USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > Proceedings at the dedication of the building for the Public library of the city of Boston. January 1, 1858 > Part 7
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While the negotiations for the sale of the lot in Somerset street were progressing, in the Common Council, on motion of PELHAM BONNEY, Esq., it was
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Ordered, - That the Committee on the Public Library, in eon- junetion with the Committee on Publie Buildings, consider the praeti- eability and expediency of providing for the Public Library and further accommodations for the City Government, by erections on the City's land on School street, by additions to the present City Hall, or by an entirely new erection, for the two objeets, upon the site of the present City Hall and lands appurtenant.
Two reports were submitted by the Committees to the City Council. The majority report, which was accepted, was as follows :-
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That, after seeing the elegant and commodious plans prepared by a sub-committee, they have, by a vote of seven to four, declared "that it is impracticable and inexpedient to provide for the Public Library, either by erecting additions to the present City Hall, or by erecting upon its site and the lands appurtenant, a new structure, which shall provide accommodations for the City Government and for the City Library in . one building."
For the Committee,
GEORGE W. WARREN.
The minority of the united committees, through Alder- man BENJAMIN JAMES, submitted plans for a spacious build- ing on the City Hall land, to answer the purposes of a public library and municipal offices. The apartments assigned to the library were in the third story, as follows: ".One room on the west side, extending from front to rear, say one hundred and sixty feet by thirty-eight in the clear, which can be lighted both by windows on the sides and by sky lights, and capable of holding one hundred and fifty thousand volumes at least. When more room is required, that on the east side, of the same size as the one on the west, can be appropriated; and should more room then be needed, that over the Court square vesti- bule and stairway, measuring fifty feet by forty, can be
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added: the latter would hold full fifty thousand volumes. It has been estimated that these rooms, packed as many libraries are, would contain over five hundred thousand volumes."
The City Council then decided, finally and wisely, to pro- vide accommodations for the library in no other building than one erected exclusively for that purpose. The following order was then passed : -
In Common Council, June 30, 1853.
Ordered, - That the Committee on the Library, in conjunction with the Board of Trustees, be requested to select a site for a library, secure the refusal of the same, and report to the Council.
The Board of Aldermen having concurred in this order, the Committee and the Trustees met in convention, and, after careful deliberation, agreed to submit the following report to the City Council : -
The Joint Standing Committee on the Library and the Trustees . . have attended to the duty assigned them, and respectfully submit, that after full'deliberation, they recommend as a site for the library, the " Wheeler estate " and one adjoining it, on Boylston street, as the most eligible of any that have come to their knowledge, and recommend that these estates be purchased, provided it can be done at reasonable prices.
The Committee and the Trustees have deliberated upon the sug- gestion of fixing the site in the Public Garden ; but many objections arise to this - among them, the difficulty and expense of obtaining a sure foundation; the extra cost of erecting a building in a position requiring that the four sides should be finished with regard to orna- ment, and also its exposed situation in the winter, rendering its use, at this important season of the year, more limited to our citizens, and especially the young, than is desirable.
BENJAMIN SEAVER, Chairman of Committee on Public Library. EDWARD EVERETT, President of the Trustees of Public Library.
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NOTE. After the Committee had separated, the undersigned re- ceived notice that an estate in Temple place, which, perhaps, would be suited to the wants of the Public Library, may possibly be obtained on favorable terms. The Council may, therefore, deem it advisable to include this location in any grant of power they may think it expe- dient to make to purchase a site.
BENJAMIN SEAVER.
EDWARD EVERETT.
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The report was accepted, and the following order was passed :-
Ordered, - That the Committee on the Public Library, in con- junction with the Board of Trustees, be authorized to purchase, under the direction of the Committee on Public Buildings, either of the sites indicated in the Committee's report of this date.
These three committees proceeded to the discharge of the trust devolved upon them, and authorized the Mayor to nego- tiate for two lots of land fronting on Boylston street, being the same on which the Public Library building has been erected. Their report was as follows : -
The Committee on the Public Library, together with the Trustees . . have, after very careful consideration, and under direction of the Com- mittee on Public Buildings, purchased, as a site for the Public Library, the Wheeler estate and the dwelling house adjoining, . . containing about thirteen thousand three hundred square feet.
