Canadian Colonial Subscription Libraries, 1775 to 1850

Ennotville library c.1910 (built 1856)

 From 1775 to 1850, small membership subscription libraries acted as public libraries dispensing educational resources and recreational reading to Canadian users on a geographic-community or common-interest reading basis. The variety, number, and collective status of subscription libraries ushered in the persistent nineteenth-century concept of the semi-private public library administered by trustees and populated by members who voluntarily agreed to accept entry charges, annual dues, and fundraising. The collegial space provided by the subscription library fostered a greater sense of publicness in an emerging Canadian nation before 1850. It also forged numerous associative identities in localities for like-minded reading groups. Subscription library development reveals that significant attributes of post-1850 municipal public libraries—especially the public library association which continues today—were inherited from Canada’s colonial library era.

 

Early Subscription Libraries

Beginning at Quebec City (1779) and Montreal (1796) and spreading to other colonies and the Canadian west, a variety of subscription libraries were established ranging from the exclusive share-holding archetype (e.g., at Halifax) to the more inclusive, general interest library supported by modest entry charges and annual fees in small towns and cites. Over time, these libraries developed on an irregular, parochial basis in differing colonial environments, although common public features are evident, such as claims for societal betterment. It was not unusual for a subscription library to be integrated with the work of specialized societies and associations (esp. in Quebec), or for the library to be aligned with news or reading rooms. This multifaceted public interface helped to bridge reading from the private to the public realm, to improve access to print resources, and to invest libraries with a communal significance in the Victorian period before Confederation. By the mid-point of the nineteenth century, subscription libraries occupied the middle ground between the personal realm and the state where formation of ideas on private liberality, community interests, and governance converged.

In the course of seven decades, subscription type libraries evolved into ‘library associations’ regulated by public statutes stipulating control by the members and an elected governing board. These libraries were identified less with earlier joint-stock, proprietary, or subscription business terminology and more with the appellation ‘public library’ that was in use throughout the entire period, i.e., a library that was accessible to all residents of a community, but not generally free because it required voluntary personal payments. These small libraries performed a public function but were not state agencies. In some instances, they received token payments from different government levels, but legal sanction for state financial aid did not exist in legislative acts. In the evolution of public libraries in Canada, attempts by subscription managers to achieve a public profile by seeking financial support from colonial parliaments and by staking claims to publicness (the interests of the people as a whole) were significant steps.

Mechanics’ Institutes and Association Libraries

At the midway point of the nineteenth century, the Library Association and Mechanics’ Institute Act of 1851 became a critical foundation for the subscription library’s conversion to the Canadian ‘association library.’ In accordance with enabling legislation that would become the hallmark of twentieth-century Canadian provincial public library legislation, the 1851 law for the two colonial Canadas (now Ontario and Quebec) recognized that a public library association was to be available for persons on a voluntary membership basis. The law established that library associations would be governed by local boards of trustees independent from control by municipal politicians (a ‘special purpose body’ later identified by political commentators and academics on local government in the 20th century). Further, it provided public recognition of association libraries, thereby creating the opportunity for provincial grants which supplemented local fundraising efforts. Similar legislative arrangements in other provinces, such as British Columbia, ensured that the subscription model, re-labelled as a ‘public library association,’ would continue to coexist with its tax-supported ‘free library’ cousin well into the twentieth century and beyond.

 More information is available in my article published in Library and Information History, a quarterly journal publishing articles by authors on all subjects and all periods relating to the history of libraries and librarianship and to the history of information. For access to a limited number of PDFs, go to this link: Subscription Libraries for the Public.

Canadian Academic Libraries in the Postwar Period, 1945–1960

The general history of college and university library development in Canada has not been examined extensively. There are few studies that synthesize the entire history of Canadian academic libraries and normally two core themes are emphasized—library growth and progressive advances in librarianship. But these two perspectives can be applied to other types of libraries and do not serve to highlight the distinctiveness of academic libraries or librarians. There are some valuable, informative accounts of Canadian libraries in higher education that are commonly regarded as ‘institutional history.’ Because the library is positioned within its parent institution, librarians have understandably chronicled library support for the needs and plans of a particular university or college. Individual libraries, such as those at the Universities of Toronto and Alberta, are notable in this regard: Robert Blackburn’s Evolution of the Heart: A History of the University of Toronto Library up to 1981; and Merill Distad’s The University of Alberta Library: The First Hundred Years, 1908-2008. These institutional histories may be considered the foundation for more general histories that explore particular themes and developments. Added to these local studies are are a multitude of other contributions as articles, pamphlets, and theses. Many works concentrate on more recent decades after the 1960s when ‘growth’ and ‘progress’ were central features.

