Intellectual Freedom Statement adopted by the Canadian Library Association in 1966

Canadian Libraries and Intellectual Freedom

Although the Canadian Library Association-Association Canadienne des Bibliothèques did not adopt an intellectual freedom statement until 1966, its development had a long genesis. As early as 1951, at its Toronto conference, the Ontario Library Association requested CLA-ACB to develop a statement on a “Library Bill of Rights,” i.e., a national library policy on intellectual freedom similar to the American Library Association’s statement revised in 1948. As a result, the CLA-ACB appointed a special committee to explore a “Library Charter” chaired by Gerhard Lomer (McGill University). Over two years, the committee worked on a statement in three sections: the rights of the Canadian people, the services and responsibilities of libraries, and the duties of the government. However, the committee was discharged in 1953, perhaps because CLA-ACB chose a reactive “watch and ward” position focused on its Undesirable Literature Committee (est. 1950).

Yet, this latter committee did not attempt to draft a policy, although it did submit a 1953 brief to a Senate committee concerning indecent publications that declared censorship could be problematic. For many years, meetings and conferences of CLA-ACB mostly dealt with “bread and butter” issues, such as salary standards for employees, standards of service for public libraries, or the development of a projected national survey on the state of libraries. The welfare of librarians and libraries, not issues of national or public policy, was the prime interest of the membership.

The lapsed mandates of the two 1950s committees were eventually incorporated into an Intellectual Freedom committee in 1961. This committee, chaired from 1962–66 by John Archer, began a more purposeful program first of providing information for libraries and the public through a series of articles and then the composition of a statement on Intellectual Freedom for CLA members to debate. John Archer was a 1949 BLS graduate (McGill University) who had advanced to the positions of Legislative Librarian and Provincial Archivist of Saskatchewan. He came to the committee after the Canadian Criminal Code adopted a more permissive view of obscenity in publications—the new test was the interpretation of an author’s “undue exploitation” of sex, crime, violence, or cruelty. This legal application opened the door to works of artistic merit to circulate freely; thus, challenges in the early 1960s swirled about novels of apparent “ill-repute” such as Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Naked Lunch, Tropic of Cancer, Women in Love, and Memoirs of Fanny Hill. As well, a federal statute enacted in 1960, the Canadian Bill of Rights, provided citizens with certain legal rights, such as a free press, in relation to other federal laws and government actions. However, its scope was limited. For example, it did not apply to provincial laws.

A general principled approach, not statements on individual authors or works, was adopted by CLA-ACB. John Archer’s first step came in the March 1962 issue of the Canadian Library, where two articles appeared: “The Freedom to Read” and the “Library Bill of Rights.” Both statements were reprints originally adopted by the American Library Association, which had begun to address the right to read and libraries’ responsibilities as early as 1939. Later, in November 1962, Rev. Edmond Desrochers, S.J., the President of CLA, published an article, “A Catholic Librarian looks at Intellectual Freedom in the Canadian Setting.” Desrochers identified some problems with the ALA statements in a Canadian context. He emphasized the need for a policy that “embodies due respect for the different philosophical and religious beliefs of the Canadian people.” However, he did not oppose adoption of a statement, rather he encouraged the creation of a policy that recognized the diversity of Canada. Finally, in March 1963, the Canadian Library published a final article by Archer, “This Freedom.” It became obvious from its two-page text that “watch and ward” should be jettisoned.

Libraries must play a vital role in the maintenance of intellectual freedom. As a responsibility of library service to the public, the reading materials selected should be chosen for interest and for informational and cultural values. The freedom of an individual to use the library should not be denied or abridged because of factors of race, national origin, or political views. Library service should offer the fullest practical coverage of materials, presenting all points of view concerning local, national and international issues of our times. The libraries and those responsible for libraries must stand as leaders for intellectual freedom and must resist social influences tending to restrict the legitimate right to provide Canadians with worthwhile books.

A CLA-ACB annual meeting was scheduled for Calgary in June 1966. The Intellectual Freedom Committee wisely decided to hold a two-day pre-conference meeting at Banff that attracted about seventy registrants. On the first day, there were topical addresses followed by four breakout discussion groups: two for public libraries, one for academic libraries, and one for government/special libraries. John Archer, now Director of Libraries at McGill University, was the incoming President of CLA-ACB and led a strategy group that condensed the findings of each group and provided a draft for discussion and adoption on the second day. Then, the CLA-ACB Council fine-tuned the draft to be forwarded at two open meetings of conference delegates at the Calgary conference. The following statement, slightly revised at these meetings, was approved Twenty-first Annual Conference held at Calgary on June 21, 1966.

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The Canadian Library Association Statement on Intellectual Freedom, 1966

Intellectual Freedom comprehends the right of every person (in the legal meaning of the term), subject to reasonable requirements of public order, to have access to all expressions of knowledge and intellectual creativity, and to express his thoughts publicly.

Intellectual Freedom is essential to the health and development of society.

Libraries have a primary role to play in the maintenance and nurture of intellectual freedom.