The material of the present buildings will be available when the City shall erect a library building. . .
The whole amount of purchase money for said estates is about seventy-three thousand dollars, for the payment of which the City Coun- cil are respectfully requested to provide the means.
BENJAMIN SEAVER, Chairman of Committee on Public Library.
EDWARD EVERETT, President of the Board of Trustees.
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The Committee on Public Buildings, under whose direction the foregoing estates were purchased, respectfully unite in the above recom- mendation.
For the Committee,
BENJAMIN JAMES, Chairman. ,
This report was referred to the Committee on Finance, and, on their recommendation, the Treasurer was duly authorized to borrow the amount necessary to meet the cost of the land.
In the meantime, the Trustees continued to receive, from public-spirited citizens, valuable donations of money and books for the library, which had already acquired a strong hold upon the affections of the people.
A letter was received from Mr. JAMES NIGHTINGALE, en- closing one hundred dollars, " to be expended by the Mayor and Aldermen in furnishing any of the rooms of the said building, when the same is completed, or expend the same in the purchasing of books for the benefit and use of the said Library, as in their judgment may seem best."
The following is an extract from the second letter re- ceived from Mr. BATES :-
Be pleased to draw on me for a sum sufficient to contribute a fund of fifty thousand dollars, to be held by the City of Boston in trust, that . its entire income, but only its income, shall in each and every year here- after be expended in the purchase of such books of permanent value and authority, as may be found most needed and most useful, and that the City will, so soon as it may conveniently be done, provide, and always hereafter maintain, a suitable establishment for a Free Public Library, in which arrangements shall be made for the comfortable accommodation, at one and the same time, and at all proper hours of the day and evening, for at least one hundred readers.
Extract from a letter to the Mayor from N. I. BOWDITCH, Esq., dated November 4, 1853 :-
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DEAR SIR, - The City has at last completed its purchase of the Boylston street estates. I have traced the several titles back to the first settlement of the town - the book of possessions. My memo- randa occupy more than twenty-five pages. One of the titles was extremely complicated. A late owner had left a will, untechnically drawn, which presented questions of difficult legal construction. One devise was to the testator's son for life with a remainder limited to his children, of such a character as to open and let in any after-born chil- dren. This son died about a year since. So long as he lived it would have been impossible to have obtained an indefeasible title by convey- ances from all his children. There were eventually four minors inter- ested in this estate, and their shares were sold under license of court - rendering necessary a careful examination of the probate proceedings. The fact, that two of the various deeds to the City convey, respectively, thirty-two forty-ninths of one third, and seventeen forty-ninths of one third of this estate, sufficiently shows the difficulties of the investigation. If my professional experience has been found of any slight service, . .. if the corner-stone of the City Library shall have been laid more securely through any instrumentality of mine in removing legal obstruc- tions - I assure you that I feel myself to have been fully compensated by the opportunity thus afforded me of becoming a fellow-laborer in a good cause.
A generous donation of ten thousand dollars was made, in this year, by Hon. JONATHAN PHILLIPS.
The first annual report of the Trustees was submitted to the City Council on. the twelfth of November. After con- gratulating the government and the public upon the condition and prosperity of the Library, they proceed to speak of the proposed building as follows :- " The eligible lot of land purchased on Boylston street, unites, in a greater degree than any other which could be obtained, all the important conditions for such a purpose, and is believed to be very generally approved by the public. The situation is central; it admits of enlargement on either side, if hereafter required ; it can never be overlooked in front; and it commands a view of the Common, which secures to it unobstructed light and
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air, and as fine a prospect as can be enjoyed in any city of the world. The Trustees are confident that on this spot a building may be erected, at moderate cost, which, besides answering the primary purposes of the library, will be an ornament to the city.