Of course, the development of academic libraries on a national basis as well as the careers of the ‘college librarian’ or the ‘university librarian’ began before the sixties. I wrote, in 2016, about the contribution of the Carnegie Corporation of New York (CCNY) to the development of Canadian university and college libraries during the Great Depression. This was one instance of a change in philosophy of service. From 1932-35, thirty-four institutions of higher education shared in library grants totaling $214,800 in a national (Canada and Newfoundland) project conducted by a Canadian Advisory Group established by the CCNY. George H. Locke, Toronto Public Library, headed the group which awarded Carnegie financial aid for the improvement of undergraduate print collections. The attempts by Canadian administrators to adapt library collections, organization, and staffing to local circumstances to improve interwar undergraduate library services was an unusual step towards national thinking about the role of college and university libraries. For this post, see The Carnegie Corporation Advisory Group on Canadian College Libraries, 1930-35, posted in 2016 with an accompanying link to my article published in the journal, Historical Studies in Education/Revue d'histoire de l'éducation.

Postwar Academic Libraries in Canada

Another period, the postwar (1945-1960), is another seldom referenced period that is of interest. After the Second World War, the expansion of Canadian post-secondary sector was notable for several modernizing trends: the infusion of federal funds for academic research, the frequent erection of campus buildings, increased enrollments, the establishment of new universities, the independence of previously affiliated small colleges, and the creation of comprehensive research efforts and graduate programs. In this changing environment, the preeminence of the humanities and undergraduate teaching gave way to scientific and technological research, business and professional orientations, and graduate studies.

Mills Memorial Library, n.d., McMaster University, Hamilton, opened 1951

 Libraries and librarians responded to these challenges in many similar ways. There are many contemporary accounts in relation to library architecture, the acquisition and organization of collections, administrative library structures and staffing, services for faculty and students, and efforts by librarians to realize professional standing, to achieve recognition as ‘professional librarians.’ The architectural redefinition of libraries, the impetus to establish research collections, the maturation of academic librarianship, and the increasing complexity of library operations were prominent features in the postwar period. The gradual evolution of academic libraries toward more uniform organizational purposes and structures on a national basis in a ‘postwar era’ following World War II was followed by a period of ‘mid-century modernization’ that included the more memorable and better documented decade of the 1960s.

 The postwar history of academic libraries was deeply influenced not just by local conditions and persons but also by broader trends occurring in the nation’s universities and colleges and the library community across North America. Examination of sources for the period mirror general currents in the Canadian post-secondary sector that made library provision of resources, assistance, and information more integral to the work of students and faculty. Of course, the national pace of change from 1945 to 1960 was moderate compared with the succeeding period, the dynamic 1960s that loom large in the history of Canadian libraries. The sixties ushered in many educational changes, especially the establishment of provincial systems of higher education and vastly improved funding for libraries in higher education. Nonetheless, library development in the 1960s should not be viewed simply as a break with the past but as an outgrowth of many changes already underway.

More complete information on the postwar era is in my article, “Postwar Canadian Academic Libraries, 1945–60,” at the Canadian Journal of Academic Librarianship website. 

I have another post on Canadian academic libraries in the 1940s is at this link.

CANADIAN VICTORIAN PUBLIC LIBRARIES BEFORE 1900

The common characteristics of free public libraries that were legislated in Ontario (1882), the City of Saint John (1883), and British Columbia (1891) served as a guide for public library development towards the end of the nineteenth century. In this version, the 'free public library' or 'free library' was a municipal institution governed by a board of management and funded primarily by local taxes. These libraries were accessible to all community residents who were not charged at the point of entry. Local decisions, based on provincial legislation, mostly determined the establishment and governance of libraries. Community members participated on a voluntary basis and the nature and extent of services varied from one community to another. 