In declaring its support of these general statements, the CLA-ACB affirm these specific propositions:

1) It is the responsibility of libraries to facilitate the exercise of the right of access by acquiring and making available books and other materials of the widest variety, including those expressing or advocating unconventional or unpopular ideas.

2) It is the responsibility of libraries to facilitate the exercise of the right of expression by making available all facilities and services at their disposal.

3) Libraries should resist all efforts to limit the exercise of these responsibilities while recognizing the right of criticism by individuals and groups.

4) Librarians have a professional duty, in addition to their institutional responsibility, to uphold the principles enunciated in this statement.

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Following the adoption of the statement, conference delegates also passed a resolution that they believed (hopefully) would secure legal recognition for libraries.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Government of Canada be requested to recognize both this role and this responsibility by introducing amendments to the Criminal Code specifically exempting libraries from such provisions of the Code as may now or in future restrict or forbid individual citizens from acquiring books or other materials within the scope of the CLA-ACB statement on Intellectual Freedom, such materials to be acquired by libraries for purposes of research.

Not surprisingly, many matters pertaining to the federal Criminal Code were deemed more important by government officials in Ottawa. The impetus for following through on the statement and the resolution soon lapsed.

Although CLA-ACB had produced a succinct and clearly worded document that acknowledged libraries and librarians should be proactive, not reactive, in terms of censorship and freedom of expression, the association’s interest in asserting its policy diminished for several years until a revival occurred in the mid-1970s. In 1974, the Church of Scientology served writs on the Hamilton and Etobicoke libraries because both libraries refused to remove books critical of Scientology, such as Cyril Vosper’s The Mind Benders. Eventually, the Church withdrew its civil action, and CLA successfully redrafted its position on June 17, 1974 (the so-called Winnipeg Manifesto). The revised statement cited the 1960 Canadian Bill of Rights and used more assertive wording, such as “guarantee,” and broadened its scope by referencing “employees and employers.” In many ways, this revision improved and simplified both the OLA 1963 statement and the previous CLA-ACB effort adopted at Calgary in 1966. One interesting CLA point on facilitating access to library spaces and services (#2) did not seem to be contentious until the late 1970s when libraries in Mississauga and Oakville decided to screen the film, The Naked Civil Servant. Nevertheless, issues involving pornography, child pornography, and hate propaganda would require CLA’s continued attention, especially in the 1980s: the 1974 statement was revised in November 1983 and November 1985 to reference the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Shortly before CLA disbanded, it would be revised a final time on September 27, 2015.

John Hall Archer was invested with the Order of Canada in April 1982. The University of Regina’s main library is named in his honour. He died in 2004.

The Bibliothèque Edmond Desrochers at the Centre justice et foi in Montreal, specializing in the social sciences, was named in his honour in 1985. Father Desrochers died in 1987.

Read the contemporary statement adopted by the Canadian Federation of Library Associations upon review on August 26, 2016.

Intellectual freedom statement adopted by Ontario Library Association in 1963

Ontario Libraries and Censorship

Throughout the 1950s and early 1960s, the Ontario and Canadian library associations formed specific committees to deal with the issue of obscene literature and censorship. At mid-century, many librarians reasoned they were selecting books, not prohibiting access or advocating freedom. They worked within an environment where Canadian law did not always always ensure civil rights and liberties for everyone. In this situation, library neutrality was often cited as the best course. Most librarians believed in the concept of treating patrons equally and providing resources for multiple viewpoints. During this period, the general stance by both associations was to issue reminders that self-censorship by librarians in book selection was often a greater threat to intellectual freedom than actions by external local groups, governments, or federal laws. “Watch and ward” became a byword for both the OLA and the CLA when periodic eruptions of censorship occurred that involved libraries. In principle, the library stood as a watchman protecting the public from harm. The associations felt that the answer to a bad book was a good book.

    Of course, “bad books,” even ones legally published, often could not be found on library shelves. An experienced librarian, Grace Buller, in her 1974 court testimony, said, “when I first went to the Toronto Public Library in 1949, we didn’t have a copy of Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath.” William Riggs, a Windsor trustee, told journalists at the OLA’s 1951 conference that, “we know librarians sometimes hide books containing strong language under the counters, and often refuse to give out literature on specialized subjects [e.g., birth control] to groups requesting it.” In the late 1950s, Vladimir Nabokov’s critically acclaimed but contentious novel, Lolita, presented difficultly for library selectors: a survey in 1959 revealed only four of twelve libraries in the metropolitan Toronto area had the book available. Sometimes, libraries complied with police investigations: the Toronto Public Library Board surrendered copies of Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer in 1961 after Canada Customs ruled it ineligible for importation.