" Such a building will necessarily occupy two or three years ; and it is of the utmost importance to the prosperity of the Library that the plan should be in the best taste; that it should combine all the most recent improvements in library buildings ; and that such a plan, once adopted, should be carried out to its completion with steadiness. To attain these ends, the Trustees respectfully submit to the City Council that it might be expedient to confide the superin- tendence of the structure to a commission specially appointed for that purpose, whose duty it shall be to adopt a plan for the building, employ a well-qualified architect, make the necessary contracts, and generally be responsible for the work. Such a commission might consist of a member of each branch of the City Council, . . . and of a certain num- ber of citizens elected at large. Thus constituted, the com- mission will, on the one hand, be kept in constant and intimate relations with the City Government for the time being, while, on the other hand, it will be able to preserve that unity of counsel and purpose which is essential in the execution of a work of a somewhat novel and highly im- portant character."
Of their present accommodations, they remark, " The Library cannot be opened to the public until after the end of December, when the outer of the two rooms now appro- priated to it in Mason street will cease to be required as a ward room, and can be fitted up as a reading room, where above a hundred American and European periodicals, to- gether with the books in the library, will always be conve- niently accessible. But even after both rooms are within the control of the Trustees, the accommodations in Mason
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street will be too small; and before a proper building can be erected, they will be found insufficient even for putting on convenient shelves the books that will have been received."
On the fifteenth of December, the Committee on the Library reported, that they concurred in the recommendation of the appointment of special commissioners, to whom shall be confided the erection of the new library building, and were of the opinion that the commission should consist of one member from each branch of the City Council, one from the Board of Trustees, and two citizens at large. The sub- ject, however, was referred to the next City Council.
On the twenty-fourth of January, 1854, by invitation of the Trustees, the City Government visited the rooms newly fitted for the library, to which the books in the City Hall had been removed. The reading room was opened to the public on the twentieth of March, and the circulation of books for home use commenced on the second day of May.
On the twenty-sixth of January, the report of the previous year, recommending the appointment of commissioners, was referred to the new Committee on the Library. They subsc- quently reported that they "unanimously concur with the Board of Trustees in the great necessity of appointing a permanent board, who shall be responsible for the faithful and judicious performance of the important trust confided to their care; and, in accordance with these views, the Commit- tee recommend the adoption of an ordinance providing for the establishment of a Board of Commissioners on the erection of a Building for the Public Library of the City of Boston."
The ordinance reported by the committee (City Docu- ment No. 21) was opposed, partly from an objection to the proposed location, and partly from an opinion that the erec- tion of the building belonged rather to the Committee on Public Buildings than to a special commission, and was rejected.
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The following order was offered by Alderman GEORGE ODIORNE, and passed, viz :-
CITY OF BOSTON : In Board of Aldermen, March 20, 1854.
Ordered,- That the Committee on the Public Library take into con- sideration the expediency of locating the building to be erected for the Public Library on some portion of the land known as the Public Garden, and report upon the subject.
Passed : sent down for concurrence ..
1 J. V. C. SMITH, Mayor. In Common Council, March 23, 1854. Concurred.
ALEXANDER H. RICE, President.
Another order was soon adopted, " that the Committee on Public Buildings, in consultation with the Board of Trus- tees, be, and they are hereby, instructed to report the outline of a plan and estimates for a library building, which shall be adapted to the site owned by the City on Boylston street, and commensurate, both in its capacity and design, with the intention and wishes of the noble benefactors."
On the twenty-eighth of September, the Committee on the Library having made no report upon locating the build- ing upon the Public Garden, the papers were ordered to " be taken from the hands of said committee, and referred to a joint special committee," consisting of Aldermen G. ODI- ORNE and JOSIAH DUNHAM, Jr., and Messrs. GEORGE W. WAR- REN, J. AMORY DAVIS and JOHN R. MULLIN of the Common Council. They reported that, " after mature deliberation, - they are unanimously of the opinion, that the interests of the Public Library and the faith of the City, pledged to its generous ' benefactor, JOSHUA BATES, Esq., demand the immediate erection of a building upon the site already pur- chased in Boylston street."
