Library History Today Blog

Roads to Reading . 16 mm film, colour, sound, 14 minutes, 1958. Produced by the Nova Scotia Film Bureau for the Nova Scotia Provincial Library. Directed by Margaret Perry with Alberta Letts as technical advisor. Journey from Zero = La Longue Randonnée . 16 mm film, sound, colour, 13 minutes, 1961. National Film Board of Canada, Directed by Roger Blais. By 1960, regional libraries were fairly well established in Canada. The sight of a bookmobile on Canada’s rural roadways was by now means novel anymore. In Nova Scotia, where regional services had begun in earnest in the late 1940s, there were five regional systems: Cape Breton (headquarters in Sydney), Annapolis Valley, Pictou County (headquarters in New Glasgow), Colchester-East Hants (headquarters in Truro), and the Halifax City Regional Library. In 1952, the province adopted a new library act that provided a comprehensive plan for a centralized direction and regional libraries to cover the entire province financed to the amount...

Canadian library histories often recount six American Library Association’s conferences in Canada: Ottawa (1912), Toronto (1927 and 2003), and Montreal (1900, 1934, and 1960). But there is rare mention of another ALA annual meeting held in Vancouver on the University of British Columbia campus from August 22–25 in 1949. It was the only the second ALA meeting on the Pacific west coast following the first in Seattle in 1925. However, this convention was not ALA’s usual full-scale conference; instead, it was the first of seven regional ones which the Association experimented with during 1949 to determine their effectiveness. Normally, ALA would register about 3,000 members at its single annual meeting each year. By comparison, there were about 750 in attendance in Vancouver. This number was boosted by the fact that the Pacific Northwest Library Association celebrated its 40th anniversary in Vancouver along with members from western state associations, such as California. A few Canadians, ...

Libraries in the Post War Period, Being the Report of the Chief Librarian to the Toronto Public Library Board, January, 1944 by Charles R. Sanderson. Toronto: Toronto Public Library Board, 1944. 18 p. Charles Sanderson’s Libraries in the Post War Period , published in January 1944, naturally focused on Toronto’s efforts and touched on the integration of national, provincial, and local matters. Sanderson had been recruited in England by George Locke to come to Toronto to be his assistant, and he succeeded Locke after his death in 1937. The new chief librarian had a first-hand knowledge of British library development and American service ideals that were penetrating Canadian librarianship. Charles Sanderson’s Vision for Canadian Library Development in 1944  Beginning with Toronto, Sanderson developed a theme of library cooperation and formalized networking. In his introductory passages, he promoted five viewpoints: ■  the concept of metropolitan regions with linkages between...

The National Library of Canada, Its Eventual Character and Scope; A Brief Submitted to the Chairman and Members of the Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters, and Sciences by the Canadian Library Association/Association Canadienne des Bibliothèques, 1949 [For release on 18 August 1949] . [Ottawa]: the Association, 1949. 5 p. with exhibits. On 8 April 1949, Prime Minister Louis St-Lauren asked the Governor General of Canada to approve an Order-in-Council, appointing a Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences under the chairmanship of the Right Honourable Vincent Massey. For two years, the Commissioners held public hearings across the country, received briefs, and called many witnesses to investigate the state of Canada’s arts and culture. A final report appeared in June 1951. This brief was crucial in outlining the vision, functions, and structure for establishing a National Library by advocating the need for a national bibliogr...

A National Library for Canada; A Brief Presented to the Government of Canada submitted by the Canadian Library Association/Association Canadienne des Bibliothèques, Royal Society of Canada, Canadian Historical Association, Canadian Political Science Association, Social Science Research Council of Canada. [Ottawa: s.n.], December 1946. 16 p. with appendices. Canadian Library Association Statement on a National Library, 1946 “A National Library is, first of all, the most comprehensive Library in the world in its own country. A National Library is also a centre for services to other libraries, research workers and individuals . . . an agency responsible for the national bibliography . . . in short, the nerve centre of the whole network of libraries in the country.” This introduction to the need for a National Library, which was presented to the federal government on 27 January 1947, signalled a new approach to establishing a national library. Previous efforts had empha...

A National Library by Elizabeth Dafoe. [Toronto:] Canadian Adult Education Association, 1944. 5 p. [offprint from Food for Thought , v.4, no. 8, May, 1944] After introducing her topic with a summary of major publications and earlier efforts to advocate for the establishment of a national library in Ottawa—all of which had come to nought—Elizabeth Dafoe, chief librarian at the University of Manitoba, posed the question: Is the apathy of the public in this regard due to ignorance of the real nature of a national library, the confusion of its functions with those of a parliamentary library, lack of pride in Canada's history and cultural growth, or a general indifference to libraries and library service? Elizabeth Dafoe, n.d. Then, she proceeded to develop a cogent statement in a strong and well-argued manner on the need and functions of a national library that would constitute an important part of a postwar plan for library development in Canada. Her report would form part of a late...

Rural Canada Needs Libraries/Livres pour Aujourd'hui et Demain by Nora Bateson. Ottawa: Canadian Library Council, Inc., 1944. 8 pages with diagrams. The genesis of Nora Bateson’s pamphlet on the scarcity of libraries in rural Canada was her February 1943 article “Libraries Today and Tomorrow” in the journal Food for Thought published by the Canadian Association for Adult Education. At this time, Bateson was still Director of Libraries, Regional Library Commission, Nova Scotia, and worked to assist the Canadian Legion Education Services in organizing libraries for armed forces personnel serving in the Atlantic region. Her knowledge of rural Canadian conditions stemmed from her previous library positions. She had first worked in the Carnegie financed Fraser Valley regional demonstration in British Columbia in the early 1930s. Afterwards, she established a regional library system in Prince Edward Island from 1933–36 and then prepared the way for the development of regional libraries...

Library Service for Canada: A Brief Prepared by the Canadian Library Council, as Forwarded August 2, 1944, to the House of Commons Special Committee on Reconstruction and Re-Establishment . 10 leaves, 2 appendices [Ottawa?]: Canadian Library Council, July 1944. In 1942, the Canadian House of Commons appointed a Special Committee on Reconstruction and Re-establishment. James Gray Turgeon, a Liberal politician from British Columbia, served as chair. The committee’s purpose was to study and report the potential problems and ensuing responses that might arise from a postwar period of reconstruction and re-establishment following the Second World War. The committee submitted a report of its activities and associated briefs in 1944 and completed its work in 1945. A major aspect of the committee’s activities concerned the state of culture across the Dominion. A variety of arts and cultural groups made submissions which helped create a better awareness of cultural issues. These early efforts p...