5th edition, Paris, 1938

     In Ontario, film censorship and restrictions on access by classification was more evident until 1960, when the Ontario Attorney-General formed an advisory body, the Obscene Literature Committee, to review controversial books or periodicals and the “pulps.” Book publishers and distributors mostly welcomed the committee’s reports to the Attorney-Generals office because it was a way to avoid expensive, time-consuming legal proceedings. The OLA also believed this provincial administrative process was reasonable and requested a librarian be appointed. Robert B. Porter, the chief librarian at Peterborough Public Library, joined the committee in May 1960. He had served as a lieutenant with the Regina Rifles when the regiment landed on D-Day, June 6th 1944. He had also been a member of the OLA’s Intellectual Freedom Committee in the late 1950s. Like many librarians, indeed most citizens, Porter was reluctant to alter existing conditions in the sphere of intellectual freedom but he was also fair-minded. In many ways, library trustees and librarians preferred consensus based on local, fluctuating “community standards.” Ontario libraries seldom rose to the defence of controversial books or authors. A notable exception occurred in 1955 in Flesherton when the library board and the librarian successfully defended the removal of several books accused of promoting “atheism, profanity and sex.” On balance, Robert Fulford’s 1959 assessment in the Toronto Star was well founded: “Libraries, in this country at least, have never been in the vanguard of the fight against censorship.”

    However, the OLA’s Intellectual Freedom Committee began to adopt a more proactive course after the Supreme Court of Canada narrowly ruled (5–4) Lady Chatterley’s Lover, a novel by D.H. Lawrence, was not obscene in March 1962 because, on balance, it was a serious work of literature. Shortly afterwards, the committee members decided it would be an appropriate time to state clearly OLA’s policy on the question of intellectual freedom and to issue a statement on its position. A new committee chair, Peter Revell, London Public Library, forged ahead for the 1963 annual meeting in Kitchener. He was an English librarian working on his MA in literature at the University of Western Ontario. Revell was familiar with censorship issues and would later pen a short article, “Propaganda and Pornography,” in Library Journal. The OLA committee members worked through 1962–63 to agree on a policy statement. Then, at the first session of the OLA annual general meeting on May 29, 1963, in the theatre-auditorium of Waterloo Lutheran University [now Wilfrid Laurier University], the following statement on Intellectual Freedom was passed by the unanimous vote of the members present.

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Ontario Library Association Statement on Intellectual Freedom, May 1963

In affirming its support of the fundamental rights of freedom of the press and freedom to read, the Ontario Library Association declares its acceptance of the following propositions:

(i ) That the provision of library service to the Canadian public is based upon the right of the citizen, within the limits of the law, to judge for himself on questions of politics, religion and morality.

( ii ) That it is the responsibility of librarians to maintain this right and to implement it in their selection of books, periodicals, films and recordings, subject only to the provisions of federal and provincial laws governing the suppression of treasonable, seditious and obscene literature.

(iii) That freedom of the press requires freedom to examine other ideas and other interpretations of life than those currently approved by the local community or by society in general, including those ideas and interpretations which may be unconventional or unpopular.

(iv) That freedom of the press requires freedom of the writer to depict what is ugly, shocking and unedifying in life when such depiction is made with serious intent.

(v) That the free traffic in ideas and opinions is essential to the health and growth of a free society.

(vi) That it is therefore part of the library’s service to its public to resist any attempt by any individual or group within the community it serves to abrogate or curtail the freedom to read by demanding the removal of any book, periodical, film or recording from the library.

(vii) That it is equally part of the library’s responsibility to its public to ensure that its selection of materials is not unduly influenced by the personal opinions of the selectors, but determined by the application of generally accepted standards of accuracy, style and presentation.

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    There was little public fanfare about the OLA Statement on Intellectual Freedom. The OLA was a small body of less than a thousand members. A few newspapers in Toronto, Kingston, Brantford, Kitchener, North Bay, and Windsor covered the new policy with brief articles. Yet, the statement marked a new era in thinking about censorship issues for Ontario’s libraries. It provided library boards with a framework, which was non-binding, to develop local formal policies on collection development and defend contentious purchases. In line with contemporary attitudes on social responsibility, it evoked a different approach to censorship and free expression. No longer would it be sufficient to guard ever changing “community standards.” A more proactive approach was necessary to allow freedom of expression for authors and the legal circulation of unconventional materials to the public. The public, not librarians, would judge the morality of an author’s work.

    Of course, the Ontario library declaration coincided with the liberalization of Canadian law in terms of censorship, obscenity, and customs seizures. The OLA statement arrived several months before police in Richmond Hill and Toronto confiscated John Cleland’s Memoirs of Fanny Hill at the end of 1963 and the start of 1964. The novel made a long transit through the court system until December 1964 when the Ontario Supreme Court ruled Fanny not obscene. Later, in 1964, two years after Lady Chatterley’s Lover was legalized by the Supreme Court of Canada, the Ontario Obscene Literature Committee ruled that Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn were serious works of literature that could circulate and be sold in Ontario. The threat of criminal prosecution for publishers or distributors was thereby lifted for similar works and more permissive standards adopted.

