations and to interview candidates for library positions. They developed a deep mutual understanding and sympathy, reducing the sense of isolation that can accompany a top executive position.
In considering the impact of their work, it is useful to think of Isom and Marvin as pioneers, individuals who were active at the beginning of something, and also as sustainers, individuals who engaged in the longer-term activity of building on an established foundation, adapting, and adjusting to changing conditions and demands over time. This was a key to their impact: the foundation for the state's libraries was solidly established during their careers. The long duration of their tenure distinguishes them from some other library pioneers whose greatest contributions were to set in motion events that others carried through. Discussing this distinction for a wide range of American progressive reform activities, Crunden pointed out that "Given the revivalistic way in which many progressive reforms came into existence, it was perhaps only natural that there should be something of a moral hangover after the preacher left town and the new converts had to go about the duller business of daily living" (Crunden, 1982, p. 197). The most objective, tangible evidence of the impact of Isom and Marvin is the state of public libraries in Oregon as they concluded their careers, contrasted with the circumstances they confronted when they assumed leadership of Oregon's most important library organizations.
From the very beginning of their work in Oregon both women benefited from personal access to members of the state's social, political, and economic elite. They stood somewhat alone as top administrators of Oregon's major library institutions and were accountable directly to their controlling boards. In order to be successful they needed to be self-possessed and persuasive as well as highly competent. As women, they were attempting something relatively new, with few role models; this, too, is often part of the pioneer's reality. Salome Cutler Fairchild discussed the small numbers of women in top library positions at this time: "It is evidently believed by men holding such positions and probably by trustees holding the appointing power, that women are not in the present stage of civilization fitted to hold such positions" (Fairchild, 1904, p. 161). After listing what were perceived to be disadvantages of hiring women in senior positions, Fairchild made an observation that may explain Isom and Marvin's success in attaining top positions: "In many cases men stating certain disadvantages of women as a class have recognized that exceptional women are not only free from them but positively excel in the opposite direction" (Fairchild, 1904, p. 161).
In a time when it had become more socially acceptable for middle-class women to have professional careers, Marvin and (particularly) Isom used their social status and "breeding" to help establish themselves in their very senior administrative positions. This helped them to gain quick acceptance by influential and powerful individuals in local society and politics, by virtue of their solid middle-class family backgrounds and their status as professionals. These relationships provided them with access to sources of political and financial power. Their credentials as outstanding graduates of two of the earliest library schools gave them credibility in the marketplace and access to some of the most influential individuals at the national level in American librarianship. An extensive network of library school alumnae operated behind the scenes to match librarians with positions in libraries all across the country, including Oregon. The surviving documentation of Marvin and Isom's work is filled with examples of the power of these connections.
CONCLUSION
For fifteen years as colleagues in Oregon, Isom and Marvin respected and advised one another. They shared challenges as senior leaders of their institutions, as public servants, and as women in positions of power. They promoted tax-supported libraries throughout the state of Oregon and advocated staffing these new libraries with formally trained librarians. Both were determined to introduce good standards and practices in Oregon libraries, an important emphasis of their own library training. They operated summer programs for library workers without formal training; they were influential in recruiting and placing library school graduates in Oregon libraries; and they created and sustained initiatives to extend free library service to rural areas. They helped establish a formal professional support system for librarians in the region by participating in the founding of the PNLA. Both had moved West across the continent, carrying with them highly specialized skills, missionary zeal, and leadership qualities. They considered themselves servants of the public as they applied their abilities to crafting the foundations of free public libraries in the state of Oregon.
Marvin and Isom possessed social "polish" and professionalism along with missionary zeal. These characteristics enabled them to influence the wealthy and politically powerful elite to support their mission and their methods to establish libraries and provide them with public funding. As with other progressive reformers of their time, they were motivated by the ideal of improving society by creating opportunities for individuals to improve themselves using the resources of the free library. Their ideas about social improvement also sometimes led them to support causes we might label "social engineering" today, such as eugenic sterilization. Influential advocates for what they believed to be the greater social good, they enjoyed the social and financial advantages of the American middle class, and they used the power of their positions to advance the moral and political values of that class, particularly the ideal of empowering the individual to prosper and succeed to the maximum of his or her potential.
