The Development of Southern Public Libraries and the African American Quest for Library Access, 1898–1963 by Dallas Hanbury

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Development of Southern Public Libraries and the African American Quest for Library Access, 1898–1963 by Dallas Hanbury James L. Baggett The Development of Southern Public Libraries and the African American Quest for Library Access, 1898–1963. By Dallas Hanbury. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2019. 186 pp. $95.00. ISBN 978-1-4985-8628-3. Public libraries are vital, but sometimes undervalued, cultural institutions. In The Development of Southern Public Libraries and the African American Quest for Library Access, Dallas Hanbury looks at the histories of public libraries in Atlanta, Birmingham, and Nashville, and how those libraries were impacted by racial segregation. In theory, public libraries are egalitarian spaces open to all. But under Jim Crow, African Americans were denied library services or offered services that were inferior to services offered to whites. As public library systems were created, people in these African American communities recognized the importance of public libraries and actively campaigned for library service. “Southern African Americans quickly became frustrated by their inability to receive library service,” Hanbury writes, and “took matters into their own hands, establishing libraries in black churches and schools, as well as universities and colleges” (39). Black communities found some support from white philanthropists outside of the South, including Andrew Carnegie and Julius Rosenwald. But philanthropic funds for Black libraries never equaled the support provided for white libraries. Black communities organized, raised funds, and advocated for better library services. During the Civil Rights Movement, segregated public libraries became places for activism and social change. And in each of the three cities studied here, African American activists employed different tactics based on their understanding of local politics and, in the cases of Nashville and Atlanta, their understanding that white elites were committed to “creating and maintaining a specific image of their respective cities” (139). In Nashville, where public libraries were integrated the earliest, activists avoided media coverage and worked quietly through letters, meetings with white leaders, and [End Page 265] cans in the South (Lanham, MD, 2019), and Aisha M. Johnson-Jones’ The African American Struggle for Library Equality: The Untold Story of the Julius Rosenwald Fund Library Program (Lanham, MD, 2019). [End Page 267] James L. Baggett Birmingham Public Library Copyright © 2022 Alabama Historical Association