    The OLA Intellectual Freedom Statement served Ontario libraries for three decades before major changes were introduced. While many library selectors continued to rely on various interpretations of what was sometimes termed “library neutrality,” their arguments on selection could be sharpened by reference to the “standards of accuracy, style and presentation” that the statement advocated. Of course, complaints about books continued to erupt from time to time, Xaviera Hollander’s The Happy Hooker being a case in point. In the early 1970s, it was apparent that reliance on a statement alone was not sufficient—libraries and the OLA needed to respond forcefully when censorship challenges arose. The 1972 OLA Kingston conference theme was Intellectual Freedom and Censorship. A revised statement was prepared for approval but, ultimately, rejected by the membership: some delegates believed its principles actually interfered with a librarian’s decision in the selection of library resources. However, the OLA original statement would be revised to suit changing legal definitions and societal changes. The development of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and passage of the Constitution Act in 1982 followed by the growth of the Internet in the mid-1990s accentuated new issues, such as access and social responsibility. In 1990, the OLA issued an Intellectual Freedom Handbook to assist libraries with the changing times. The OLA statement was revised in 1990, 1998, and more recently in 2020 to reflect the rights of individuals as well as the concept of intellectual freedom in a democratic society. Still, there are recognizable passages from the 1963 version, especially the first and fifth clause, that continue to resonate six decades on.

    The OLA spokesperson on censorship in the mid-1960s, Peter Revell, returned to Britain to earn a PhD in librarianship at the University of Wales. He published important studies about American poetry and was chief librarian at Westfield College (London) from 1975 until his death in 1983. The Obscene Literature Committee continued its work until 1972 when it was dissolved because it was no longer needed. Bob Porter continued at Peterborough until his retirement announcement in 1980. He died in 2010.

Further reading:

The current Ontario Library Association Statement on Intellectual Freedom and the Intellectual Rights of the Individual (2020)

Peter Revell, “Censorship Facts.” Ontario Library Review 46 (May 1962): 95–96

Peter Revell, “Viewpoint: Propaganda and Pornography.” Library Journal 88 (October 1, 1963): 3562 and 3585.

D. Granfield and N. Barakett, Intellectual Freedom Handbook (Toronto: Ontario Library Association, 1990)

Pearce J. Carefoote, Forbidden Fruit: Banned, Censored and Challenged Books from Dante to Harry Potter (Toronto: Lester, Mason & Begg, 2007)

Four eastern Canadian library associations convene at Montreal, April 1939

Canadian Interprovincial Library Cooperation Begins in the 1930s

The scope for library collaboration across Canada broadened in the 1930s when more provincial library associations were formally organized in Quebec (1932), the Maritimes (1935), and Manitoba (1936). When these new groups joined the established library associations in Ontario (1900) and British Columbia library (1911), liaising more effectively on a west-west axis became possible. For three decades, Canadian librarians had looked to the south—to the American Library Association (ALA) or Pacific Northwest Library (PNLA) Association—to establish professional relationships. Although sporadic attempts to found a national library organization had floundered, library changes at the provincial level and the development of regional libraries were proving to be more successful. The Montreal Special Libraries Association and Library Association of Ottawa provided the groundwork for hosting larger conferences in large cities. Now, there was a firmer basis to move forward on broader issues,

    After the economic slump of the early 1930s, North American librarianship was invigorated by the catchword “cooperation.”  When the ALA returned to Montreal in 1934 for a convention, it debated an American “National Plan” to improve access and mitigate local and state tax inequities. As well, the concept of a Canadian Library Council to represent libraries on a national basis was revived and a decision was made to re-establish an association of Maritime libraries. Three years later, British Columbia librarians and Americans in the PNLA mixed pleasure with business at Harrison Hot Springs in the Fraser Valley on Labour Day weekend, 1937. They saw first-hand the success of the Fraser Valley Regional Library, discussed the issue of trade unionism, and debated whether library collections should aim to be primarily “highbrow” or “lowbrow.” Earlier in the same year, the OLA had met with other associations outside its traditional location, Toronto. At the request of Ottawa’s mayor and city library groups, the OLA, Quebec Library Association (QLA), Ottawa Library Association, the Montreal Special Libraries Association, and two delegates from the Maritime Library Institute held joint sessions at the Chateau Laurier on Victoria Day weekend, 24–25 May. This meeting was the first inter-provincial library gathering to be held in Canada. Dorothy Carlisle, OLA President 1936–37, and other officials hosted almost 250 delegates. A notable speaker on “Books, Readers, and Reviewers” was Martin Burrell, the Librarian of Parliament since 1920, who was known as a politician and writer. Other federal officials expressed a desire to cooperate with libraries, notably with the publication and distribution of government documents. A library “bonne entente” was established, and, subsequently, the OLA accepted an invitation by the QLA to Canada’s metropolitan centre, Montreal, for 1939.

Joint Conference of the Ontario, Quebec and Montreal Special Library Associations and the Maritime Library Institute, Montreal, April 10–11, 1939

The Joint Conference of Canadian Librarians in Montreal, 1939    

In April 1939, at Montreal’s stately Windsor Hotel, a short time before the arrival of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, the QLA and OLA joined with the Montreal Special Libraries Association and delegates from the Maritime Library Institute. Members from the recently formed Eastern Townships Library Association and the library group of the Professional Institute of Civil Service of Canada also attended. It was evident a European conflict was fast approaching. Poland and Britain had recently agreed to a treaty to forestall German aggression. The approaching Royal Visit to Newfoundland and Canada in May and June reminded Canadians of their British ties. Over the Easter weekend, newspapers carried the story of Italian forces occupying Albania. The OLA’s President, Kathleen (Moyer) Elliott, from Galt (now Cambridge), relied on Rudyard Kipling to inspire her audience: “If civilization is really slipping from us nothing is to be gained by stopping work to worry. If the values in which we believe are yet to triumph, then the very best we can do is to keep on keeping on.” Kipling’s exhortation to stay the course was wise guidance in spring 1939.