Types of Public Libraries

However, widespread acceptance of this model developed slowly, in part because other views identified the 'public library' as one that was accessible to all residents of a community, but not generally free or a constituent part of local government because it relied on voluntary personal payments or contributions from philanthropic individuals, community groups, or persons willing to pay a membership fee. This type of library performed a public function but was not a state agent, i.e. the municipal, provincial, or federal government. Often, the establishment of libraries open free to the public was furthered by philanthropic efforts and managed privately.  In some cases, these libraries received assistance and direction from government in recognition of their beneficial public function.

It is these atypical or hybrid libraries that will be discussed here in a Canadian context. They were public libraries open freely to the public without direct charge or with small personal (or family) charges. They were clearly regarded as community-based service agencies. In many ways, they characterized the importance of nineteenth-century ideas about voluntarism, civic promotion, and public-private partnerships working in the interest of the public good. They were distinctive in their own right and founded in all parts of British North America as the following few examples illustrate.
 

Fraser Institute, c.1900

 

Fraser Institute, Montreal (est. 1885) --- In his 1870 will, the businessman Hugh Fraser placed most of his possessions amounting to $200,000 in trust to John J. C. Abbott and Frederick Torrence to establish an institution--a free public library, museum, and gallery open to all Montreal's citizens regardless of class and without any fee. The Fraser Institute was incorporated by a statute in 1870 that determined its course: "to aid in the diffusion of useful knowledge by affording free access, to all desirous of it, to books and to scientific objects and subjects, and to works of art, and for that purpose to erect appropriate buildings, and to procure books, scientific objects and subjects, and works of art, making always the acquisition and maintenance of a library the leading object to be kept in view." The Institute was managed by an elite Board of Governors; however, legal battles over Fraser's will delayed progress. Finally, a building was acquired and opened in 1885. The Institute, located at the corner of University Street and Dorchester Boulevard, initially was a reference library. A circulating collection commenced operations in 1889. Thus, after almost 20 years, the Institute was able to fulfill its original purpose outlined in the 1870 Act. Hugh Fraser's philanthropic vision involved a private institution--starting as an endowed library--operating in the public interest to further educational standards. It had a self-perpetuating incorporated private board of managers which, from time to time, made substantial contributions to its success and ensured free access. 

New Westminster, B.C. --- In 1865, New Westminster was the capital of the mainland colony of British Columbia. There were two initial inducements to establish an institute and public library: a collection of books offered by the disbanded Columbia Detachment of Royal Engineers and Queen Victoria's donation of a copy of her late husband Prince Albert's speeches "to the public libraries of her more important colonies." The New Westminster Library and Reading Room opened on 15 August 1865 on Columbia Street supported by a grant from the colonial government and by membership and regular subscription rates, e.g. to borrow books a member paid $5 a year. The library operated from a building that formerly housed the colony's official Mint and was run by a board of management composed of four colonial officials and the president of the municipal council. This happy state of affairs continued for a few years until the colony's government funding was withdrawn by 1868. Subscriptions--a common method of financing 19th-century local libraries--supported library operations thereafter until 1890. At this point, the federal government offered the Mint property to the city provided a new building would be erected and opened as a free public library. The offer was accepted: the mint was demolished and a new building opened in 1892 with renewed funding from the municipality. For most this period, the library was never a 'free library' in the modern sense but exhibited a private-public partnership to support a 'public library' that was not unusual in the 19th century.

Montreal Free Library/Gésu Free Library (est. 1889) --- "Any bona fide resident of Montreal, irrespective of class or creed, is entitled, under certain conditions, to draw books from the Gésu Free Library." So read the introduction to an 1895 catalogue of circulating books for the Gésu Free Library opened on 4 October 1889. It was aimed at primarily English-speaking Catholic Montrealers. The library was essentially a parish library situated near the Jesuit Collège Sainte-Marie on Bleury Street. The library owed its existence to the dedicated work of a few ladies active in the Promoters of the League of the Sacred Heart who raised funds through annual afternoon teas. They desired to promote books based on Christian beliefs and morals. A small committee, ultimately responsible to the Sacred Heart Union, managed the library. By 1895, the library was circulating 15,000 books to an extended public in downtown Montreal and receiving in-kind donations and money from private citizens. The library offered titles in English, with translations of French authors who were mostly Catholic. Notably, however, there were fiction books for youngsters, such as Frances Hodgson Burnett's Little Lord Fauntleroy, at a time when many public libraries maintained age limits excluding children. There were also popular British novelists: Dickens, Trollope, Collins, Bulwer-Lytton, and Scott. American authors, such as Irving and Cooper, and few women authors, such as the Irish novelist Rosa Mullholland and Lady Georgiana Fullerton, were also available. The Montreal Free Library (sometimes called Sacred Heart Union Library) was not a municipal institution of course, it was a small library without charge at the point of entry and based on the ideas of its Catholic promoters that good reading (including fiction). Considering the mid-19th century controversies in Montreal about liberal works and fiction in general regarding the closure of the Institut Canadien de Montréal, this was a progressive step. Books for children was another important ingredient that would eventually become an orthodox feature of public libraries.