On the ninth of November, the second annual report of the Trustees was presented. They urged the City Council to proceed without further delay. " The present rooms," say
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they, "were regarded merely as a temporary provision, and are already found wholly inadequate to the proper manage- ment of such an institution, and to the demands daily made on it by our citizens. The reading room is noisy, uncom- fortable and unfit for its peculiar purposes. The interior, or proper library room, is no better. It is small, and so nearly . filled with books that it will soon be impossible to find places for more. Notwithstanding great dilligence and promptitude on the part of the Librarian and his assistants, aided by an admirably contrived system for the search and delivery of books asked for, it is manifestly impossible, in premises so contracted as those now appropriated to the library, with an average of three hundred persons daily resorting to it, to prevent occasional delay and crowd. It is hoped by the Trustees that the convenience of more than six thousand citizens who have already subscribed their names for the use of the library, and to whose number additions are daily made, will be thought by the City Government to merit their ear- liest attention."
On the ninth of November, the ordinance for establishing a Board of Commissioners, which had been rejected by the Common Council, under a suspension of the rules, was recon- sidered and adopted. See City Document, No. 120.
On the eleventh of December, the following gentlemen were duly elected Commissioners, under the ordinance, viz : Hon. ROBERT C. WINTHROP, LL. D., SAMUEL G. WARD, HENRY N. HOOPER, GEORGE TICKNOR, LL. D., NATHANIEL B. SHURT- LEFF, M.D., Alderman GEORGE ODIORNE, and GEORGE W. WARREN of the Common Council. All of these gentlemen accepted the appointment excepting Henry N. Hooper, Esq., whose declination was received by the City Council on the twenty-first of December.
The Commissioners assembled at the Library in Mason street, on Wednesday, the twentieth of December, and pro- ceeded to organize the Board by the choice of Hon. ROBERT
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C. WINTHROP for President. Edward Capen, Esq., the Libra- rian, acted as Clerk, agreeably to the provisions of the ordi- nance. The President was then "requested to apply to the City Council for an appropriation of two thousand dollars, to cover the expense of procuring plans for the Library Building, and other preparations for erecting it."
On the twenty-eighth of December, another discussion took place upon the propriety of erecting the building upon the Public Garden, when an order passed both branches of the government, authorizing the Commissioners " to locate the building upon the lot upon Boylston street, if, in their opinion, it be deemed expedient.
Upon the reception of this order by the Commissioners, it was unanimously voted by them, " that in the opinion of this Board, the lot of ground on Boylston street, purchased as a site for the Public Library Building, is a suitable place for the location of said building, and that measures be taken to procure plans accordingly." Plans of the land, and other preparations, were immediately made.
. On the twenty-sixth of January, 1855, the Board issued a public notice of their readiness to receive designs that might be submitted to them on or before the fifteenth of March, accompanied by a carefully considered statement of the requirements of the building.
The general requirements were
1. That the building be completely and absolutely fire- proof.
2. That thorough provision be made to guard against dampness from any cause, and all other influences injurious to books.
3. That every part of the building be well lighted.
4. That the best mode of heating and ventilating be pro- vided for, having in view the health and comfort of persons frequenting the Library, as well as the preservation of books and other property.
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5. That proper provision be made for the introduction and use of gas by stationary fixtures, and also for the intro- duction of water wherever it may be needed.
6. That such general arrangements be made as will best ensure centralization, so that the Librarian and his assistants can be readily informed of all comers and goers, and that the care of the library may be intrusted to as few officers as possible.
The special requirements were
1. A library hall, capable of containing, at least, two hundred thousand volumes. The alcoves, or other divisions of this hall, are to be easily accessible from each other. All the divisions and shelves are to be so contrived as to follow strictly the decimal system; that is, each of its principal and lesser divisions is to be in series of tens. The shelves are to be fixed, and not movable.