Nora Bateson, n.d.

    The Presidents of the Quebec Library Association and Montreal Special Libraries Association, Helen Haultain and Beatrice Howell, welcomed conference-goers on Monday. There were more than two hundred in attendance anticipating speeches and business meetings. The Montreal joint conference reprised many of the decade’s library developments and presented initiatives for further activity. The speech by the new Director of Libraries in Nova Scotia, Nora Bateson, was perhaps the first-day highlight. She spoke about her efforts to form regional libraries in Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. For as little as thirty-five cents a taxpayer, good regional service could be organized in Nova Scotia. Bateson proposed spending this levy on books and services rather than buildings. Another highlight was a meeting of children’s librarians: Mary Falconer (Halifax), Donalda Putnam (Montreal), and Jean Thomson (Toronto) described services, especially storytelling, in their respective areas. Lillian Smith presided over this session and subsequently used the opportunity to form the Canadian Association of Children’s Librarians (CACL). This new national association, regional in scope at first, was perhaps a response to Smith’s recent observation in an ALA publication that a “sense of isolation” was a chief handicap felt by many children’s librarians. The CACL met in Hamilton in October 1939 and spread westward during WWII to include librarians such as Amy Hutchinson (New Westminster) and Louise Riley (Calgary). It would become part of the Canadian Library Association in 1946.

  Major A.L. Normandin, head of Public Printing and Stationery at Ottawa, discussed the governmental distribution and current listings of national publications. Many librarians, such as W.S Wallace at the University of Toronto, had been pressing the Dominion government to publish a monthly and annual checklist of Canadian federal publications to replace the unsatisfactory annual price list of in-print publications begun shortly before WWI. Normandin was sympathetic, but it would not be until 1953 that the Queen’s Printer would publish daily and monthly check lists with annual accumulations.

    Two McGill representatives, Philip J. Turner, School of Architecture, and Colonel Wilfrid J. Bovey, Director of Extramural Relations and Extension, addressed delegates on architecture and French-Canadian cultural achievements. Turner had overseen the remodelling of the Westmount Public Library in 1936. The colonel’s presentation caught the attention of the Montreal press, especially Le Devoir: Bovey “rendu un mangnifique témoignage aux Canadiens français.” La Presse, the Montreal Gazette and the Montreal Daily Star were also impressed with the McGill presentations.

E.C. Kyte, n.d.

Another speech by Queen’s University director, Ernest Cockburn Kyte, caught the most attention in English-speaking newspapers. His address was “A Canadian National Library,” by now a familiar theme to librarians but not the general public. Kyte cited the need to collect Canadiana of all sorts but not overstate the need for a new building. He emphasized the urgency to begin collecting immediately. His comments attracted a supportive editorial in the Montreal Daily Star: “It is therefore to be hoped that the committee which has been appointed by the librarians to achieve a national institution will be successful in its efforts and that the public will heartily support the project. Self-respect on the part of Canadians should go far to assure this.” An act to establish a national library came into force in 1953.

Conference Outcomes    

One immediate positive news note at the conference highlighted successful efforts to achieve a Library Book Rate, a postal subsidy authorized by the Postmaster General. Across Canada, sending books by mail was becoming commonplace and was regarded as an educational asset. The 1930–33 Commission of Enquiry led by John Ridington, George Locke, and Mary Black had supported the concept of a reduced postal rate for library books. British Columbia and Ontario librarians had begun to advocate for this rate in briefs and letters to the government. After the Canada and Newfoundland Education Association also supported reduced rates in 1938, the Ontario College of Education surveyed a hundred major libraries in early 1939. The survey revealed more than 300,000 books, excluding book packages, had been issued. Clearly, books-by-mail was becoming a substantial activity. Conference-goers were pleased to learn that a federal book rate would be introduced shortly. By the summer of 1939, a special rate came into effect. Books passing between libraries and their patrons within the same province would be assessed at 5¢ for the first pound and 1¢ for each additional pound. Canadian librarians and educators could toast a small victory.

    The 1939 Canadian library conference in Montreal raised many subjects that would continue to resonate in the library community into future years: subsidized postal book rates, a national library in Ottawa, improved children’s services, regional library systems, and better bibliographic control of government publications. It was at this conference that the Canadian Association of Children’s Librarians was established. The most significant step, of course, proposed by E.C. Kyte, was the formation of a Canadian Library Association which would continue annual conferences such as the successful one in Montreal. The Commission of Enquiry had supported the idea of a national association and a national library in the depths of the Great Depression but believed conditions were not sufficient for their establishment. By the late 1930s, Canadian libraries had recovered from the worst effects of the global depression; however, wartime restrictions would force librarians and libraries to wait seven years longer for a Dominion-wide association to be formed.