Yarmouth Public Library, N.S. (est. 1872) -- Loran Ellis Baker, a prominent local businessman and politician, was instrumental in establishing a public library in Yarmouth in 1872. He first purchased 2,500 books and then presented a library, housed on the second floor of the Young and Baker building, to the town's citizens. The library was open for limited hours each week, but books circulated free of charge. All the library expenses, including the salary of a custodian who also maintained the library, were assumed by Baker. From time to time, townsfolk contributed books and material objects which eventually formed the basis for a museum. For more than a quarter-century, Baker's generous civic-mindedness served local residents well and in the 1890s, the Yarmouth Council made small appropriations to the library. When L.E. Baker died in 1899, his will stipulated that the library, its books and materials, as well as $8,000 would be made available to an incorporated body with the proviso that an equal amount be raised to establish a free public library and museum within five years. The Yarmouth Public Library and Museum was incorporated in September 1904. It was a 'free library' operated by a private body--the Yarmouth Free Public Library Association--that did not charge a fee for borrowing books. Residents could, however, pay a nominal fee to become a member of the Association managing the library and museum.

Town of Portland, N.B. (est. 1882) -- After Isaac Burpee, a prominent MP representing the local riding in Parliament, provided a small collection of books for Portland, the town turned to the local branch of the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) for assistance. The members of this branch had built a Union Hall for the promotion of temperance and social and moral reforms, a fitting home of a town library. In 1882, the Portland WCTU incorporated (45 Vic. Chap 93, Act of NB 1882). The management of the library within the Hall was vested in the hands of the WCTU. Although the town provided support for the building and its maintenance, a small fee was also charged for library use by the WCTU library committee. This situation continued for a few years until Portland was annexed by Saint John in 1888, after which this library began to receive regular grants provided residents would not be charged for borrowing books and use of the library. The activity of the WCTU was an early manifestation of the interest by women's groups in promoting and maintaining public libraries across the nation.

Pettes Memorial Library, Que. (est. 1894) -- Narcissa Farrand Pettes built and donated a library to the village of Knowlton and Brome Township, Quebec, in memory of her late husband, Nathaniel Pettes. In the same year, 1894, the Quebec Legislature enacted An Act to Incorporate the "Pettes Memorial." This legislation stipulated that the Pettes building would be "a free public library and reading room, to be open to all honest and respectable persons whomsoever, of every rank in life, without distinction." Also, the building would function as "a lecture hall, to be used in connection with the said library and reading room, and solely for purposes calculated to promote and advance the interests and usefulness of the same." The purpose was clearly Victorian in mindset: the Pettes Memorial was intended to promote "the diffusion of useful knowledge, by affording free access, to all desiring it, to books, magazines and periodicals, making always the acquisition and maintenance of a library the leading object to be kept in view." An incorporated board of seven trustees was established to oversee the library. Narcissa Pettes also agreed to pay the salary for the librarian, to assume the cost of maintenance during her lifetime, and to leave funds to be invested to meet future annual expenses.