They assumed moral as well as administrative authority over their institutions, and the personnel, collections, and services of Oregon's most important libraries reflected their moral values and their moral certainty. However their motives are judged, the accomplishments of both women grew directly from the courage of their convictions-they believed. Each generation of librarians has its true believers and its polarizing issues, and regardless of our personal sympathies it is not always easy to tolerate a zealot. Johansen described Marvin and Isom as "liberals, fighting liberals" and observed that "We do not take kindly to enthusiasm, to the crusader, to the man or woman of action, whether with the padded glove kindliness of an Ida Kidder or the hard-clenched fist of Cornelia Marvin or the smiling firmness of Mary Frances Isom" (Johansen, 1959, pp. 21-22). Still, without the inexhaustible energy of the true believer, how can enormous challenges such as the creation of a statewide public library system be met? Isom and Marvin could certainly be direct, even strident, and Marvin in particular could be relentless in wearing down opposition or rallying the apathetic. But both also displayed skill and sophistication in their pioneering work, and it is because of their accomplishments that Oregon moved very rapidly from having no free public libraries to having both a model county library system centered in urban Portland and a model agency in Salem offering services statewide. These complementary systems grew directly from the efforts of these two librarians, who worked cooperatively and energetically supported one another.
Hofstadter stated that "One of the primary tests of the mood of a society at any given time is whether its comfortable people tend to identify, psychologically, with the power and achievements of the very successful or with the needs of the underprivileged. In a large and striking measure the Progressive agitations turned the human sympathies of the people downward rather than upward in the social scale" (Hofstadter, 1985, pp. 241-242). Isom and Marvin were representative of their profession in directing their efforts toward the members of society they believed were most in need of the resources and services of the public library. It is important to recognize that there was a moral foundation underlying their work, as there was with other progressive reforms. Crunden said of Jane Addams that "The foundations of Hull-House were laid in one woman's moral revulsion against privileged uselessness" (Crunden, 1982, p. 19). While not necessarily wealthy enough to enjoy lives of "privileged uselessness," Marvin and Isom did not pursue library work out of financial necessity but by choice, because they wanted to help make American society better. In Oregon they transformed tax dollars into cherished public services and set in place systems and practices that encouraged continuing library progress in the state after their own careers were over. Both took to heart the motto of the Library Association of Portland, "Illumino" (I give light), and of the Oregon State Library, "The best reading for the greatest number at the least cost."
Giants did walk the earth a century ago, and perhaps they still do. Isom and Marvin belonged to a generation that has been described as the "Era of Crowned Heads" and "a period of pioneers and giants" (Van Home, 1959, p. 415; Holley, 1976, p. 185). These giants are complex human beings whose accomplishments outlive them, for good or ill. If there are lessons for the present in their stories, perhaps the most important is to find an appropriate role in professional practice for personal conviction, conscience, and moral authority. Moral absolutism and extremism can be hazardous to the judgment of posterity as careers and contributions are evaluated. Many of the activities of librarians even today might be interpreted as social engineering, or social control. For example: do librarians guide access, or do they censor? Should they try to protect patrons from material that may harm them, or is that no longer a proper role for the custodians of our cherished institutions, America's free public libraries? In the "missionary" period, when librarians were pioneers, these would have been simpler questions.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank the following people who provided assistance in the research for this article: Gay Walker and Mark Kuestner, Special Collections and Archives, Reed College; Theresa Gillis at the Cornelia Marvin Pierce Library, Eastern Oregon University; Merrialyce Blanchard at the Oregon State Library; the reference archivists at the Oregon State Archives; Linda Long, Special Collections and University Archives, University of Oregon; the staff of the Oregon Community Foundation; and Monique Coleman and Penelope Hummel at the administrative offices of the Multnomah County Library. I would also like to thank my colleagues at Washington State University, who provided encouragement and support; three inspiring teachers, Jacqueline Dirks, Cheryl Knott Malone, and the late Toni Smith, who encouraged me to pursue historical research and writing; and Boyd Rayward, for editorial guidance. Any errors in this article are my own.