Additional library history blog postings:

The 1930–33 Commission of Enquiry (2013)

Nora Bateson’s regional efforts in the Maritimes (2014)

Special Libraries go on the air “Putting Knowledge to Work” in Montreal, 1936

Montreal Gazette, May 5, 1936

Special Libraries Organize in Montreal after 1932

The 28th annual conference of the Special Libraries Association (SLA) was held in Montreal at the Mount Royal Hotel on rue Peel from June 16–19, 1936. It was the third time SLA had come to Canada for its yearly convention, having joined with the American Library Association’s conferences at Ottawa in 1912 and at Toronto in 1927. But on this occasion, SLA chose to convene on its own because a separate, very active SLA Chapter in Montreal had formed in May 1932 with 19 original members. At this time, Montreal was the business and financial capital of Canada. The new Chapter soon expanded rapidly to almost 70 members and to other libraries in regional centres: Ottawa, Toronto, and Winnipeg. Special librarianship quickly attracted several Canadians from libraries such as the Royal Bank of Canada, Sun Life Assurance Company, Canadian Industries, École Polytechnique, Montreal Board of Trade, McGill University, Forest Products Laboratory of Canada, the Insurance Institute of Montreal, the Dominion Bureau of Statistics and the National Research Library. The chapter’s quarterly Bulletin first appeared in January 1935 edited by Beatrice V. Simon, a McGill University medical librarian. Although the Depression era still lingered, it was a vibrant time of growth for Canadian special librarians.

The Chapter also had strong leaders, especially Mary Jane Henderson (BA, Queen’s University, 1925; BLS, Pratt Institute School of Library Science, 1926), who became the first president of the Montreal Chapter. Henderson was an accomplished organizer who was inducted into the Special Libraries Association Hall of Fame in 1964 after her retirement. She made the host arrangements and organized a successful program under the theme, “Putting Knowledge to Work,” for the 1936 conference expected to attract about 200–300 people. The Mount Royal Hotel (today a renovated shopping mall) served as the conference headquarters. Henderson coordinated the work of four essential committees: programs, luncheons and banquet, local arrangements, and advance publicity. She also helped enlist prominent speakers. For the Friday general session. Brooke Claxton, a distinguished Montreal lawyer, addressed SLA delegates on the question of peace and war: “I thought it would be interesting for us, for a time, to see if we have any common reaction to that fear of war which everyone throughout the world shares today.” Claxton would eventually rise in political ranks to become Canada’s Minister of National Defence in 1946. B.K. Sandwell, the liberal-minded editor of Saturday Night published in Toronto, echoed the theme of Anglo-American relations. He spoke during a luncheon to three SLA groups on the issue of cross-border “trade” in ideas noting the impact of Andrew Carnegie and the Rockefeller Foundation on Canadian culture. Two prominent McGill men, Sir Andrew MacPhail and Lt.-Colonel Wilfrid Bovey, spoke at the evening banquet on Thursday. MacPhail entertained his audience regarding his views on the gradual transition in library work: the business of a special librarian, he concluded, was not to accumulate books but to select and “selection is the main business of art, of the artist, and of the genius, which a librarian must be.”

A notable conference highlight featured three radio talks carried by the CBC network in eastern Canada at 6:15 p.m. on three weeknight evenings. Radio broadcasts by librarians were not innovative, but SLA’s reach on the CBC spanned thirteen stations from Toronto to Halifax and Charlottetown was a Canadian first.The SLA President, William F. Jacobs, General Electric, opened with an introduction to special libraries.

We special librarians have in our files such diversified material as newspaper clippings, pamphlets, magazines, telephone directories, corporation directories, yearbooks, government documents, advertisements, art prints, and so on. To us, all this is knowledge — knowledge needed by the business man, the research worker or the specialist in his profession. And it is our job to see that this knowledge is usefully applied.

He was followed by Eleanor Cavanaugh, librarian at Standard Statistics Co., New York City, who explained how a business could profit from its own library resources. After offering a few examples, she stated, “The special librarian has, in the past twenty-five years, justified the judgment of those executives who realized the need of some organized and centralized fact-finding department within their own organization.” Angus Fletcher, Director of the British Library of Information in New York, delivered the final radio session devoted to “Putting Government Documents to Work.” The British Library in New York had a unique function in the SLA fellowship which was populated mostly by business concerns. This library was part of a growing Anglo-American culture spanning the Atlantic.

“It was established in the year 1920 and attached to the British Consulate-General in the city of New York. Its task is to serve the general public as a library of authoritative information on British affairs, and it is also the office to which appropriate questions are referred by the British Embassy and Consulates in the United States.”

Delegates concluded the convention on Friday afternoon with a short tour and a social tea at the Royal St. Lawrence Yacht Club, hosted by the city of Montreal, before returning home. By all accounts, especially in newspapers, the SLA’s annual meeting was a success. The host chapter had enlisted the aid of McGill University, the CBC, the Quebec Library Association, municipal and provincial officials to bolster their confidence. They were justly proud of hosting SLA and realizing the Montreal chapter had attained the seventh largest membership in just four years! This organizational experience would stand the chapter in good stead in the prewar years. The group would participate in two more important Canadian inter-provincial library conferences held in Ottawa in 1937 and Montreal in 1939 by offering organization assistance and speakers to highlight their respective views. Its example encouraged special librarians in Toronto to form their own chapter in 1940 and, eventually, host SLA’s annual conference there in 1952.