Halifax Citizens' Free Library, N.S. (est. 1864) --  At Halifax, the collections of two previous incorporated subscription libraries, the Mechanics' Library (est. 1831) and the Halifax Library (est. 1823-24), formed the nucleus of the Citizens’ Free Library by the mid-1870s in the city hall courthouse. In 1864, the city council accepted a generous offer from Chief Justice William Young, who had purchased the collection of the Mechanics’ Library, to administer and to open a library freely to local residents. A Halifax newspaper lent hearty support for ‘public institutions of a literary character’ especially at modest cost. Later, in 1876, the city bought books from the defunct Halifax Library, which the privileged classes had supported for half a century. In the following year, provincial legislation (40 Vic. chap. 34) permitted municipal funding for the Free Library to pay debts and maintenance costs without resort to direct personal fees: "The City Council may payout of the general assessment of the City or may add to the sums authorized to be assessed, such a sum not to exceed one thousand two hundred dollars, as may be necessary for the maintenance of the Citizens' Free Library and defraying the expenses thereof." A committee of city aldermen parsimoniously managed affairs and the library moved a few times before settling into the city hall in 1890. During this time, the library suffered a chronic shortage of funds, a situation that did not improve in the first part of the 20th-century. Nonetheless, the Citizen's Free Library was the first Canadian instance of 1) ongoing municipal tax support without a specific rate clause that a managing committee could not rely on and  2) municipal administration of a library open to the public without charge at point of access.

In the late Victorian era, commentaries on the rationale for free public libraries serving the general public were becoming commonplace. This evolution in thinking combined with legislative standards, enhanced physical library access, and claims that libraries advanced literacy, educational attainment, and societal progress, reinforced support for libraries. In a more prosperous and educated nation, with wealthier business leaders, an increasingly literate populace, a growing middle-class interested in cultural uplift, and civic-minded leaders, the formation of libraries became a cause--a movement--that attracted promoters and followers. Given the disparate state of local government across the new Dominion, a variety of options emerged after Confederation in 1867 for alternative methods of governance and private-public financial support for libraries open to the public without charge to users

Further Reading

Moodey, Edgar C. The Fraser-Hickson Library: An Informal History. London: Clive Bingley, 1977 at the Internet Archive

Hanson, Elizabeth. “Books for the People: The Fraser Institute, 1885-1900.” Épilogue : Canadian Bulletin for the History of Books, Libraries, and Archives 11, no. 2 (1996): 1–10

Montreal Free Library. Analytical and Descriptive Catalogue of the Montreal Free Library. 3rd ed. Montreal: Montreal Free Library, Library Hall, 146 Bleury Street, 1895 at the Internet Archive.

Lamonde, Yvan. “Un aspect inconnu du débat autour de la bibliothèque publique à Montréal: la Montreal Free Library (1889- ).” Les Cahiers des Dix, no. 57 (2003): 263–71. https://doi.org/10.7202/1008108ar.

Brief history of the Pettes Memorial Library, Knowlton, Quebec.

Free Public Library (Yarmouth, N.S.), ed. Catalogue, Free Public Library of Yarmouth, Nova Scotia: Established 1872. Saint John, N.B.: J. & A. McMillan, 1872.

THE BRITISH COLUMBIA FREE LIBRARIES ACT, 1891

British Columbia became the second province to pass an act allowing local governments to establish free libraries in 1891. Generally, municipal conditions were different in B.C. compared to its eastern counterpart, Ontario. There were only a handful of cities and towns able to fund and maintain libraries adequately: the total population of the province in 1891 was 98,173 and Vancouver, with 13,709 people, was the largest city. But libraries in a variety of forms--subscription, mechanics' institutes, literary societies, and commercial circulating libraries--had existed for many years in different localities such as Vancouver, Victoria, and New Westminster.

Consequently, legislation was introduced in March 1891 that enabled a local council that had received a petition from 100 electors to submit the issue to be voted upon by ratepayers and, if successful, for council to pass a bylaw establishing a free library which might also include a free news-room, or museum, branches, as well as evening classes for artisans, mechanics and workingmen to promote mechanical and manufacturing arts. Essential features of this Act (54 Vic. chap 20) were similar to Ontario's 1882 legislation:

• a board of management composed of the mayor or reeve of a municipality, and three other persons appointed by the council, and three by the public school board (or the board of education) governed the operations of the library;
•  councils were mandated to levy a "Free Library Rate," a special annual rate not to exceed one half a mill upon the assessed value of all rateable real property to furnish the estimated budget submitted by the library board each year.;
• all libraries, news-rooms, and museums were to be open to the public, free of all charge;
•  mechanics' institute and library associations were authorized to transfer property and assets to a municipality for the purpose of the Act;
• municipal councils were authorized to raise by a special issue of debentures (termed the "Free Library Debentures") amounts required for purchasing and erecting buildings and, in the first instance, for obtaining books and other things required to establish a library.