2. A general reading room, with ample accommodations for at least one hundred and fifty readers at tables.
3. A special reading room, for ladies, with seats for at least fifty persons.
4. A room for the delivery of books to borrowers, which may be used as a conversation room, with accommodations sufficient for at least two hundred persons.
5. A library room, connected with the foregoing, in which not less than twenty thousand volumes of books most con- stantly demanded for circulation, may be arranged on the decimal system.
6. A Trustees' room, of moderate proportions.
7. A Librarian's room, etc.
On the ninth of March, the Commissioners submitted their first report to the City Council. After detailing their pro- ceedings to that date they state that "they propose that the front of the building be of brick, with stone dressings; not excluding, however, the use of iron where needed.
" In conclusion, the Commissioners cannot omit to say, as
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the result of their personal experience and observation, while attending the stated meetings of the Board, at the rooms now used for the Public Library, that they have a deep sense of the importance of proceeding with the work in- trusted to them, as promptly and as rapidly as may consist with safety and success "
" A simple but substantial structure, ample in its dimen- sions, just in its proportions, absolutely fire-proof, and depend- ing for its effect rather upon its adaptation to the use for which it is designed, than 'upon any ornamental architecture or costly materials, is what is aimed at by the Commis- sioners; and they hope and believe that such a building may be erected without any undue expense or any unreason- able delay."
A room in the Tremont Temple was rented by the Com- missioners, and, on the twenty-third of March, the designs which had been received were there opened and examined.
The attention of the City Council was called to the vacancy in the Board, owing to the original appointment having been declined by Mr. Hooper. About this time, the resignation of ex-Alderman George Odiorne was received and accepted, when the Committee on the Library, who had the subject under consideration, upon examining the ordi- nance, discovered that it contained no provision, as had been intended, for the annual election of two members of the City Council as commissioners. The Committee, therefore, on the twenty-ninth of March, reported "an ordinance in addition to an ordinance, providing for the establishment of a Board of Commissioners on the erection of a building for the Public Library of the City of Boston."
Section first provides, that there shall be chosen annually, until the building shall be completed, one member of the Board of Aldermen and two members of the Common Coun- cil, who shall hold their office until " others are elected in their stead, and who shall, with the following Commissioners
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now elected, viz: Robert C. Winthrop, Samuel G. Ward, George Ticknor and Nathaniel B. Shurtleff, constitute a Board of Commissioners for the erection of the Public Li- brary Building of the City of Boston. The four persons last named shall hold their office until the completion of said edifice."
Section second provides, that " they shall select a proper plan and design for the edifice, make contracts for all the labor and materials, superintend the building thereof, and shall have the sole charge, care and responsibility of the building, warming, lighting, ventilating, draining, and furnish- ing the edifice."
Section third provides for the publication of notices for proposals for contracts, etc.
Section fourth provides, that the " Commissioners shall meet at stated periods, and cause a record of their pro- ceedings to be kept, and for this purpose the Librarian of the Public Library shall act as their clerk; and they shall make a report of their doings to the City Council, once in six months, and oftener, if thereto required by a vote of the City Council."
Section fifth requires the Superintendent of Public Build- ings to perform such services as may be demanded of him by the Commissioners.
This ordinance having been adopted, and having received the approval of the Mayor, the City Council proceded to the election of Commissioners, as required, and duly elected Alderman CHARLES WOODBERRY and Messrs. JOSEPH A. POND and BRADBURY G. PRESCOTT of the Common Council. Mr. Prescott having declined the appointment, EDWARD F. PORTER, Esq., was elected.
These gentlemen, with the permanent Commissioners named in the ordinance, assembled at the room in the Tre- mont Temple on the fourteenth of April, when the Board
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was reorganized, and the designs, twenty-four in number, were reopened.
Twelve meetings, each of an average length of more than two hours, were devoted to the examination of the designs, many of which afforded gratifying proof of the advanced state of architectural knowledge and taste in the com- munity. On the twenty-seventh of April, the Commissioners proceeded to the selection of a design, by ballot, and that of Mr. CHARLES KIRK KIRBY, which most nearly coincided with their ideas, was adopted.
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