Further reading:

Selected speeches, the conference program, three radio broadcasts, and various SLA reports are available in the digitized issue of Special Libraries for July-August 1936.

Mabel Dunham: Librarianship as a Profession for Women, May 1921

    At the end of her year as president of the Ontario Library Association in March 1921, B. Mabel Dunham, the chief librarian of the Kitchener Public Library since 1908, selected a topic of major importance at the OLA’s twenty-first meeting: “Library Work as a Profession for Women.” For the most part, press reports shortened the topic by omitting “for Women” but briefly reported her main remarks. Library journals, such as Public Libraries, which covered the meeting in its May issue, had little to say about Dunham’s speech. It reported, “Miss Dunham’s paper was a very able plea for library work as a means of service to the community and development of one’s highest personality.” The Library Journal reported that “Miss Dunham ranks library work as one of the high callings for women, inasmuch as it presents an opportunity for service to the community and for building up one’s own character and personality.” The synopsis in the May issue of the Ontario Library Review observed that she “upheld the high ideals of our calling.” An experienced librarian, Marjorie Jarvis, from Toronto’s reference library, provided the most detail for the Review:

She spoke of the present lack of standards, of positions given to local applicants instead of trained workers, of the indifference of many library boards, who consider a board meeting a social event. Against this she set the opportunities library work afford both of self-education and then of wide influence, the openings for originality and initiative. These she pointed out were attractive to the college graduate who felt her responsibility for service and had the trained mind and wide mental outlook which were necessary for one who wished to do ‘pioneer work in a new educational field.’

Mabel Dunham Addresses the Issue of Women in Librarianship in Ontario

If Mabel Dunham hoped to arouse vigorous discussion at the Association, she would not be entirely satisfied. There had been many articles on professionalism in libraries and women’s entry into librarianship for three decades, especially in the United States, but not in Ontario. However, she felt it necessary to address these issues in the current postwar era when new expectations were being formed about Canadian society in the 1920s.

Mabel Dunham, n.d. (c. 1920)

Mabel Dunham introduced her topic by outlining women’s societal progress before linking professional work in libraries with young female university graduates. Her viewpoint took for granted whiteness and middle-class values in the field of library work for professionally minded women—the “few favored ones.” She did not address the position of library assistants or women, such as the Bishop Strachan School graduate Marjorie Jarvis, who relied on lesser educational qualifications and experience to gain a reputation in libraries. Excerpts from her speech, which resides at the Archives of Ontario in the Ontario Library Association fonds on microfilm holdings MS-907, follow.

    “These are days when women are filling a much great place in public life in Canada than ever before. Half a century ago it was a universally-accepted belief that women’s sphere was in the home, but now the most confirmed woman-hater is discreetly silent, though he sees women engaged in all manner of competitions once sacred to the lords of creation. Women work in our factories, our stores, our banks; they are to be found in medicine, in law and in the applied sciences. They serve on our municipal boards, on our provincial commissions and they have invaded the unholy realm of politics. They have, perhaps as a result of the nature of their work in the world war, come to realize that, as citizens, it is their native right and also their duty not to complete with men as rivals but to cooperate with them in the common task of making Canada a better place for men and women and little children to live in.

    “Unfortunately, the great majority of women of Canada are allowed to begin the battle of life with but very little training. When they have passed through the elementary schools at the age of fourteen or fifteen, they enter industrial or domestic, or commercial life. Naturally enough, they are fit for little else than manual labor. They give themselves up to the monotony of a life of routine and rarely rise above it. Some are fortunate enough to be able to attend the secondary schools and at eighteen or thereabouts they find themselves called upon to choose among the callings that are open to women of their training. A very few favored ones there are for whom the choice of a profession is postponed until after they have graduated from the university.

    “Canadian women are availing themselves of the advantage of higher education and year by year an increasing number of young women graduate from our universities. Eagerly they have been looking from their cloistered windows into the busy world and trying to find a place in it for themselves. Not one of them but hopes ‘to serve the present age,’ as to live and work among people of education and refinement, to be in a position to continue her own education, and, withal, to earn at least a competence. These are the requisites of a happy life.

     “Prominent among the professions that come up for consideration when a girl is choosing her vocation in life is Library work. She has learned to love the college library, its corridors, its books, its very silences. She has proved it to be a friend in need and a very present help in time of trouble. She remembers that it is more blessed to give than to receive and she pictures herself in a librarian’s chair, doing for others what others have done for her.  ... To be in a position to direct the reading and thinking of a whole community is a work that comes to her as a challenge. To be able at the same time to continue her own education amid the most pleasant surroundings she regards as a privilege.