For the most part, British Columbia's legislation followed Ontario's law; however, one distinctive clause included in the B.C. Act permitted boards to conduct evening classes and to appoint and dismiss salaried teachers or instructors.

B.C.'s library act was primarily aimed at larger urban centres in a developing province. There was no provision for establishing libraries in the rural districts and no provincial financial or organizational assistance provided to undertake such work. The beneficiaries of the 1891 legislation were communities that had previously struggled to establish a public library by various means: Vancouver, Victoria, and New Westminster. In Victoria, for example, a public referendum had been held in 1887 to transfer the assets of the Mechanics' Literary Institute to the city for the purposes of establishing a public library. Vancouver's city council had begun granting small amounts for a public library earlier in 1889. New Westminster had provided accommodation in a central building for its library in 1890. Now these communities were eligible for an annual library rate. As well, there was a major unanticipated benefit to the 1891 legislation. A decade later, when Carnegie money became available for free public libraries, all three communities automatically were eligible for a grant to erect a new building.

The 1891 Act marked another late Victorian Canadian milestone in the recognition of free libraries--how to establish and administer a library, what services would be provided, and how operations would be financed. The Act would remain in place until a complete revision was undertaken in 1919.

Further reading on B.C.'s Carnegie library heritage:

Vancouver, 1903:  now the Carnegie Centre
Victoria, 1906:  opened at the at the corner of Yates and Blanshard Streets

THE CITY OF SAINT JOHN FREE PUBLIC LIBRARY ACT, 1883

The 1880s were a critical turning point for free library legislation in Canada. Ontario was not alone in enacting legislation for free public libraries, that is, library service owned and funded by a local government accessible to local residents without charge at the point of service. Unlike Ontario, however, in the Maritime provinces specific legislation for the establishment of a free public library was the typical method chosen by Legislatures. Saint John became the earliest incorporated library to assume this course in 1883.

In the nineteenth century, Saint John was served by various subscription-membership libraries, notably the St. John Mechanics' Institute, in operation from 1839-90, and the St. John Society Library, in operation from 1811-69. Agitation for a free library, similar to the Toronto experience, began as early as the late 1870s. The success of a project which secured more than 2,000 books for a free library led to the appointment of a city commission in 1880 charged with forming a free library. After accommodation in the city's central market building was secured, the library eventually opened on 13 June 1883.

A month before, on May 3rd, a provincial act had established the library's legal basis. This Act allowed for appointment by city council of a nine-person board of commissioners to manage the library. The law allowed city council to assess $500 per annum for the library maintenance (this trifling amount was raised to $2,500 by an 1890 amendment). One article authorized council to appoint women as commissioners, not to exceed four in number. In fact, a committee entirely composed of ladies had been instrumental in helping raise funds to create the library before 1883 and it continued to assist in this way after the library opened. Each year, the library was required to submit an annual report to council; in effect, the library board was a semi-independent body within local government.

The act for St. John was singular in nature, shorter, and different from the Ontario enabling law of 1882. For example, it did not have a specified rate clause; it did not stipulate that commissioners could operate branches or newsrooms; it formally provided for bequests and gifts to be held by the library for its own use; it did not authorize appointments by school boards; and it did not enable the transfer of property by a mechanics' institute. Because of the circumstances leading to the library's foundation, there was no need for electors to vote on establishing the library.

Although the St. John law did not serve as a model for other communities in New Brunswick (or Nova Scotia), it did demonstrate an interest in the formation of Canadian free libraries at the local level by means of public statutes, a concept that was repeated in British Columbia (1891) and Manitoba (1899) before the end of the 19th century. The principle of local municipal appropriations, however, was emulated later in separate acts for free public libraries at Woodstock in 1912 and Moncton in 1927 before a general New Brunswick library was enacted in 1929.

CAP. LVIII.

An Act to establish a Free Public Library in the City of Saint John.