RELATED ILLUSTRATIONS
Images related to this article, including photographs of Isom and Marvin, are available on the Washington State University Libraries' Web site. Please visit the author's publication page for the links: www.wsulibs.wsu.edu/holland/masc/mascpersonnel/cheryl/publications.html.
NOTES
1. The challenges associated with conducting biographical research on early, influential women librarians has been discussed by several library historians, including Mary Niles-Maack (Maack 1982) and Laurel Grotzinger (1983). According to Niles-Maack, "The loss of personal papers is an endemic problem for the library historian. . . . Too often the official correspondence, the annual reports, the speech left with the library's records, and the published articles or books are all that remain to piece together an account of a spirited, eventful life" (Maack, 1982, p. 177). While her other correspondence is lost, Isom's correspondence with Marvin is preserved in the records of the Oregon State Library, housed at the Oregon State Archives. It spans sixteen years and covers a myriad of professional and personal topics. Only a few other Isom letters have been found and these were all in the board room of the Multnomah County Library. In contrast, much of Marvin's correspondence survives, providing a richer record of her professional activities. There was also at one time a collection of her personal papers, housed at the Oregon State Library. These provided the basis for biographical works by Melissa Brisley during the 1960s and 1970s (Brisley, 1966, 1968; Mickey 1978). Many of these papers were lost during a transfer from the State Library to the University of Oregon in the 1970s (L. Long, personal communication, September 4, 2003). Only fragments survive, most notably as quotations inscribed in Brisley's works. What remains is included in the manuscripts collection of the University of Oregon (as part of the Walter M. Pierce Papers). There are also a few of Marvin's papers in the archives of Reed College. A partial box listing of the former Cornelia Marvin Pierce Papers, dated 1965, and other material related to Reed College scholars' use of these papers when they were still at the Oregon State Library, are included in the Cornelia Marvin Pierce Collection, Special Collections and Archives, Eric V. Hauser Memorial Library, Reed College. Despite the loss of many personal papers, Isom and Marvin's official correspondence offers useful information about their relationship because it often blended the personal with the professional.
2. Van Home based his article largely upon personal communications with former librarians of the IAP who had worked with Isom; his queries and their responses have been preserved in the files of the Oregon Community Foundation. For examples of articles about Isom in biographical reference works, see Pipes (1932), Kingsbury (1978), and Dane (2000).
3. Spindrift is still standing and is on the National Register of Historic Places. See Gunselman, 2004. The 1913 central building of the library also still stands. It was renovated during the 1990s and still serves as the Central Library for Multnomah County. One architectural historian describes it as "Portland's Crown Jewel" (Ritz, 2000).
4. Michael Harris in particular has argued for a more critical, and less congratulatory, approach to public library historiography-a revisionist approach (Harris, 1973, 1975, 1978a, 1978b; see also Garrison, 1975). Other historians have responded, encouraging balanced analysis (Dain, 1975, 1978, 1994; Hildenbrand, 1985; Maack, 1982). Recently, Davis and Aho (2001) presented several possible future directions for this branch of history.
5. For an in-depth discussion of the professionalization of librarianship, see Wiegand (1986).
6. See MacColl (1976, 1988) for helpful historical analysis of politics and the Portland establishment.
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Cheryl Gunselman, Manuscripts Librarian, Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections, Washington State Library, P.O. Box 645610, Pullman, WA 99164-5610
LIBRARY TRENDS, Vol. 52, No. 4, Spring 2004, pp. 877-901
© 2004 The Board of Trustees, University of Illinois
Copyright University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Graduate School of Library & Information Science, Publications Office Spring 2004