    “It is a profession that is eminently suited to women. If numbers prove anything, it is, like teaching, a profession that men use as a stepping-stone to other professions but this cannot be said of the men engaged in library work in Canada. They have drifted into the profession from many other walks in life and they hold their positions, like our judges, for life and good conduct. They are for the most part managers of large libraries and are surrounded by a corps of assistants who are either trained or experienced workers in the various departments of library service. There are a few women who have shown themselves not only capable managers of large libraries but also conversant with the work of every department, and through the country the majority of workers holding important library posts are women.

    “But, although there are good positions in library work in Canada, there are few openings and advancement in the profession is slow and uncertain. There are too many instances of University women who have taken library courses but who have failed to get a footing in the library world. When vacancies occur, preference is usually given to local applicants without any special regard for educational or professional qualifications. That there are pecuniary considerations back of these conditions I will not deny. Library appointments, when once made, are more or less permanent. Year after year goes by and no questions are raised as to the competency of the person appointed, no inquiry is made into the measure of her development intellectually and professionally, an no interest is shown in the reputation of the Library either locally or provincially. Too many librarians, whether they realize it or not, are merely marking time. The tragedy of it is that nobody seems to care so long as they keep off other people’s corns. This fact cannot be gainsaid, the majority of women engaged in library work in Canada began in their own home town and have not departed from it.

    “The result of this practice has been that library work, in Ontario at least, is called a profession by courtesy only. To state that a woman is a librarian means nothing at all. It means something to be called a teacher, a doctor, a nurse, or a lawyer. Everyone knows without being told that these persons have successfully passed certain examinations, both academic and professional. There are certain standards to which they must have attained. ... But in library work there are no such standards set. For years the bars have been down to all comers and, naturally enough, a number of untrained people have wandered in. These have unintentionally though non the less effectively, kept low the status of library work as a profession.

    “The librarian has so much to do with her Library Board that she is wise if she considers well, before accepting an appointment, whether or not she can work with them. It is not always an easy task to please nine men with nine different minds, and the presence of women on the Board may accentual the difficulty.

    “But along with the limitations and weaknesses of library work as a profession there are many compensations. It has, indeed, very much to commend it as a profession for earnest, trained women.

    “Certainly it is educational work and it is only for the ignorant who despise education. Every thoughtful man and woman knows that all true education has for its object the formation of character, and, after all, character is the one thing in all that really matters. The Public Library is or should be an integral part of public education. By all the rules of logic it is evident that library work is a holy service.

    “Leisure is not only a test of character but, and this means more to the educationalists, it furnishes a life-long opportunity to develop and mould character. For this reason it is sacred.

    “The Public Library is the one institution that has in view the education and culture of the people by their own volition during their periods of leisure. ... People come and read because they love to read or because they are in need of help which the Library can afford. ... The librarian meets, under the most pleasant conditions, people whom she would never meet through any school, or club, or office, or church, people of all ages, all races, and all creeds. She creates a municipal home where all may meet as equals by the common right of citizenship. ... She becomes a friend and co-worker with the teachers, the preachers and all others who have at heart the public weal and the library under her management becomes a mighty social factor in the community.

    “Another boon library work has to offer, namely the priceless privilege of showing initiative and originality. ... The librarian who would be worthy of the profession she has chosen must be awake and resourceful. There is no room for automatons in library work, for it is a pioneer effort in a relatively new educational field and only those can follow the plough and dig well the furrows who know the rules and are willing to use both hands.

   “It is to equip boys and girls with the keys that will open the doors to great storehouses of literature that their father knew not of. It is to create within them such interests and ambitions as will help them to avoid many of the pitfalls of life into which boys and girls of an earlier generation have fallen. It is, in short, to raise the type of men and women of the Canada of to-morrow.

   “But no woman, however brilliant and earnest, should undertake library work without some measure of professional training.  ... A librarian must learn to know books by their index and contents pages, to use them not only as sources of information but as tools to guide her to information in other books. She must know how to select books wisely and how to buy them economically. She must familiarize herself with systems of classification and methods of cataloguing. She should know what equipment is necessary and where to procure it most advantageously. She must understand methods in staff and budget management and she must be able to think of things so automatically that she will not waste her energies on the mere machinery of library work and run the risk of losing sight of the real meaning and object behind all her work.

    “The pity of it is that so many of us librarians of experience seem to be people of circumscribed vision. ... There is a verse somewhere in the Bible which reads: ‘Where there is no vision the people perish.’ I trust that I may not some day be found guilty of distorting or misapplying scripture if I suggest that it may have some bearing on the library situation in the Province of Ontario in this our day of grace.”

Mabel Dunham’s comments speak to an emerging profession in Ontario after the Great War. She was wholeheartedly in favour of providing advanced library training for young women seeking a professional career. At the same time, she cautioned that librarianship was circumscribed by few openings, beset by uncertain advancement, and impeded by some male directors who regarded their board tenure as a right. Library work is a “holy service,” Dunham declared when she sought to encourage the young female university graduate to better her career opportunities and develop her character. The 1920s would witness the establishment of graduate library education at the University of Toronto and McGill University and the increase of women as administrators in public libraries in Ontario.

Further reading:

Mabel Dunham’s biography is at Wikipedia and in another blog on the Library History Today website.