Sections
1 City Council to appoint Board of Commissioners.
2 Commissioners incorporated.
3 Continuance and succession of Commissioners; proviso.
4 After organization, property to vest in Commissioners.
5 Powers and duties of Commissioners.
6 Commissioners to make bye laws.
7 Females may be appointed to Board of Commissioners, proviso.
8 Vacancy in Board, how filled.
9 Report of receipts and expenditure to be made to Council annually.
10 City Council to order an annual assessment.
11 Assessment, to whom paid, and how applied.
Passed 3rd May 1883.

WHEREAS a number of persons have made large and valuable gifts of Books and Records, and also contributions in money, for the purpose of founding in the City of Saint John a Free Public Library, and it is desirable that a corporate body should be constituted for the management and continuance thereof;—
Be it enacted by the Lieutenant Governor, Legislative Council, and Assembly, as follows:—

1. It shall be the duty of the Common Council of the City of Saint John within sixty days after the passing of this Act to appoint a Board of nine persons, to be Commissioners for the management of a Free Public Library in the City of Saint John.

2. The persons so appointed by the Common Council shall, upon acceptance of the office, constitute and be the Board of Commissioners of the Free Public Library, and they and their successors are hereby constituted a body corporate by the name of “The Commissioners of the Free Public Library of the City of Saint John,” and by that name shall have the general powers and privileges by law incident to Corporations.

3. The continuance and succession of the said Corporation shall be as follows:—Upon the first day of June in each year after the year of the passing of this Act, two of such persons so appointed shall retire from the Board, in the order hereinafter in this Section prescribed, and two persons shall be annually appointed by the Common Council to fill the vacancies so made: The two persons last and eighth named upon the first appointment shall first retire, and in the next succeeding year the seventh and sixth named in the first appointment shall retire; and in the then next year the fifth and fourth; and in the next year the third and second; and the next year the first named in the first appointment shall retire, and also the first in seniority who may have been appointed to fill the first vacancy by retirement; and thereafter two persons in each year shall retire in the order of seniority of appointment or re-appointment; provided that the Common Council may in their discretion re-appoint any person or persons so retiring: Three Commissioners shall constitute a quorum, and shall be at all times a sufficient number for the legal continuance of the Corporate body.

4. Upon the organization of the Board of Commissioners under this Act, all books, records, moneys and other property now held by certain Trustees heretofore appointed by the Common Council to receive and hold such property, shall vest in the said Corporation constituted under this Act; and upon delivery thereof to the said Corporation, the Trustees shall be and thereupon are hereby discharged of all further responsibility, and relieved of all trusts and duties relating thereto.

5. The said Corporation constituted under this Act shall have full power to take and hold all books and other property coming into their hands for the purposes of this Act, and to receive and take all gifts, bequests and grants of money or chattels of any description, to be held by them for the purposes of this Act.

6. The said Corporation shall have full power and authority from time to time to make and ordain bye laws not contrary to law, for the management and control of the property held by them and the appointment of their officers; and to establish rules and regulations for the care and use of the books and other chattels for the maintenance of a Free Public Library.

7. In the first or any subsequent appointment under this Act, it shall be lawful for the Common Council in their discretion to appoint any female or females on the Board of Commissioners; provided that the female members at such Board shall not at any time exceed four in number.

8. Whenever any vacancy occurs in the Board of Commissioners by death or resignation, such vacancy shall be reported by the Board to the Common Council, who shall proceed to fill such vacancy by the appointment of another Commissioner, who shall hold office for the residue of the term of the person whose place he fills.

9. The Corporation constituted under this Act shall make an annual Report to the Common Council, with a statement of receipts and expenditures.

10. It shall be the duty of the Mayor, Aldermen and Commonalty of the City of Saint John in Common Council, in every year after the present year from and after the passing of this Act, and they are hereby authorized and empowered to order and direct an assessment upon the whole City of Saint John and the inhabitants thereof, in addition to the yearly assessment for other civic purposes, for the sum of five hundred dollars besides the costs of levying and collecting the same, to be assessed, levied and collected at the time of levying and collecting other City rates, and therewith and in the manner provided by The Saint John City Assessment Act 1882, or any other Act for the time being in force relating to the levying, assessing and collecting of rates and taxes in the City of Saint John.

11. The moneys so assessed and collected under the last preceding Section of this Act shall be paid to and received by the Chamberlain of the City of Saint John, and shall be by him paid over as collected to the Commissioners of the Free Public Library in aid of the expenses of management of such Public Library.