CHAPTER 18 - Libraries for Children 1919–1945

Abstract

This chapter discusses the condition of children libraries in England and Whales in 1919–1945. The value of libraries in schools was the subject of continuous comment in the numerous reports issued by the Board of Education, both in those which were concerned with the educational system, such as the Consultative Committees, and also in the Kenyon Report on The Public Library Service (1927). The latter Committee was strongly of the opinion that every school, elementary or secondary should have a well equipped library in proportion to its needs. The formation of the School Library Association (S.L.A.), and the Schools Section of the Library Association in 1937 acted as catalysts. The S.L.A. was founded to promote the development and use of the school library as an instrument of education in schools of all kinds, and to this end, organized branches, published book lists, pamphlets, and its mouthpiece The School Librarian (1937); while the Schools Section of the L.A. had similar aims and functions and publicized its views in The School Library Review. In the early years of World War II, the S.L.A. set up a committee to report and make recommendations on the provision of libraries in grammar schools, and the findings were published in The School Librarian in December 1942 and in pamphlet form in 1943. A joint committee of the S.L.A. and the Schools Section of the L.A. was set up in 1943 to consider the provision of libraries in elementary schools, but owing to the passage of the 1944 Act the report eventually emerged as a statement of the need for school libraries in general.